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The Internal Revenue Service said Monday it is ending its decades-old policy of making unannounced home and business visits, in an effort to help keep its workers safe and to combat scammers who pose as IRS agents.
Effective immediately, revenue agents will no longer make unplanned visits to taxpayers’ homes and businesses “except in a few unique circumstances,” the Treasury Department said in a statement. The agency will instead mail letters to people to schedule meetings.
“Today’s announcement is the right thing to do, at the right time,” new IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel told reporters on a call Monday.
The change ends “an era at the IRS,” he said, reversing a practice by revenue officers whose duties include visiting homes and firms to resolve taxpayers’ liabilities by collecting unpaid taxes and unfiled tax returns.
The agency in recent years has experienced more threats, in part tied to conspiracy theories that agents were going to target middle-income taxpayers more aggressively after the passage of a climate, health care and tax bill that provided $80 billion to step up tax collections.
