BUSY SEASON MANAGEMENT

IRS Emerges as Major Tax Season Competitor

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IRS marketing to 100 million taxpayers for free filing.

By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines

If you’re wondering where some of your tax business went this year, maybe the IRS took it.

Professional tax preparers are missing about 769,000 returns, compared to last year – business that appears to have gone to former or would-be clients now using do-it-yourself software. At typical rates, that’s about $153 million in lost fee income to the industry, enough to support thousands of practitioners, according to CPA Trendlines estimates.