It’s Tax Day. And your refund may be big this year

WASHINGTON (AP) — On this Tax Day, refunds are looking a bit bigger for taxpayers.

According to the latest IRS statistics, the average income tax refund so far this season is $3,011, up $123 from last year. Two out of three taxpayers expect to receive a refund.

The IRS is promoting the customer service improvements the agency rolled out since receiving tens of billions in new funding dollars through Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act. Getting refunds out faster — to some people in just over a week — is part of the promotion.

So far, the IRS has delivered more than $200 billion in refunds through early April, and the latest agency numbers show that 101 million people have filed returns this tax season.

At least one prominent person did not get a refund. President Joe Biden on Monday released the tax returns he filed with his wife, Jill, showing that he still owed the IRS $334 and the state of Delaware $1,480. But Jill Biden qualified for a $433 refund from Virginia, where she teaches. The Biden earned $619,976 and paid a federal income tax rate of 23.7%.

From cutting phone wait times to digitizing more documents and improving the “Where’s My Refund” tool to show more account details in plain language, agency leaders are trying to bring attention to what’s been done to repair the image of the IRS as an outdated and maligned tax collector.

The promotion also in part is meant to quickly normalize a more efficient and effective IRS before congressional Republicans threaten another round of spending cuts to the agency. So time is of the essence for both taxpayers and the agency.

“This filing season, the IRS has built off past successes and reached new milestones,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on a Friday call with reporters. “It’s showing that when it has the resources it needs, it will provide taxpayers the service they deserve.”

“It’s clear that we’re seeing historic improvements in taxpayer service levels, and the agency is rebounding from some very tough and lean years during the past decade,” said IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel.

For most people, April 15 is the last day to submit tax returns or to file an extension.

The IRS says call wait times have been cut down to three minutes this tax season, compared with the average 28 minutes in 2022. That has saved taxpayers 1.4 million hours of hold time and the agency has answered 3 million more calls compared with the same time frame. Also, the updated “Where’s My Refund” tool giving more specific information about taxpayers’ refunds in plain language was rolled out to 31 million views online.

Werfel told The Associated Press earlier this year that the agency’s agenda is to deliver “better service for all Americans so that we can ease stress, frustration and make the tax filing process easier — and to increase scrutiny on complex filers where there’s risk of tax evasion.”