Tax Filing Delays–Patrick Cox of Tax Masters on Fox Business Network

January typically marks the beginning of the IRS tax filing season. But after Congress took so long to agree on a tax bill in late 2010, the IRS is running a few weeks behind on being able to accept millions of tax returns. Taxpayers who itemize deductions and file their taxes electronically may have to wait until at least mid-February to file because the IRS was not able to complete programming before January, 2011.

Patrick Cox, TaxMasters’ CEO, was asked to sound off on the tax filing delays during Varney & Company on the Fox Business Network. Click the screen below to see the interview, conducted by guest hosts Charles Payne and Tracy Burns.

The basic issue is that the IRS did not, or could not, anticipate the tax bill Congress would pass and the effect final legislation would have on filing when it was finally signed into law. While some have called the delay in filing and refunds nothing more than a hiccup in the 2011 filing season, Patrick Cox pointed out that even a short delay in filing and receiving refunds “could push some people into the instant refund loan or into the refund anticipation loan, which is in advance of even filing your return. And those do carry very high interest rates. Three or four hundred percent a year is not unheard of.”

Anyone who itemizes instead of taking standard IRS deductions will be affected by this delay. Perhaps those hardest hit will be the taxpayers who depend on their tax refunds to pay off bills or holiday debts. As discussed in the interview, even school teachers are affected by these delays if they itemize their allowed $250 classroom materials deduction.

When asked about the significance of the IRS taking only a few weeks longer this year to issue refunds, Cox replied, ”If you came up to mid-April and you said [to the IRS] I tell you what, I’m going to take an extra two or three weeks to pay you, you’d pay pretty hefty penalties and interest for that privilege. So, it seems like the rules are different for us and for the government.”

About Tax Masters

Houston based Tax Masters has served tens of thousands of clients and had incredible success with settling federal tax debt, defending clients in audit, setting up monthly IRS payment plans, and filing past-due tax returns. The company is publicly traded under the stock symbol TAXS.