IRS Website Experienced Major Outages on Tax Deadline Day


irs website experienced major disruptions

The Internal Revenue Services experienced disruptions in its online services on Monday, April 18, 2022, as millions tried to file their tax returns.

Monday was the IRS deadline for taxpayers to file their tax returns which started on January 24, 2022.

IRS Website Experienced Outages on Tax Deadline Day

Monday saw many taxpayers experiencing difficulties when they tried to file their taxes through the IRS’s electronic filing system. As April 18 was the last day to file returns many were disappointed over the interruption of services. People who owe taxes and do not file their returns on time or request an extension may face a failure-to-file penalty.

Down Detector, a service outage tracking site reported increases in outage reports about the IRS website that surged on Monday mid-morning and remained elevated into the afternoon. Among the complaints received 70% include not being able to open the website, 24% not being able to log in and 6% experienced issues related to the application.

According to the IRS taxpayers who want to file for an extension have until Monday, Oct. 17, 2022, to file a return. An extension to file will automatically process when taxpayers pay all or part of their taxes electronically by April 18, 2022.

Free e-filling Services

Besides accepting tax filling through mail and tax service providers, the IRS also offers free filling software where taxpayers can file electronically. In fact, the IRS encourages e-filling as the tax software does the calculations, flags common errors, and reduces tax return errors by prompting taxpayers for missing information.

The IRS offers two ways for taxpayers to prepare and file their federal income tax online for free through the Guided Tax Preparation or the File Fillable Forms.

The IRS’ Guided Tax Preparation service is applicable to people who earned less than $73,000 in the year and have not yet filed their taxes. For those earning more than $73,000, they can apply through the IRS Free Fillable Forms service. By April 8 the IRS had processed more than 70 million applications and issued refunds worth over $222 billion.

Image: Depositphotos

1 Comment ▼

Samson Haileyesus Samson Haileyesus is a staff writer for Small Business Trends and has several years of progressive experience in media, communication and PR working with government, NGOs and private sector. He is passionate about public outreach, branding, media relations and marketing.

One Reaction
  1. A lot of people procrastinate. The IRS is encouraging more people to file electronically. Sounds like the perfect storm.