Efiled returns from paid preparers increased their pace over 2020 tax season results while efiles from do-it-yourselfers failed to gain on last year’s total. That summarize the statistics the Internal Revenue released for the season through April 30, compared to the period ending May 1, 202The pro efiles pulled total efiles slightly above the 2020 totals for the first time this season. There were 113,617,000 efiles received for the period reported this year, up .4 percent from 113,110,000 ago. There has been one major development in the assisted preparation market this year—Intuit’s entry into the full assisted market this tax season and its hiring of thousands of preparers. However the company has not yet released any statistics about its returns business this season.
Total returns received remained 3.5 percent behind last year’s comparable period, falling to 121,168,000 from 125,474,000.
Tax professionals had submitted 61,282,000 efiles as of April 30, an increase of 7.6 percent over 56,965,000 ago. There were 52,335,000 self-prepared returns received, a drop of 6.8 percent from 81,485,000 -a year ago. In the reports for the period ended April 23, the tax professional total was up 5.4 percent over a year earlier.
The IRS has issued 81,485,000 refunds to date, off 5.8 percent from 86,471,000 a year ago.
