Reports

Department of Commerce OIG

Independent Program Evaluation of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Pandemic Relief Program

For the independent program evaluation of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Pandemic Relief Program, the evaluation objective was to determine whether NIST grantees and subrecipients accounted for and expended pandemic relief funds provided under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act and subsequent funding authorizations in accordance with federal laws and regulations. We contracted with the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), an independent firm, to perform this evaluation. Our office oversaw the evaluation’s progress to ensure that IDA performed it in...

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Inspection / Evaluation | 3/27/2024

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

The IRS Continues to Reduce Backlog Inventories in the Tax Processing Centers

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 3/18/2024

Social Security Administration OIG

Controls over the Social Security Administration’s National 800-number Service During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Objective: To determine whether the Social Security Administration had and used management controls over the service its 800 number employees provided callers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 8/29/2023

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

American Rescue Plan Act: Review of the Reconciliation of the Child Tax Credit

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 6/14/2023

1 - Open

Review all of the 6,833 taxpayers with excess Child Tax Credit identified during our review and take appropriate actions to ensure that the taxpayers receive the correct amount of the Child Tax Credit.

2 - Closed

Identify additional taxpayers after May 5, 2022, who received excess Child Tax Credit as a result of tax examiner error and take appropriate actions to ensure that these taxpayers receive the correct amount of the Child Tax Credit.

3 - Closed

Review the 105 taxpayers who potentially did not receive all of their eligible Child Tax Credit identified during our review and take appropriate actions to ensure that they receive the correct amount of the Child Tax Credit.

4 - Closed

Evaluate the priority of programming to ensure that processes and procedures are developed to identify and correct tax examiner entries input during the error correction process that exceed statutory limits, including a process to systemically reprocess corrected returns through Error Resolution programming before being released for processing.

5 - Closed

On February 17, 2022, we notified IRS management of our concerns with undeliverable payments that post after the processing of the tax return. In these instances, the IRS processed the tax return as if the payment was received by the taxpayer. As a result, the taxpayer would receive less Child Tax Credit than they are eligible to receive. We recommended that the IRS develop a process to identify undeliverable payments after
processing of the TY 2021 tax return.

6 - Closed

Identify taxpayers with advance payments who have yet to file a TY 2021 tax return and send a reminder notice, similar to the Department of the Treasury, using the advance payments as part of the criteria.

7 - Closed

Work with the Commissioner, Small Business/Self-Employed Division, to create a process to recover potentially erroneous advance payments from taxpayers who have not filed a TY 2021 tax return.

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

American Rescue Plan Act: Continued Review of Premium Tax Credit Provisions

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 6/14/2023

1 - Open

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, and the Commissioner, Small Business/Self-Employed Division, should consider expanding the use of soft notices to address potentially erroneous PTC claims. These notices should provide individuals with information specific to the eligibility or reporting requirements related to the potential error the IRS identified and suggest the filing of an amended return, if an error has
occurred.

2 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should notify the 317,418 taxpayers we identified, who potentially received less PTC than they were entitled or repaid more APTC than required, that they may qualify for additional PTC or overpaid APTC and encourage them to file an amended Tax Year 2021 return, if applicable.

2 - Open

3 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should develop processes, such as the use of courtesy letters to notify individuals of their potential eligibility, to proactively assist taxpayers who, based on available tax return and Exchange data, potentially claimed less PTC than entitled or paid more APTC than required.

3 - Open

4 - Closed

On October 26, 2022, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, of our concerns regarding taxpayers who are potentially eligible for additional PTC based on their unemployment status during Tax Year 2021. We recommended that the Director, Submission Processing, notify these taxpayers that they may qualify for additional PTC or be able to reduce the amount of excess APTC they must repay and encourage them to file an amended Tax Year 2021 return, if they qualify.

5 - Closed

On October 25, 2022, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, of our concerns with the draft Tax Year 2022 Form 8962 instructions. We
recommended that the IRS revise the instructions to inform taxpayers that they have an option to set a domestic violence indicator on their tax return.

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

Recurring Identification Is Needed to Ensure That Employers Full Pay the Deferred Social Security Tax

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 5/22/2023

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

Additional Actions Are Needed to Reduce Accounts Management Function Inventories to Below Pre‑Pandemic Levels

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 5/10/2023

1 - Closed

Ensure that all sites understand and begin immediately stamping the ICT received date after correspondence screening is completed, and that individual and business documents are screened with equal importance.

10 - Open

Coordinate with the Information Technology organization to explore adding Taxpayer Relations inventories into the CII, so that all Accounts Management inventory is located in the same inventory management system.

11 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should establish time frames for and a process to measure correspondence screening timeliness at each site.

12 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should rescind the requirement that only the TEs and the CSRs perform correspondence
screening and encourage all sites to use mail clerks, after providing them with adequate training.

