Thousands of Practitioners Protest End of e-Services Tools

A petition of nearly 4,000 practitioner signatures has gone to the IRS to urge it to reverse its decision to retire two e-Services products used to file disclosure authorizations and resolve IRS account problems. 

In June, the IRS said that it plans to retire the Disclosure Authorization and Electronic Account Resolution e-Services products on August 11 “due largely to low usage” (see “IRS to Shut Down Disclosure Authorization and Electronic Account Resolution Apps.”)

According to New River Innovation, the makers of Beyond415, a Web software designed to help practitioners with best practices and automation for post-filing work and the entity that submitted the petition, “An overwhelming number of practitioners were upset and disappointed to learn that they would lose the convenience of interacting with the IRS electronically.”

“Overwhelming” practitioner response to this issue, according to New River, “spurred a grassroots movement to petition the IRS to abandon its plans to retire  the e-Services products or replace the products with other electronic solutions. Various tax professional associations are also pushing the IRS to reconsider its decision.”

The petition has already been submitted to the IRS, but Beyond415 is suggesting other ways to contact various IRS officials as well as lawmakers in Congress at this link.

DA, in particular, is popular among practitioners because it offers an efficient alternative to filing authorizations with the IRS Centralized Authorization File unit, which experiences long average processing times, New River added in a statement.

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