tonight on c-span's "q&a". . .

and they understand from this report is the irs's goal, if you meet the goal -- only 70% of the people who call will actually get a hold over real person. why such a low percentage? >> let me talk about the service in general. first, with every irs program, my belief is we can always get better. the report you are referencing talks about some declining service levels the last two years as compared to years before. to put it in broad context, i tried to make sure we run good service channels, and when i say channels, i mean phone service, web servers, service over the internet, as well as the paper that goes back and forth. our full level of service have decreased over the last couple years.

the man has really exploded. on average we get about 65 million calls every year. two years ago when we send out economic stimulus checks, we had 150 million calls. last year we had 100 million calls. some things we're trying to do to bring the numbers back of this year -- first, we are providing more service over the web used to have to call in for. the last couple years if you are calling to see where your refund is, we have an application where you can type in and find out when you are going to get your refund. this year we are adding an application, what is my adjusted gross income? last year we got 500 calls for

the year before, so we are trying to push more service to the wenb. we are trying to route calls this year. we are also trying to make sure when people do call, they get more accurate service, so one key is while this internal measure went down several percentage points this last couple years, when you do get through, accuracy is going up, which means you only have to call once you can get your issue resolved. i am focused on all the channels, and i am not happy where we were the last couple years with service, and we aim to get better. >> with all the additional programs you have this year, what do you expect this year for level of service? >> the one thing we cannot control is demand, so we are hoping we will be allowed to move some demand to the internet, so people will be serviced on line, and we're

hoping calls will be down, but i think we are still in tough times were a lot of calls are still in the irs, and we are predicting level of service to be nudged up the last couple years, and we will get back to where we were. >> do we have what we need to deal with customer service? >> we, like every government agency, need to outsource our -- to get our resources right. i think it is clear the fiscal administration wants to make sure the government runs effectively. i want every call to be answered quickly and well. >> when is the peak. -- when is the peak period? >> it is right now. at the end of the year people are making calls to a finding out what they need to file their taxes. february, march, april, when everyone is getting ready for the deadline.

>> i want to fall -- follow up on that question. you said you're going to push more people to the web so they can get their questions answered that way rather than reaching real people on the phone. they also talked about automation. one thing you will do is you have an automatic system for filing liens. she talked about using correspondence audits versus face-to-face audits and how it sundance might be difficult for a tax -- house sometimes it might be difficult for a taxpayer to get one. there seems to be a trend for automation, and that is sometimes a source of errors. is that just a fact of life that more things are going to be automated? is there more you can do about that? >> what i want to do is make sure we meet taxpayers where they want to be met and where it is appropriate to meet them. we still have centers where people can come in. we still stand auditors and

agents out to do face-to-face audits -- said auditors and agents out to do face-to-face audits, and -- send auditors and agents out for face to face audits. i think our job is to allocate resources appropriately, use government resources wisely, make sure we can answer phone calls, service people over the web, service them in person, and use all those channels effectively, so i would not say there is a push one way or the other. we want to make sure we make channels available but also do it in a prudent or efficient way so we are wisely spending taxpayer money when we run our programs. >> also with regard to the tax filing season we are in now, you wall announced this past week a new strategy on overseeing tax returns for payers.

one of the things you did is released some tips for customers, and you advise -- for taxpayers and advise them to be cautious with promise of larger refund than others, which is a pretty common strategy. for instance, h&r block will guarantee a product against a competitor delivering a larger refund, and i wonder, should taxpayers be wary of tax preferences -- tax prep firms? >> there are a couple of issues. i announced on monday sweeping changes in the way we approach the tax preparer community, so preparing someone taxes and

helping with one of the largest financial transactions they have every year -- right now there is no minimal standard, so what i announced is we're going to make everybody who prepares a return pass a minimum competency test. we're going to have a database that allows taxpayers to make sure they are going with somebody confident. i also talked about -- this is going to take awhile to implement. we are looking at this for a long time. we have had broad public dialogue, and while that has been implemented, taxpayers can protect themselves. one thing i talked about is when people say i can get a much bigger return. what you want taxpayers to do is not pay more than they owe but the right amount. that is what i am talking about. i am not talking about somebody

