American tax preparation company H&R Block has reported some of its desktop software customers were left dealing with an outage and unable to e-file their returns for several hours ahead of the looming Tax Day deadline on April 15.
By Monday morning, outage reports had slowed to a trickle. But starting around 6 a.m., they began to climb again, reaching a peak around noon, with 1,700 people reporting software issues before dropping again. Overall, Downdetector data shows that 94 percent of people reported issues with the tax reporting software, while 3 percent had problems with the website and App.
However, the company claims the IT issues did not impact online clients or those working with H&R Block in person. As a quick fix, it was recommended that customers experiencing issues try filing again later or print and mail their tax return. Most people had until 11:59 p.m. in their local time zone on Monday to file their taxes and avoid a late fee from the IRS.
Residents of Maine and Massachusetts have until Wednesday, April 17, to file their taxes due to the Patriots’ Day holiday on April 15, and the Emancipation Day holiday in the District of Columbia on April 16.
Numerous customers on social media said they had multiple filing charges on their bank accounts or credit cards, and H&R Block tried to reassure customers that all “pending charges” would be dropped.
“If you are paying an e-filing fee by credit card, you might see temporary authorization holds for the amount of the fee. These holds will expire. You will not be charged,” the company said.
“It usually takes 3-5 business days for holds to expire, depending on your bank.”
Other customers were asking for compensation to recoup the cost of mailing their returns due to the software failure. H&R Block has yet to publicly address whether customers will be entitled to any form of refund.
IRS Working Overtime
The IRS says it processed more than 100 million individual tax returns during April. Tens of millions came in advance of the April deadline, which the government agency says is the “busiest time of the year for tax returns.”According to the IRS, at least 19 million taxpayers will file extensions, which will be due by Oct. 15. Although an extension grants extra time to file, it does not extend the obligation to pay taxes due on April 15.
The agency claims to have delivered over $200 billion in refunds through early April. The average refund was $3,011, a 4.6 percent increase from last April’s average of $2,878.
Compared to a year ago, the IRS claims to have answered over 1 million more taxpayer phone calls and helped 170,000 more people in person—service levels not seen in more than a decade.
