IRS wants to know how it can improve service to persons living abroad:
See below portions of a letter recently received from a person living outside the U.S. This letter, sent from a division of the IRS, invites persons to fill out a survey on the “unique perspective” of people like us with the aim of improving IRS services.
Apparently there will be 4000 such requests mailed out (out of 7 million or so US people abroad). The IRS survey help desk advised me over the phone that the 4000 names are provided by the IRS to the survey company.
It appears that the invite will be sent to some US persons abroad who have NEVER had an interaction with the IRS.
How does the IRS discover such never-filers? According to a past survey discovered by @MyKitty:
“Nonfilers with a perceived filing obligation were identified through their information on the IRS
nonfiler database and matched to passport data from the U.S. Department of State.”
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/12rescontaxpayexperience.pdf
A never-filer with filing obligation would never ever respond to an IRS online survey. Right?
Not true. 16% of nonfilers with a perceived filing obligation actually responded to the 2011/2012 survey.
The helpdesk will not provide survey questions to me, but I may be able to obtain the questions and if so will add these to this post.
Here is the letter (I have boldened a few sentences):
“Date
Dear [ ]
Help us improve our services!
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is currently conducting the 2014 IRS Survey of Individuals Living Abroad with the help of an independent research company, ICF International.
I invite you to participate in this important study seeking to understand the unique perspectives of individuals living outside the continental United States (U.S.).
Even if you have never had an interaction with the IRS [If you never had an interaction with the IRS, what should be your response to this invitation?], your insights are still extremely valuable in helping us improve our services for individuals living abroad, including those living in U.S. territories.
ICF International will not provide any identifying to the IRS and will keep your identity private to the extent permitted by law.
….Your participation in this study is entirely voluntary; however by completing this survey, you will help the IRS develop a comprehensive portfolio of service improvements. The service should take about 10 minutes to complete.
You do not need to wait for the paper survey if you prefer to take the survey online….entering password…
I am personally committed to improving service to individuals living abroad. Please help me…If you wish to verify the IRS’s sponsorship….
https://www.icfmtvweb1.com/irs_nonfiler/authenticate.asp
IRS Division…”
[Part of fine print at bottom of letter: “The information you provide may be disclosed to an IRS contractor when authorized by law.”]
If I get one of these, I’ll have great pleasure in feeding it to my shredder, it’s always hungry for more paper. Hope this one doesn’t give it indigestion.
Great links, not that Lisa!
IRS…for my most sincere thoughts, how about this? I really wish I was taller so that I could hold up my middle finger even higher!
After reading all of this, even if I receive the survey, compliant or not, I don’t think I would want to fill it out… Really scary!
“IRS wants to know how it can improve service to persons living abroad?”
Really? How about using some common sense?
How about you stop acting like arrogant unethical illegitimate extraterritorial extortionists? How about you actually do something to acknowledge that even your own Taxpayer Advocate has flagged multiple issues regarding the treatment of those abroad, in multiple reports that you haven’t bothered to respond to or ameliorate.
And on behalf of those who you threaten and scare into complying:
How about providing actual quality services to people in the country with the second biggest population of US deemed ‘taxable peons’ in the world? How about a toll free number? How about helpline people who actually understand the forms, mechanics and details of the extraterritorial US demands? How about putting the brakes on the erroneous computer generated threatening notices and demands for payment? How about making the forms and compliance simpler and understandable so we don’t have to pay incredible amounts for specialized legal and accounting help just to report that we owe the US nothing?
Cases in point:
Should it take multiple long distance phone calls, holding for extended periods, faxing what has already been faithfully filed, and speaking to multiple agents in order to establish what is plain and uncontested? Is it not absurd to try to rationalize erroneous automated billings of someone living abroad – and issuing repeated demands for US taxes when their taxable income is not even at the taxable threshold? Does it make sense to insist on that absurdity in the face of the real numbers? To continue to generate and issue erroneous demands for payment? To spend scarce US tax dollars on sending registered letters abroad to threaten to register liens against non-existent US property in order to enforce imaginary outstanding US taxes? Quite apart from the fact that on top of not even meeting the taxable threshold for US taxes, the tax credit from abroad or the FEIE would also have ensured no US tax owed?
Give me a break.
If the IRS pays no attention to Nina Olson, National Taxpayer Advocate, why would they listen to us? Why would we think this is anything other than just more data collection? You’re right, badger, what a waste of scare U.S. resources if their purpose is as stated. We’ve got one heck of a collection of opinions, right here.
@Badger
It’s ridiculous, isn’t it? It’s as though they’re looking at a car that won’t run, believing it’s a problem with the paint colour.
@mykitty:
Reading that document, it looks like they actually got some insightful comments from the previous survey about the problems people face.
But what have they done with the information?
Not a darn thing, as far as I can tell.
Sigh.
On another thread, someone mentioned in jest that one person was “another satisfied IRS customer abroad.”
Perhaps readers then might like to take the 2014 IRS “Survey of Individuals Living Abroad” that was presumably recently mailed out to 4000 (out of 7 million?) overseas people? This survey was temporarily on the Maple Sandbox website and now seems to be on its own website.
If the 2014 survey is like the 2011/2012, it has been sent to those living abroad including “non-filers with a perceived filing obligation”.
See especially questions 4E 1-11 and 4F-4H.
2014: http://convert.neevia.com/docs/91dba28f-87ec-41ad-97fa-239308907df6/IRS_Survey.pdf
2011/2012: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/12rescontaxpayexperience.pdf
Holy cow! Good survey…haha…people should download it and fill it out anonymously and then mail them in a pile to Nina Olsen and tell her how pissed we all are at the IRS and Treasury. No return addresses of course!!
As it turns out, the IRS had to cancel this program. The only copy of this letter, which was stored in Lois Lerner’s email client, got deleted along with all of her emails targeting innocent US citizens.
What’s most interesting about the deleted emails is that those emails would prove that Lois Lerner did not act alone…
@Syd – hahaha! If only it were so!!
Respectfully, Mr. Brock suggests that we do drudgery in order to come to a conclusion. Respectfully, I submit that even an idiot would know which course of action to take in lieu of the clear and present criminal activity being performed by our President, the DOJ and the IRS:
The founding fathers, in an act of the Continental Congress in 1774, said, “If money is wanted by Rulers who have in any manner oppressed the People, [the People] may retain [their money] until their grievances are redressed, and thus peaceably procure relief, without trusting to despised petitions or disturbing the public tranquility.”
Therefore, my decision, sans drudgery, is to wait it out until the smoke clears and the “rules” become clear, concise and concrete, and the criminal activity by these so-called “leaders” is first addressed. Until then, they are not my leaders, and do not represent me as an expat anyways, which is moreover a direct violation of my Constitutional and other rights (a.k.a. “Taxation without Representation”).
Accepting an “invite” from the IRS reminds me of the last scene of Brave Heart. No thank you!