13 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should ensure prompt completion of the ICT review to determine if additional scanners will be
purchased.

2 - Closed

Discontinue correspondence screening via telework and ensure at all sites that screening must be conducted in the same IRS facility where documents are being scanned by the ICT.

3 - Closed

Identify and address the cause of Accounts Management function employees incorrectly routing cases to other IRS functions and work with other IRS functions to update their Internal Revenue Manuals to make it clear that incorrectly routed documents should be returned to the
originating employee.

4 - Closed

We recommended that management take steps to hire as many mail clerks as possible.

5 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should establish goals for each of the Accounts Management function’s inventory types and develop a plan for addressing those goals to ensure a timely return to pre-pandemic inventory levels.

6 - Open

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment, should prioritize funding and implementation of automated processing of Forms 1040-X to increase efficiencies and reduce taxpayer burden.

7 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should implement temporary solutions for the processing of Forms 1040-X to reduce the backlogs, reduce taxpayer burden, and save IRS resources until an automated solution is implemented.

8 - Open

Coordinate with the Information Technology organization to prevent generating transcripts for manual refunds less than $100 and adjust the frequency that some transcripts are generated to help management get through the inventory more efficiently.

9 - Closed

Temporarily relieve employees in the Accounts Management function from having to complete paperwork for barred statutes, so they can focus on eliminating the backlogged inventory and prevent future barred statutes.

Social Security Administration OIG

The Social Security Administration’s Enumeration Services During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Objective: To determine whether the Social Security Administration (SSA) complied with its enumeration policies and procedures and had adequate controls over managing evidentiary documents submitted to support Social Security number (SSN) card applications during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 9/30/2022

1 - Closed

Develop and periodically conduct comprehensive refresher training on topics including but not limited to:
- processing original Social Security Number (SSN) cards for individuals aged 12 or older and emphasize requirements and documentation of the in-person interview;
- acceptable forms of evidentiary documents, and
- processing new (different) and replacement SSN cards when adoption

10 - Open

Complete the privacy assessments for the WorkTrack application.

2 - Open

Update quality control reviews to include comparison of SSNAP inputs to an applicant-submitted Form SS-5 and evidentiary documents, and provide feedback to the technicians who made input errors (such as race and ethnicity) or did not use the appropriate evidentiary documents.

3 - Open

Revise enumeration policy to include clear instructions for when Form SSA-5002 is required and how to properly document the form.

4 - Closed

Update Program Operations Manual System (POMS) to provide current instructions for enumeration notices and archive outdated policy.

5 - Open

Retain enumeration notices in the Online Retrieval System for individuals with assigned SSNs.

6 - Open

Create and implement automated tools to assist staff in navigating through enumeration evidentiary document requirements.

7 - Closed

Take corrective action on all keying errors and cross-referencing errors we identified.

8 - Closed

Require managers to verify that incident reports are submitted through the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) Loss Reporting Tool before they approve reimbursement to customers for replacing lost original documents.

9 - Closed

Update the National Mail Handling Business Process to include standard Agency-wide mitigation steps for misdirected mail including original documents.

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

Delays in Management Actions Contribute to the Continued Tax Processing Center Backlogs

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 9/16/2022

1 - Closed

On September 16, 2021, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, that the IRS needed to identify when to stop coding and editing9 prior year tax returns to prevent having to rework these returns (a situation that occurred during the 2020 Filing Season). For example, the IRS needed to send 822,994 business tax returns back to the Code and Edit function at the beginning of Processing
Year 2021 to be re-edited to allow for processing. This occurred because these tax returns, although edited, had not been entered into the IRS’s tax processing system by the end of Processing Year 2020. This resulted in an inefficient use of the IRS’s resources because IRS employees needed to re-edit the tax returns. We recommended that the IRS develop a plan to not only limit the number of returns that would require rework, but also any potential downtime in the Code and Edit function so that resources can be maximized for processing tax returns.

2 - Closed

On September 29, 2021, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, of our observation that paper-filed
information returns were being sorted and batched. According to both Tax Processing Centers, a decision had not yet been made regarding if the information return documents will be processed or destroyed. As we reported in September 2021,10 the IRS faced similar decisions during Processing Year 2020 and destroyed approximately 30 million paper-filed information return documents around March 19, 2021, because the documents could no longer be processed through its systems. We recommended that the IRS determine if/when Processing Year 2021 paper-filed information return documents would be processed. As an alternative to destroying these documents, we recommended that management evaluate and consider scanning the information return documents using the Service Center Recognition Image Processing System while forgoing the data validation process.

3 - Closed

On September 17, 2021, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, of our concerns with the processing of a backlog of taxpayer address changes using a first-in/first-out method. As of August 27, 2021, the Ogden Entity function had more than 173,000 address change requests in its ending inventory. In our discussions with Ogden Entity function management, they estimated that due to the backlog of inventory, more than 50 percent of the address change requests the staff were working had already been made by other means, e.g., the filing of a tax return that automatically updates the taxpayer’s address. As such, Entity function employees were needlessly expending
resources working address change requests for which the address was already updated. We recommended that the IRS evaluate changing the order in which address changes are worked to a last-in/first-out method.

