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    TAS Service Sinks

    Has anyone noticed the service provided by the Taxpayer Advocate Office has slipped significantly.
    Exiting tax season has resulted in three cases I am having to refer to TAS.

    You may need several calls to get past the front line of "screeners". These people are usually barely civil, and when you explain a rough order magnitude of the problem, they assume you are an idiot, having not tried usual channels. (Of course, if the "usual channels" worked to begin with, we would not need to contact the TAS).

    The obvious avowed purpose of these screeners is to keep you from getting assigned a case. They use a number of devices to get you off the phone as quickly as they possibly can. They will promise to call you back, when in reality once the phone link is abandoned the next call comes through to them. When you attempt to explain the problem it becomes obvious that they have no skill or tax knowledge, they are simply call center personnel who are considered "Tier 1" to stop you from getting to "Tier 2".

    In the past, I don't remember this much trouble from the TAS office. It makes sense, however, that they use money and resources to screen calls, and the personnel obviously care more about getting you off the phone than they do "directing your call". Their preference of directing your call is to the wastebasket.

    If any of you, like myself, have cases for the TaxPayer Advocate, make sure you have all your documentation, CAF#, etc. ready and correct the party when they attempt to tell you that "you have no case." Don't give them any reason to minimize the need for the TAS by suggesting that you haven't already gone through IRS channels.

    By the way, the TAS supposed does NOT work for the IRS, but is specially commissioned by Congress. Why then, are they assigned 7-digit employee numbers like IRS employees?

    #2
    This doesn't surprise me. But they probably do have 90+% people calling them for issues that don't need the TAS. People calling about rejected returns for dependents already used or the IRS disallowed their Schedule A home repairs deduction or so forth. I imagine anyone working that job would assume everyone is an idiot and be right most of the time, regrettably.

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      #3
      Taxpayer Advocate

      My office directed two cases to TAS this year. One we did by fax, and the other we did by mail to the Cincinnati office. We used Form 911, and also enclosed Form 2848.

      In both cases, we got phone calls from TAS, within about five business days, and the call came from someone who was qualified and prepared to help.

      I'm not sure I would waste my time trying to call TAS.

      BMK
      Burton M. Koss
      koss@usakoss.net

      ____________________________________
      The map is not the territory...
      and the instruction book is not the process.

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        #4
        That's a good tip, Koss.

        My most successful contact with TAS came after a year of waiting for action on an appeal, during which we had to ask for month-to-month extensions from Collections. Finally, Collections got so fed up that THEY contacted TAS, with almost instant results.
        Evan Appelman, EA

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          #5
          I used the TAS twice this year and got results quickly & positively. Filed the 911 & got a call back in 5 days.

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            #6
            I also used TAS twice in the past year with very positive results. One agent would call me every month to give me an update until the examination was closed.

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