Tips From A Former IRS Insider: Five Potential Flags To Avoid This Tax Season |
Every tax season, I hear the same thing: There has to be a trick. A faster way to file. A magic move that gets your refund sooner. A loophole the IRS doesn’t want you to know about. Social media is full of them, and so are group chats, bar conversations, and well-meaning advice from friends who swear they’ve cracked the code.
The truth is, there are ways to make tax season smoother, but most of them aren’t secrets, and none of them come from viral videos or internet hacks. This year especially, with major changes to the tax law thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) and an IRS operating with fewer people and bigger backlogs, the margin for error is thinner than usual. One wrong move can slow everything down, and there’s no easy undo button.
So instead of chasing shortcuts, I decided to go straight to the source. For some perspective, I turned to someone who is very familiar with the inner workings of the agency, Terry Lemons. Terry spent more than 25 years at the IRS, overseeing the agency’s communications operations for over 17 years before retiring earlier this year. Here’s what he has to say:
As another filing season kicks off, let’s face it: Dealing with taxes can be the Super Bowl of headaches.
It’s a daunting task for many. And just to complicate things a bit more this year, taxpayers will find themselves blitzed by a new law covering everything from tips to overtime.
But an enticing reward awaits at the goal line for more than 100 million taxpayers – a refund check. For many families, it’s the biggest check they will see all year. What’s more, last year’s average tax refund of $3,167 should jump by hundreds of dollars in 2026 – with some taxpayers seeing four figure increases.
For that kind of money, there’s always a catch. This year, extra pitfalls exist that could make taxpayers fumble and make a mistake on their tax return. To be clear, this isn’t the time to get offsides with the tax agency given the deep staff cuts and continuing paper backlogs, as figures in a January 27 Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report show. That means it’s more important than ever to have an error-free return that sails through the IRS processing........