cheating the tax fair or not getting what they deserved. there are unscrupulous preparers who actually say i can get you a lot more money, and i will take a cut of that money. they take a cut. the tax payer is left holding the bag and having a tax liability a year or two down the road. >> the reason you did this initiative is there is acknowledgment there are widespread problems. is that the problem? do you see that as a problem that is inherent with the chain firms? >> the reason we did this study is because, as any large business needs to look at trends in the marketplace, and as the tax code has gotten more complex, more americans are turning to the tax preparer community to prepare their returns. we're up to 60% preparing, and

the other 20% use software, so the others are not just sitting down and filling out a return. what we need to do as that evolution happens is make sure preparers are part of our overall strategy to make sure the american taxpayer gets good service and make sure the american taxpayer is compliant. the reason we are doing this is not to put undue burden or targets a specific part of the prepare our industry but to make sure there is at least a minimal level of confidence. there is some manner so we can go talk to the prepared iand mae sure we increase the overall integrity and confidence. >> do you file your taxes, or you use a preparer democrats i use a preparer. >> -- or do you separate terror?

>> i used to prepare. >> -- i use of preparer. >> how would you make it easier? >> i do not write the tax laws. congress writes the tax laws, so that is a different discussion. >> about a year ago, you talked about a newark, friendlier irs that was going to recognize -- a newer, friendlier irs, and you said this is not for people who were trying to evade taxes. this is not for people trying to cheat the government, but if you have made a good-faith effort to pay your taxes and were having difficulty, and you came to the irs yourself, you were going to take a number of steps to help people along with payment plans and other options. i want to ask you a couple things. where does that stand these days? are you still doing a program

like that this year? >> you mentioned the economy last year, when we had a chance to sit down, as the president said, and i think through some of the actions taken by secretary gartner -- geitner, the economy is pulled back from the press of this. we wanted to do our part, so we did to parts to help american taxpayers. one is we had a big part in executing the recovery act last year, and we tried to do that efficiently. second, we took some steps ourselves, and what i did was basically raise some of the thresholds and gave some of our front-line people, especially collection people, more discretion in working with taxpayers, and if you remember what i said, the reason i did

that is it is the right thing to do, but second, if someone misses a payment and we can keep them in the system, that will keep them in the system logger. those possibilities are still in place for people. a lot of those possibilities were always there, but as commissioner i have the ability to emphasize and say i want people to use those and what in the tax payer's shoes. it is hard to measure who uses them, because the real things we measure our are people making payments, etc., but those are still in place, and frankly, generally we need to do them. i want to make sure our people do not run a faceless bureaucracy, but that each person we deal with we treat with respect. >> i am curious how that squares and with the report that came out this past week from the tax

payer advocate the talk about the liens placed on properties. she had written in the report they were up 475% last year over the previous decade. i believe it was close to 1 million property liens filed on -- federal tax liens filed on property last year. how does that fit with a nicer, friendlier irs? >> i want to make sure, i nicer, friendlier, gentler irs is your words. i want an irs and meet people based on their individual circumstances. it is fair and evenhanded with the american public. our collection area is one of the most difficult areas we have sent the irs, because we have a job to do. in general, if someone has a tax debt and they are not paying that, we have to make sure they pay, and they are doing that not send not just so money comes to

the government, but some people paying -- they are doing that not just the money comes to the government, but so people who are paying on time are not paying for it. we need to make sure we do it in a way that respects tax payer rights, that treats each person fairly. liens are a tool that congress gave us. they are a tool that is important to collection, and they are a tool i think congress expect those to use. this report -- congress expects us to use. this report came out a couple months ago. i am going to take a hard look of that report, and if there is legitimate things in there, i welcome it and will make changes, but by their nature, i think liens are an important tool for the government to use when they go -- when people 0 attacks dead and are not paying. >> i want to turn -- when people

vote a tax debt and are not paying. -- owe a tax debt and are not paying. >> i want to talk about this thing where people were not punished by the irs. can you talk about what you're doing to go after those that did not turn themselves in? >> pursuing offshore tax evasion is a priority of the u.s. government right now. the president has spoken about it at the g-20, recommended and gave us more money this year for our offshore tax these asian. -- tax evasion. timothy get near -- geitner has been focusing on this.

