It’s Tax Day
Yes I am complaining about filing a tax return (I wonder how many people are blogging such complaints today). I am trying to e-file a return for [un-named relative X] who is a full time student with zero income and IRS anxiety. OK so we are silly as X is not required to file a return. So the IRS has an apparently covenient web based e-file system https://www.freefilefillableforms.com/home/continuereturn.php (warning do not click this link if you don’t enjoy the combination of opache software, red tape and buplic sector customer service).
I have learned a few things. One I learned last year.
when a return is e-files with an elementary error, the web site does not note the error immediately and demand a correction. Rather the return is queued and then rejected some time later. Below you will see how elementary my errors are and how quickly they could have been detected. Every private sector web form I have ever used (endured, cursed, and screamed at) has instant error reports for errors which can be detected and reported instantly. The IRS reports on obvious errors and delicate reasons a return might be rejected with the same significant delay. It sends an e-mail error report in burucratese allowing one to get a comprehensible explanation by cutting and pasting the entire e-mail into a help window.
The IRS does not accept income tax returns in which 0 income is reported. It is not required to file nor is it allowed. Being an idiot, I decided that $1.00 which I have given to X was to be considered a payment for (many things that X does for me as I do things like attempt to file an un-needed tax return for X).
To file one must provide either last years adjusted gross income (AGI) or a 5 digit PIN selected last year. One is informed of this *after* filling out the tax return with no warning that filing the completed form electronically might be challenging.
It seems my effort last year was also unsuccessful as the PIN I chose is not recognized. Last year’s AGI was not zero but I don’t remember what it was. That’s OK because there is a link to click to look up last year’s return. to read it one must log in to one’s irs.com account.
A freefile account is not necessarily and IRS.gov account — the username which allows me to access the completed but un-fileable 2022 return does not allow me to access an IRS.gov account with a transcript of the 2021 return (which may have been erased because I didn’t know 2020 AGI either and I didn’t notice the rejected because — well it makes no difference as it wasn’t really required to file a 2021 return either). I had no idea that a freefile username was not also an IRS.gov username — actually for a long time while I wondered why the username was sometimes accepted and sometimes rejected.
The rejections sometimes where standard username not recognized messages and equally often the following clear explanation of the problem
Aside from that, it seems to me unacceptable to provide me with a link to a site which I can’t use, because the username I use to sign into the page with the link is not the username which I need to type to make use of the linked virtual Kafkaesque nightmare.
notice that a new account must be an ID.me account. This page does not make clear the fact (reported somewhere in the IRS web labyrinth) that all existing IRS usernames will cease to function some time next month (May 2023 and no way am I going to navigate back to the page where I learned the exact day).
I now have an ID.me account — it was a hassle. also I can access it only using my Italian iPhone (I am not sure I will be able to access it when I am in the USAS). For security it wanted a US phone number to which to send a 6 digit code. I have a T-mobile number which I can’t access as there are no T-mobile antenna’s within 1000 miles. The IRS has decided to create a new digital divide such that only people with smartphones are fully citizens. The problem is worse in Italy. Someone has to tell these people that not everyone has a smartphone. I mean at least warn me that the phone number is for a text message before I give one of my 2 audio only landline numbers and then read that a text message has been sent to it. I got an ID.me account (after many minutes of effort and no warning that smartphones were required) because it accepts I have the right thumbprint on the phone I am using to logon — note I can NOT access the account and see things on a larget than palm sized screen because I can’t get text messages across the Atlantic).
I can check *my* old accounts where the AGI (which I would need to e-file my tax return) is clearly listed in the nth of dozens of lines of plain text (no way I am going to count to n or how many dozens but way more lines than appear in a 1040).
OK so why why why ? Who does the IRS have sepearate acounts for filing tax returns and for IRS.gov ? why is this never explained (really took me a long time to figure out that I could log in to edit the form but not to get transcripts of old returns). Why is ID.me (which is a huge hassle) replacing the old username ? How many IRS.gov accounts have ever been hacked ? What is the relative importance of making surer that privacy is protected compared to the cost of enraging and frustrating people by elmininating their old account and making them go through a large effort to set up a new one.
Why I am trying to bore you with this (notice I have not described the procedure for setting up an ID.me account except to say that it is long, frustrating, and boring) ?
Why wasn’t I warned that last year’s PIN or AGI was needed to file a form before I spent time filling it out (needlessly that’s my fault). WHy am I expected to know last years AGI? Does the IRS *really* think people keep copies of their 1040s for their files (as we are instructed to do by our non-lords and non-masters at the IRS). Why does freefile tell me I can get a transcript and give me a link to IRS.gov which refuses to give me that transcript I need ?
Has the IRS been infiltrated by MAGA moles determined to make people hate the IRS and vote for Republicans and tax cuts for rich people, because we are angry at IRS.gov ? Or are the infiltrators working for TurboTax ? It just can’t be this bad because of mere incompetence.
Forgive me, since I always value your writing, but many banks and investment companies freely supply TurboTax. TurboTax makes preparation a breeze, and all I needed to file were checks, envelopes and stamps. TurboTax is also freely available in libraries, and is inexpensive to buy.
ltr is not wrong, though the part about “libraries” assumes US colocation.
I know about all of the bumps raised; they are not unique to the IRS site. The paid preparers (even for free returns) require the same thing, and also don’t mention it until you have completed the form.
