Saturday, October 10, 2009
IRS officials were not prepared for the onslaught of phone calls they received from taxpayers during the 2009 filing season. Even though the agency fielded about 12,000 customer service operators at 24 call centers across the United States and Puerto Rico, the IRS failed to answer millions of calls from Americans seeking answers about tax forms, as well as stimulus checks distributed by the federal government.
The inspector general for the Department of Treasury determined in a report that more than 75 million calls were placed to the IRS’s toll-free lines. Between its automated system and customer service reps, the IRS managed to answer 35.8 million inquiries—less than 50% of all calls.
“However, 22.4 million calls were not answered during normal hours of operation because the taxpayers hung up, were courtesy disconnected by the IRS, or received a busy signal,” wrote the IG. A “courtesy disconnect” occurs when the queue is so long that a caller is automatically disconnected and told to call back later.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Higher Than Planned Call Demand Reduced Toll-Free Telephone Access for the 2009 Filing Season (Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration) (PDF)
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