Last Day to Transmit 2015 Individual Federal and State Returns this Year

The IRS will be shutting down their 1040 Modernized E-file system on the morning of November 30, 2016. This shutdown will last until the 2017 filing season opens in January 2017.

If you have any 2015 federal or state tax returns that you wish to file as a current year return, you should transmit them by November 29, 2016 in order ensure that you are able to get acknowledgements back before the IRS system is shutdown on November 30, 2016.

IRS Statement on System Outage

The IRS announced it resumed processing individual and business tax returns at approximately 5 p.m. Thursday following resolution of its system outage. Many of the tools and applications came up earlier on Thursday morning, including “Where’s My Refund” on IRS.gov.

“IRS teams worked throughout the night and around the clock on this system outage,” IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said. “Our processing systems are back in business. Taxpayers should see little, if any, impact on their tax returns or refunds. We apologize for the inconvenience this caused, and we appreciate the support and patience from taxpayers as well as our partners in the tax community and state revenue departments.”

The IRS emphasized that taxpayers do not need to take any additional steps or action due to the outage, including people who filed just before or during the outage. Throughout this period, taxpayers were able to continue to send their tax returns to their e-file provider; these companies have already started sending these tax returns into the IRS.

Taxpayers who have received a specific refund date from the “Where’s My Refund?” tool on IRS.gov should not be affected by the outage. The IRS reminds taxpayers that many variables factor into processing of tax refunds, including fraud prevention efforts, but we continue to anticipate that nine out of 10 taxpayers will receive their refunds within 21 days after being accepted by the IRS. In addition, the IRS reminds taxpayers that IRS.gov remains the best place to check for information on refunds. Additional information is available at: https://www.irs.gov/Refunds/What-to-Expect-for-Refunds-This-Year

The IRS is continuing to examine the underlying cause of the outage yesterday as well as monitoring any follow-up issues.  It's important to note that at this time this situation appears to be a hardware failure. 

IRS SYSTEM UPDATE

The IRS released the following update today regarding their systems:

IRS teams continued working throughout the night and this morning on the system outage, and many of our tools and applications came back up this morning, including “Where’s My Refund” on IRS.gov. We are continuing our work and analysis of our return processing system; we hope to have that back up again running at some point today. We will provide a further update later today.

While the e-file system for individual and business returns remains unavailable, the IRS reminds taxpayers they can still prepare and file tax returns as they normally would. Taxpayers can continue to send their tax returns to their e-file provider; these companies will hold the tax returns until the IRS resumes accepting electronic tax returns. Taxpayers who have already filed their tax returns do not need to take any additional action.

In addition, we continue to expect that 9 out of 10 taxpayers will receive their refunds within 21 days.

The IRS is continuing to examine the underlying cause of the outage yesterday.  It's important to note that this situation appears to be a hardware failure and nothing else. There is no indication that any external factors had any role in this incident.

IRS Announcement: Modernized E-File (MeF) Delay for Some 2012 Business Returns

"The IRS continues to review the details and impact of the new tax law signed this week, but a number of these provisions will require changing forms and updating our processing systems involving non-1040 business returns. As a result, electronic filing of many business returns will be delayed while we update forms, related instructions and corresponding systems. This delay is not expected to significantly impact business filers since most of these returns with reporting periods ending Dec. 31, 2012, are not due until March or April 2013, depending on the form.

The IRS will not accept these business tax returns for processing through MeF at this time*:

• All 2012 tax year business forms (other than Forms 2290 and 7004)
• Form 8849, Schedule 3 - Certain Fuel Mixtures and the Alternative Fuel Credit
• Form 990 series (Tax Exempt tax returns)

Beginning Jan. 7, 2013, the IRS will accept these forms for processing through MeF:

• Fiscal year returns with a year ending prior to 12/31/2012
• All 2011 tax year and 2012 fiscal year business returns, including Form 1120 series
• 2012 tax year Form 2290, Heavy Highway Vehicle Use Tax Return
• 2012 tax year Form 7004, Application for Automatic Extension of Time to File Certain Business Income Tax, Information and Other Returns

We will share additional information on when we can accept the remaining 2012 tax year business forms as soon as it becomes available. More information will also be available soon regarding 2012 individual 1040 tax returns impacted by this week’s legislation.

* Note: Business tax returns not processable through MeF at this time will also not be processed if submitted on paper."

(The above content is as it appeared in an official IRS Quick Alerts e-mail distributed on January 4th, 2013.)