Accounting
IRS wraps up tax season
The Internal Revenue Service reported stronger performance on Monday, April 15, as it concluded this year’s tax filing season, saying it had answered 1 million more phone calls from taxpayers and helped 170,000 people in person compared to last year.
The IRS has been improving its technology and taxpayer service, thanks to the extra boost in funding from the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. The agency said it received 75 million more visits to its IRS.gov site, driven by improvements to its “
The “Where’s My Refund?” tool received over 275 million of those visits, up 62 million from 2023 for a 29% increase. The IRS also
Natalia Bratslavsky/Adobe
“Taxpayers continued to see major improvements from the IRS during the 2024 tax season,” said IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel in a statement Monday. “A well-funded IRS is like night and day for taxpayers. With the help of more funding and added resources, service for taxpayers this filing season eclipsed levels seen during the past decade. This tax season meant real-world improvements for people looking for help, whether calling, visiting in-person or using IRS.gov.”
The IRS is hoping to protect as much of its funding as it can. The extra $80 billion in funding over 10 years designated under the Inflation Reduction Act has already been reduced by about $20 billion after a deal last year to raise the debt limit, with most of the cuts targeting tax enforcement.
Through April 6, the IRS processed more than 100 million individual tax returns. Tens of millions more will come in advance of the April deadline, the busiest time of the year for tax returns. The IRS also projects about 19 million taxpayers will file extensions, which will be due Oct. 15.
Since the start of the January tax season, the IRS has delivered more than $200 billion in refunds through early April. The average refund was $3,011, a 4.6% increase from last April’s average of $2,878.
The IRS added 5,000 new telephone assistors last year, and the level of service on its main phone lines exceeded 88%. That’s above the 84% level seen last year and over five time better than the phone service levels during the pandemic, when the level of service dropped to just 15% in 2022.
The IRS answered more taxpayer calls on its live assistor lines this year, a 16.8% increase from 2023. IRS assistors handled 7,608,000 calls, up from 6,513,000 the year before. IRS automated lines handled another approximately 7 million calls, 280,000 more than the previous year. Taxpayers waited, on average, just over three minutes for help on the IRS main phone lines. That’s down from four minutes in 2023 and 28 minutes in filing season 2022.
The IRS provided callback options on 97% of the phone lines this filing season. The agency offered callback for over 4 million taxpayers this tax season, more than double the 1.8 million calls in 2023. This option, offered when phone lines were busy, saved taxpayers nearly 1.4 million hours of wait time on the phones.
Taxpayers certainly needed help from the IRS. The National Taxpayers Union Foundation also released on Tax Day its
Carr, Riggs & Ingram, a Top 25 Firm based in Enterprise, Alabama, has added CapinCrouse, a Regional Leader based in Indianapolis, effective Jan. 17, 2025.
The deal is CRI’s biggest merger in its history, and the first since it
CapinCrouse focuses on exclusively serving nonprofits, such as faith-based organizations and private colleges. The merger will add 40 partners, 185 professionals and 15 offices to CRI, which has 437 partners and 2,304 staff
After the outside investment, CRI split its attest and non-attest practices, as is common when accounting firms receive private equity or venture capital funding. Carr, Riggs & Ingram, L.L.C., as an independent licensed CPA firm, is providing assurance, attest and audit services. CRI Advisors, LLC (including its subsidiary entities) operates as a separate legal entity, providing clients with tax and business consulting services.
“This merger represents an exciting milestone in our firm’s history and a significant advancement for both CRI and CapinCrouse,” said CRI Advisors LLC chairman Bill Carr in a statement Tuesday. “We have previously invested in firms that specialize in serving faith-based organizations and private colleges. With the addition of CapinCrouse, CRI is now positioned to become the leading national provider in these vital markets. By combining our strengths, we will enhance the value we offer and greatly expand our national geographical presence. We are proud to welcome CapinCrouse to the CRI family.”
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. CRI ranked No. 24 on Accounting Today‘s 2024 list of the Top 100 Firms, with $455.36 million in annual revenue. CapinCrouse ranked No. 27 on Accounting Today‘s Regional Leaders list of the Top Firms in the Great Lakes region, with $35.51 million in annual revenue.
“We are very pleased to join CRI,” said Fran Brown, Managing Partner of CapinCrouse. “For over 50 years, our focus has been on providing innovative service to nonprofit organizations whose outcomes are measured in lives changed. CRI’s commitment to client service, respect, and integrity is an excellent fit with our mission and firm culture. We will continue to operate under the CapinCrouse brand and are excited to now have access to more offerings and resources to further drive exceptional client service.”
Koltin Consulting Group CEO Allan Koltin advised both firms on the merger. “It is interesting to note that this is CRI’s biggest M&A deal in its history, and it comes on the heels of their private equity deal with Centerbridge Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners,” he said in a statement. “CapinCrouse, a top 125 firm nationally, is viewed by many as the preeminent firm in the country when it comes to the audit and related advisory services of nonprofits and religious organizations. My intuition suggests that going forward, we will see CRI expanding its geographic reach nationally by combining with more top 200 firms.”
Last August, CRI added
In 2022, CapinCrouse acquired the
President Donald Trump named Mark Uyeda, a Republican member of the Securities and Exchange Commission, as acting chairman of the SEC, while confirmation hearings await for Trump’s official pick as chairman, Paul Atkins.
Uyeda has been an SEC commissioner since 2022 and a member of the staff since 2006. Last month, he
“I am honored to serve in this capacity after serving as a Commissioner since 2022, and a member of the staff since 2006,” Uyeda said in a statement Monday. “I have great respect for the knowledge, expertise and experience of the agency and its people. The SEC has a vital mission—protecting investors, maintaining fair, orderly, and efficient markets, and facilitating capital formation—that plays a key role in promoting innovation, jobs creation, and the American Dream.”
Last month, Trump
As acting chairman, Uyeda announced Monday that he would be launching a crypto task force dedicated to developing a comprehensive and clear regulatory framework for crypto assets. The task force will be led by another Republican commissioner, Hester Peirce.
The task force plans to collaborate with SEC staff and the public to set the SEC on a regulatory path as opposed to pursuing enforcement actions to regulate crypto “retroactively and reactively,” according to a
“This undertaking will take time, patience and much hard work,” Peirce said in a statement. “It will succeed only if the Task Force has input from a wide range of investors, industry participants, academics and other interested parties. We look forward to working hand-in-hand with the public to foster a regulatory environment that protects investors, facilitates capital formation, fosters market integrity, and supports innovation.”
The task force plans to hold roundtables in the future, but in the meantime is asking for public input at [email protected].
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