chairman rangel has introduced legislation to give us more tools, and we have had a very focused program and high-profile cases involving offshore tax evasion. >> can you estimate in terms of dollars how much you think has been he evaded? >> it is incredibly hard to put a dollar figure on overseas tax evasion. the way we could dollars on things is we do a random tax audits and that is how we do our research. it is hard to do that overseas. it is in the billions of dollars, and we found that through the voluntary program i will talk about in a second, and it is a dollar figure, and this also fairness. americans paying their taxes and expect people with resources to put money overseas should be paying their taxes, too.

voluntary disclosure -- unprecedented response. we said as the u.s. government steps up its focus on offshore tax evasion, we are going to give people a special chance to come in, pay their back taxes, pay interest, pay a stiff penalty, but avoid going to jail. we have almost 15,000 people take us up on that offer. what is happening now -- that is just the offer that expired in october. now we are sifting through those accounts. some people came in and gave us their social security number and general information. we make sure they qualified and turnout in the process of sending a bank account for get all those people have a detailed questionnaire where they are sending us the information we need, and we are starting to process through those accounts. we have some checks in from people who came in. some send out for more audits. some were asking for more information. one of the important things is

those 15,000 people are giving us incredibly valuable information for the next step. we are finding out what country they were hiding assets in, what financial institutions were facilitating it, what tax in fires those -- what tax advisers were promoting those schemes. we are going to take that information and have another wave of focus on finding more people who have been hiding money overseas. all i would say is through these efforts, two things have happened. one thing is we cleaned up a bunch. two is we change the risk for people who wanted to go and do this in the future, and that is the most important thing for me. what i think we have done is we are protecting the revenue streams for the next 20 or 30 years, so people are going to think twice about evading taxes. >> a swiss court ruled this week on friday that some of the initial names turned over to you

should not actually have happened according to swiss law. the swiss government now has 4000 or surnames under settlements with the u.s. they are supposed to turn over. you see the swiss court decision hindering that in any way? >> if i understand, i think that was in reference to the several hundred names that were turned over to the u.s. government as part of the deferred prosecution agreement with the justice department and ubs almost a year ago. now the 4500 name cbs needs to turn over to the swiss government, and the swiss government will turn over to us, which is part of a settlement be reached with switzerland is a separate issue running through a separate process, and i tried that closely.

-- i track that closely. >> can you give us an idea of where we are in terms of getting those 4500 names gammon -- 4500 names? >> back in august we made an agreement with the swiss government, which is really a watershed agreement, for the first time ever in that jurisdiction, 4500 accounts are going to be turned over to the irs of u.s. taxpayers who have been hiding assets in switzerland, so it is really going to ripple across the world and call into question the whole notion of a secrecy and us not being able to gain access to accounts. that is very public. there is a procedure they are going through, notifying account holders. account holders have the opportunity to appeal. all the milestones have been

met, and it is on track. the real target is by next august it will be in the government nepos hands. >> when you are doing this -- the government's hanseds. >> when you're doing this were you planning on doing a similar process and working with them to try to figure out who else the work with and see if there are other accounts elsewhere and sort of shake the tree to get more people in these networks helping people hide money overseas? >> the u.s. government generally has finite resources, including the irs. i mentioned before the tax preparer strategy. if we can find points of leverage where we work with a community that has 1 million people to help us do our job, that makes a lot of sense. if we can find financial institutions or others that are facilitating u.s. taxpayers evading taxes, that is an

