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Click here to submit a suggestion

There are currently two attachments:

• Attachment 1:  Dedicated to application and federal suggestions
• Attachment 2:  Dedicated to state suggestions
  • Sorted by state
• Attachment 3:  TaxSlayer Suggestion Status (Coming Soon)
  • Broken into status categories

We are working through the suggestions you submitted to us during the season. We encourage you to continue to send us suggestions throughout the summer and fall.

Reminder: The suggestion box should not be used for calculation errors or software issues.  You should reach out to VITA/TCE support.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service today announced the 2020 IRS Nationwide Tax Forums will be held virtually in 2020 with a series of live-streamed webinars beginning this July.

“Given restrictions on large gatherings and difficulties with travel, we’ve made the decision to present the IRS Nationwide Tax Forums in a virtual format this year,” IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig said. “While we’re unable to meet in person, tax professionals will still be able to choose from a wide variety of virtual seminars on tax law.Many will be able to fully satisfy their annual continuing education requirements by registering and attending.”

Held each summer for the past 30 years, the IRS Nationwide Tax Forums are the IRS’s marquee outreach event to the tax professional community. The forums were scheduled to take place in six cities around the country this summer. Those in-person events are canceled.

However, the change to a virtual format allows experts from the IRS and its association partners to still educate and update the tax professional community on tax law, cybesecurity, ethics and other topics.

Seminar dates and agenda
The 2020 Nationwide Tax Forums will begin on July 21 and continue through Aug. 20 with live-streamed webinars broadcast on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Registration enables attendees to participate in all of the live webinars and earn up to 30 Continuing Education Credits at one price.

As in previous years, the Nationwide Tax Forums agenda will feature a plenary session with tax law and publications update, as well as multiple sessions on high-interest topics such as qualified business income, exam and enforcement priorities, due diligence, cybersecurity and more. Presentations are made by both IRS experts and partner associations.

This year several seminars, including the plenary session, will be provided in Spanish.

Further details, including course titles, dates and times, will be available beginning in early June.

2020 registration and fees
Tax professionals who register by June 15 at 5 p.m. ET qualify for an Early Bird rate of $240 per person. The standard rate, starting June 16, will be $289.

Initial registration for the in-person 2020 forums began in March. Those who have already registered may transfer their registration to the virtual format at no additional cost. Refunds are available for those who choose not to participate.

Registration information, as well as information on transfers and cancelations, is available at www.IRSTaxForum.com.

Discounts for national association members
Members of partner associations listed below qualify for a discount of $10 off the Early Bird rate, but only if they register by June 15. Participating association members should contact their association directly for more information:

• American Bar Association (ABA) Section of Taxation
• American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)
• National Association of Enrolled Agents (NAEA)
• National Association of Tax Professionals (NATP)
• National Society of Accountants (NSA)
• National Society of Tax Professionals (NSTP)
• Low Income Taxpayer Clinics (LITC)
• Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program (VITA)

5/21/2020

Ohio has indicated they have resolved the issue. Sites with outstanding OH acknowledgements should have acks at this time.

5/20/2020

We received the following message from the Ohio Department of Taxation

Ohio is currently experiencing some technical issues that has delayed the processing of submissions and delivery of acknowledgments.  The issues started in the early evening of Tuesday May 19^th and we are currently working to resolve the issue.  We will let you know once this issue has been resolved.

Update 9:48:  This is resolved, you can now start new returns

Update:  We are making an emergency deploy to resolve this.  You may see a temporary outage while we are making the deploy.

We are experiencing an error when Creating New Returns.  We have entered a critical ticket.  This does not impact opening existing returns

IRS.gov has answers to many questions people may have about their Economic Impact Payment. Here are answers to some of the top questions people are asking about these payments. 

Is this payment considered taxable income?

No, the payment is not income and taxpayers will not owe tax on it. The payment will not reduce a taxpayer’s refund or increase the amount they owe when they file their 2020 tax return next year. A payment also will not affect income for purposes of determining eligibility for federal government assistance or benefit programs.

Can people who receive a Form SSA-1099 or RRB-1099 use Get My Payment to check their payment status?

Yes, they will be able to use Get My Payment to check the status of their payment after verifying their identity by answering the required security questions.

If someone’s bank account information has changed since they filed their last tax return, can they update it using Get My Payment?

To help protect against potential fraud, the tool also does not allow people to change direct deposit bank account information already on file with the IRS.

If the IRS issues a direct deposit based on the account information that the taxpayer provided on their tax return and the bank information is now invalid or the account has been closed, the bank will reject the deposit. The agency will then mail payment as soon as possible to the address they have on file. Get My Payment will be updated to reflect the date a payment will be mailed. It will take up to 14 days to receive the payment, standard mailing time.

WASHINGTON – With a variety of steps underway to speed Economic Impact Payments, the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service urged people to use Get My Payment by noon Wednesday, May 13, for a chance to get a quicker delivery.

The IRS, working in partnership with Treasury Department and the Bureau of Fiscal Services (BFS), continues to accelerate work to get Economic Impact Payments to even more people as soon as possible. Approximately 130 million individuals have already received payments worth more than $200 billion in the program’s first four weeks.

Starting later this month, the number of paper checks being delivered to taxpayers will sharply increase. For many taxpayers, the last chance to obtain a direct deposit of their Economic Impact Payment rather than receive a paper check is coming soon. People should visit Get My Payment on IRS.gov by noon Wednesday, May 13, to check on their payment status and, when available, provide their direct deposit information.

“We’re working hard to get more payments quickly to taxpayers,” said IRS Commissioner Chuck Rettig. “We want people to visit Get My Payment before the noon Wednesday deadline so they can provide their direct deposit information. Time is running out for a chance to get these payments several weeks earlier through direct deposit.”

After noon Wednesday, the IRS will begin preparing millions of files to send to BFS for paper checks that will begin arriving through late May and into June. Taxpayers who use Get My Payment before that cut-off can still take advantage of entering direct deposit information.

The following update to the FSA process will allow sites with an existing FSA link to be able to provide this service to their taxpayers during the time when they cannot prepare traditional returns at their site.

What the sites CAN do:

Email the site-specific FSA link to the taxpayer with information on how they can contact them (the VITA/TCE site) if they have any questions during the process of preparing their return.  This also allows the site to do the following if they can do so:

• Screenshare with the taxpayer and assist them as the taxpayer prepares the return
• Talk them through the screens via telephone (since the site can create up to five accounts per email address) to walk their taxpayers through the return
• Create a quick PPT or word doc to send with the link to provide instructions for the taxpayer

Place the site-specific link behind a secured login (similar to an employee intranet site)

What the sites CANNOT do:

• Email to a random listing of taxpayers (needs to be targeted to specific taxpayers)
• Place the link on a public facing website

This can also be extended to sites that do not have a site-specific FSA link, as long as there are available licenses to fill and it goes through the ordering system.  Sites should reach out to their SPEC Relationship Manager

How can my volunteers learn to use the link in order to assist the taxpayers?

The volunteer can create their own account using the link. This will allow them to walk through the process up to e-filing the return.  We strongly recommend that you use 00  (zero zero) for the 4th and 5th digit of the SSN because the SSN must be unique across the platform.  The volunteer will see familiarity between the application they are using via the FSA link and the application they were using while preparing the return in TaxSlayer Pro Online.

We will be turning the phones off from 1:00 – 1:30 for a brief company meeting