4 - Closed

On October 21, 2021, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, of our concerns related to the accuracy of
information communicated to taxpayers regarding transcript request methods. For example, our review of information posted on IRS.gov found that non-paper-based methods for requesting tax transcripts were not communicated clearly. Whereas, the Form 4506-T, Request
for Transcript of Tax Return, and Form 4506, Request for Copy of Tax Return, provide information for automated self-help service tools. We also found that the instructions on the Forms 4506 and 4506-T do not align with the website wording and could cause confusion for taxpayers. We recommended that IRS management update IRS.gov to provide clear communications on available resources. This includes updating the Forms 4506 and 4506-T tip sections to match IRS.gov language and conducting outreach to encourage individual taxpayers to obtain tax transcripts using the various automated methods.

5 - Closed

On September 16, 2021, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, of our concerns about the printing
capacity of the new electronic fax (e-fax) equipment in the Error Resolution System functional area, noting that this new equipment can only print about 20,000 to 30,000 pages/month (approximately 240,000/year) whereas, the prior equipment printed roughly 2 million documents
per year. In addition, in the three months since Ogden received this new equipment, it has burned out and needed new parts. Although Ogden ordered new multifunctional print devices, those were not to be delivered until January 2022. As a workaround, Ogden used two printers
that had a capacity of about 15,000 pages per month. We recommended that the Submission Processing function collaborate with Managed Print Services and the Information Technology organization to identify and expeditiously resolve all instances of printer capacity, break/fix, etc.
issues that are causing work stoppages in the Tax Processing Centers.

6 - Closed

On December 17, 2021, we notified the Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, of our concern that the resources assigned to the RAIVS unit were not commensurate between the Kansas City and Ogden Tax Processing Centers. In our discussions, IRS management advised that taxpayer tax transcript requests had been previously transshipped from the Kansas City Tax Processing Center to the Austin Tax Processing Center with the last transshipment of work occurring in October 2021. On January 11, 2022, we notified the Director, Submission Processing, Wage and Investment Division, of the same concern noting that during our December 2021 walkthroughs, Kansas City management stated they have 70 full-time employees in the RAIVS/Income Verification Express Service’s unit. Whereas, Ogden management stated they have 183 full-time employees. As of December 10, 2021, the Kansas City RAIVS unit had over 751,000 unprocessed requests compared to a little more than 145,000 unprocessed requests in the Ogden RAIVS unit. We recommended that the IRS evaluate alternatives to address the volume of RAIVS inventory at the Kansas City Tax Processing Center. This should include an evaluation of the capacity to reallocate staffing at the Kansas City Tax Processing Center to assist the RAIVS unit, and/or realignment of work among the various Tax Processing Centers, i.e., transship inventory from
Kansas City to Ogden.

7 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should immediately take steps to address the imbalance of Tax Processing Center staffing and inventory to address the continued backlog of transcript requests.

8 - Closed

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment Division, should develop a detailed strategy to show how current and future staffing resources, including available surge team members, will be used to address the significant backlog of amended returns in the Submission Processing function’s inventory.

9 - Open

The Commissioner, Wage and Investment, should ensure that the various products and IRS.gov landing pages are updated to reflect acceptable methods for faxing information to the IRS.

Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration

Compliance Efforts Are Needed to Address Refund Claims Reported on Form 1139 That Are Based on the CARES Act Net Operating Loss Carryback Provisions

Full Details: Oversight.gov Report Page

Audit | 8/31/2022

Date Range

Report Type

Report Category

Submitting Agency

State/Local Agency

State (State and Local Reports)

Fraud Type

Agency Reviewed

Related Organizations

Management Challenges

Any Recommendations

Any Open Recommendations

Reports

Independent Program Evaluation of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Pandemic Relief Program

The IRS Continues to Reduce Backlog Inventories in the Tax Processing Centers

Controls over the Social Security Administration’s National 800-number Service During the COVID-19 Pandemic

American Rescue Plan Act: Review of the Reconciliation of the Child Tax Credit

American Rescue Plan Act: Continued Review of Premium Tax Credit Provisions

Recurring Identification Is Needed to Ensure That Employers Full Pay the Deferred Social Security Tax

Additional Actions Are Needed to Reduce Accounts Management Function Inventories to Below Pre‑Pandemic Levels

The Social Security Administration’s Enumeration Services During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Delays in Management Actions Contribute to the Continued Tax Processing Center Backlogs

Compliance Efforts Are Needed to Address Refund Claims Reported on Form 1139 That Are Based on the CARES Act Net Operating Loss Carryback Provisions

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