efficient use of our resources. as that data comes over, we are going to be looking at that. if it comes over and people have not voluntarily step forward, we will find out where else they have an account, what other countries, and those will be where we target our resources in the future. >> what other countries are you looking at? cayman islands, other countries, where oelse are you targeting? >> my interest is in u.s. taxpayers and then paying the right amount of taxes, not interested switzerland or another country. our voluntary disclosure process i talked about where 15,000 people came in -- we had people come in from every continent except antarctica and 60 different countries. generally the places were attractive for people to hide money are places that have

bakes' secrecy laws -- bank secrecy laws and 0 or no taxes, so we anecdotally have heard that as we focus of switzerland and other places, a lot of money has been leaving europe and moving into asia, latin america. we are aware of those flows. we have a lot of cooperation that law enforcement agencies and other tax administrators, and we're getting better at following the flow of money. >> i want to ask you about something i still get a lot of e-mail about, and i think it is something people care about. this past year youç put out a proposal to employers for how to w3çallocateç as a fringeç ber taxw3çç purposesççxd and thd on congress tot( actually pass çlegislation to simplifyr>ç ,

to remove cellphone as a fringe benefit so employers did not have to wonder how to tax them. fáhere we areçç iç 2010. ççcongress did not act on that ççlast year. çñrwhat is your plan? çare you going to go forward wh your initial proposal? are you going to give congress morel(ç time to sort that out? >> this is an example of the fact that the tax laws affect everybody. as technology changes, then you adapt with the times, so this is not -- in the past having as cellphone -- i think the laws were written in the 1980's or 1990's. i think it was a fringe benefit. now cellphone are ubiquitous. everybody has as cellphone. çw3ççwe at congress treat ce there has been a lot of discussion. congress had a busy year last year. when they come back, i hope they

take this up. in the meantime, we are not doingç anything special or movg forward with any initiatives. our hope is there will bec%leg. >> wet( only have about a minut. i want to go back to an earlier point. you prepared to -- you go to a preparer to file your taxes. what does that tell youç about the complexity ofok the tax cod? what would you tell congress to make it simpler so more people could file their tax returns? >> i would not read into what i do personally. i have had a preparer that i like and trust and has filed my taxes accurately for 10 years, so i just use that. ixd would not say that has broad implications. regarding simplification of the tax laws, i for a long time have çbeen a big fan of simplification. the easier it is for people to understand the tax code, the more compliant they will be, so i think anything that can be

done to simplify the tax laws is good for the irs. i think it is good for the country. vocal about this, as had the secretary. i think it isç difficult to do so, but we will see where things go in the next couple years. >> the irs commissioner, thank you for joining us on this sunday. >> thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] on tax code, an issuexi]u! the çt(commissioner alluded to. what did you learn? >> we learned is complex, so complex the irs commissioner has someone help him with his taxes every year. we also learned congress is going to be addressing the tax code this coming year. they havet( a lot on their plat. all the tax cuts enacted under president bush -- the major ones all expireç this comingç yearo

president obama would like to extend those tax cuts for people in the middle class. he would like to repeal them for the wealthy, so that is going to create a large debate. there is going to be a lot of work to be done this year to address that. we have other issues as well. the state tax expired. as ofçw3 september 31, they wod like to enact an extension, and they would like to enacted retroactively. it is going to be a very busy year. they are going to be taking a lot of action that is going to affect a lot of people and how they pay their taxes. >> also on the table is the possibility of taxing cadillac health insurance plans, and u.s. about cellphone sperry and why is that such a big issue? >> -- about cellphone. why is that such a big issue? >> that issue peaked mid-year.

i am getting tons of e-mails from people who have read those articles, wonderingq whatç is happening on it, and i think he made clear the irs is stored away for congress to sort it out. they are not going to move forward with their proposal. stephen makes a good point. the irs has a lot on its plate. the commissioner talked about what they are doing with the taxpayer service, but with a record volume of callsçç from÷ people wondering about stimulus payments, etc. he talked about what they're doing in terms of pursuing tax cheaters and overseas stuff, so theyç have a lot on their plat, and we are in a situation now where congress is getting ready to possibly put moreñrxd on ther plate with various tax proposals. >> how significant was disagreement you talked about last august with the swiss government? >> i think it wasñr very significant. i think the tax