We can quibble whether this is s bug or a feature–you don’t need an ID until and unless you file a return, so that is the right place in a JIT process–but it’s not due to the public/private dichotomy.
Also, fyi: returns can be filed through EOD on Tuesday the 18th, thanks to (at least) MD having a public holiday on Monday.
By private web sites I referred to every private sector web site with which I have interacted. I have no idea how your average private sector tax preparer operates (which doesn’t mean I have no interaction with private sector tax prep — I did so interact for the first time this year).
@itr yes stamps. Last year I spent days searching for stamps (that is for some entity which would sell me stamps). Indeed, I would have no problem if I had postage stamps — freefile has enabled me to print out the return. Also I have found postage stamps (used among other things to mail a check to a tax prepaper and to mail a check from the US Treasury to my sister who can deposit it in a US bank because the last time I tried to deposit a dollar denominated check in an Italian bank … uh well another long boring story.
I could describe my stamp buying adventures too. Went well this year (found them within one day) so I have no need to deal with IRS.gov. But really, Italian snail mail was never uh let’s say like the Swiss postal service and it is now definitely unmistakably obsolete
Don’t see also trying to get an Italian ATM card if you don’t own a smartphone — that is not my problem and all I know is that the bank staffers who had to deal with the problem seem to have been traumatized.
Robert:
If you say something sooner than this. We could send some US stamps to you. American Express or ?
thanks run. I need Italian stamps. On thr 14th, I found a tobacconist who still sells them. The check is in the mail. I had trouble in 2021.
One key issue is that post offices are also postal banks and there are huge lines of people trying to do banking things in front of someone foolish enough to try to buy stamps there.
Boring April 14th story shows how digital has taken over my world. Step one was to get Euros (paper Euros not my atm card). so I went to a bank. There happens to be the tobacconist who sells stamps next door to the bank, but I didn’t use my eyes — I used apple maps asking it where stamps were.
Apple maps is unrealiable in Italy (streets are where it says but stores are no longer in business and such). The storefront to which I was directed (as I walked past the stoor selling stamps looking at my iPhone not the real world) was not longer a tobacconist. So I went to the tobacconist I know (who doesn’t sell stamps) and asked if he had stamps. He said no and directed me to the place I bought stamps with the money I had taken out of the ATM machine next doo.
This shows I am an idiot but also shows some things about 21st century digitization
Robert:
The IPhone/Android maps do have errors. Waze, Google, Garmin and the other versions are not necessarily accurate. They come close.
I was in LA going to a house the Koreans (my bosses at the time) owned and i led me there. Or not exactly. I was at the bottom of a cliff and the house was at the top. So I had to turn around, go back out on the road. and drive around to find the “other-way” to the house.
In another story when I was working for the Germans. They had me in Germany for a month and a half. I drove over from Riethein -Weilheim where Marquardt was located to Prachatice, Czech Republic n my little A120 Mercedes. Cute car. I went on a Friday and could not get into the plant so I stayed. I was in Munich at the time and it made sense to drive over and visit the supplier on the Monday. I did it on Friday.
Decided on Sunday to shoot up to Prague which was not that far away. At my hotel near the Hluboka nad Vitavou, the hotel just put my meals and room on the bill. In Prague I discovered they do not use Euros and used korunas. I managed to get a vendor to sell me a sausage in bread for lunch for 1.8 Euro. I had no change so I gave hm 2 Euros. I was hungry. Did the tour with an English guide who valued Euros for tips as he was going back to England.
Meanwhile when I was back at the hotel, I asked if they could exchange Euros. They pulled out a big bag of Euros in coins. I found a currency in Krumlov. Hopped into my little Mercedes went there and exchanged Euros for paper korunas. Did a quick tour of the castle there too.
That was my work related vacation in Bavaria and other parts of Europe while working. My German Marquardt masters were ok with it. Bosch was tighter. I was questioned about buying a newspaper in Frankfurt.
To your point of having to find things as simple as stamps, it can be difficult. My German is weak at best and I understand more than I can speak. It did come back to me. I forgot the word for toilet when I needed one once.
The Germans and Czechs were kind to me.
Is there DHL nearby, FedEx, or UPS? They are international. It costs more than a stamp; but, it might be easier.
Waldmann
I have the same problems with almost all websites (AB being an exception). I suppose the problem is that I did not go to a preschool with intensive “computer skills” training. Ordinary people were not expected to have computer skills until long after I was out of graduate schools.Didn’t mean I couldn’t write simple programs for my own use, and back in the day there were real programmers who took the responsibility on themselves to make their programs usable by the intended user. Not so much today. One very popular website I know let me (my daughter, actually) go through the whole lengthy process of getting signed up, and then wouldn’t let me access my own sub-site [?] unless I gave them my cell phone number…which I do not have. no excuses accepted [there is no box you can check that says “i do not have a cell phone” or “I wouldn’t give you my cell phone number if I had one.” And there is no workaround that I was able to discover before I lost patience with the whole thing. Now I get emails from said website telling me about all the activity on my “page” (?) and inviting me to reply. which they won’t let me do, even if i wanted to, which I don’t.
And yes public websites seem to be, if not worse [impossible], afflicted with the same sort “we don’t give a damn about your problem” programming that you describe.
oh yeah, back in the day
the only computer problem ordinary people had to deal with was alleged humans saying “there is nothing we can do about it. it’s in the computer. no, I can’t prove I’m a human.”
Yes, I have heard such also.