According to New York Times, President Trump’s goal to have the IRS workforce halved is “a drastic reduction that could mean many Americans face less scrutiny, and receive less help, on their taxes.”
According to some tax practitioners on Twitter (big grain of anecdotal salt and all), the newly slimmed down IRS appears to be hustling harder:
Has the IRS been getting better? More clients are getting their refunds in under 2 weeks than I’ve seen in years. Also able to get agents on the phone in under 5 minutes!
— CPAGuy (@Taxguy33962) March 11, 2025
It’s not just him. Here, have this long-ass screenshot.
Let’s remind ourselves that it’s the middle of March, these people lost all optimism and positivity weeks ago. We’re sure their complementary observations don’t come easy.
According to the Treasury, the IRS was able to “deliver historic improvements” for the 2023 filing season that included cutting phone wait times from 28 minutes down to 3 minutes. Assuming that includes the time savings from the callback system referenced here in Treasury’s “Continuing Improvements to IRS Customer Service in Filing Season 2024” published last June:
Funding provided by the Inflation Reduction Act made possible over 5,000 new hires, which helped drive down call wait time. The IRS also expanded the Customer Callback capabilities that allow eligible taxpayers to hang up if the projected wait time was longer than 15 minutes and receive a call-back after from an available assistor. This is estimated to have collectively saved taxpayers over 1.5 million hours of hold time.
While many media outlets have picked up the two recent IRS layoff stories, the details on which departments were affected are sparse. According to a Reuters story about the first batch of 6,700 probationary employees let go in February, the cuts include “revenue agents, customer-service workers, specialists who hear appeals of tax disputes, and IT workers” per a source. The IRS said to staff in an email that all 7000+ of these employees were deemed “not critical to tax season.”
In a letter to the Acting Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) urging TIGTA to investigate the IRS layoffs, U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) said about 5,000 of the 7,600 axed probationary employees came from enforcement and collections. The letter also said:
Last month, the Trump Administration ordered the IRS to begin firing employees. The massive layoffs have already begun “shaking the foundations of the tax agency during filing season.” Reducing IRS staff and offices will profoundly affect Americans filing their taxes this season, slowing the agency’s ability to process the over 140 million expected individual tax returns and potentially causing delays for taxpayer refunds.
Let’s add this post on r/IRS from a week ago. You’ll note there are plenty of people in there who are still waiting…
Holy smokes!!! Return accepted 3/2. Refund expected Today 3/5!!!
byu/sunnyD1083 inIRS
Oh if any clients happen to see this article and are wondering where your money is, please do your tax preparer a favor and use the WHERE’S MY REFUND tool from the IRS before calling or emailing your preparer. Please and thank you.
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