Each year during the filing season, the IRS processes more than 150
million tax returns. They also provide telephone, online and in-person
services to tens of millions of taxpayers. We reviewed the IRS 2022
performance, and here's what we found. During the past two years, due in
part to the COVID 19 pandemic, the IRS has faced significant backlogs in
processing tax returns and a decline in customer service.

Millions of taxpayers are still awaiting a refund by reassigning staff.
The IRS did reduce its backlog of correspondence from 2020 and 2021,
from about 5 million pieces to about 400,000 as of the end of September.
However, this contributed to less than one in five phone calls to the
IRS being answered during the tax season 2022. The IRS met its hiring
goals, but 95% of those hired did not begin until the filing season
ended.

We've previously made 13 recommendations to the IRS and Treasury, as
well as three recommendations to Congress. Fully implementing our
recommendations could improve the IRS returns processing and customer
service performance.