TAP 04-011

Immediate Feedback on Toll Free

Statement of Issue:

Upon completion of a call, a taxpayer has no opportunity to comment on the quality of the service the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employee rendered.

Proposal:

The IRS random taxpayer satisfaction survey should be expanded to solicit customer feedback from all individuals who access the IRS through the toll-free number. The questions asked in the random survey should be reviewed and modified as appropriate to ensure useful feedback is provided.

Response Notes:

The IRS already administers a random customer satisfaction survey to gather customer input about service. This survey is currently completed by a statistically valid random sample of taxpayers; the results are used to assess performance and make systemic changes to the telephone system. The IRS believes the additional data that would be gathered if this suggestion was implemented would not significantly increase IRS ability to make system or service improvements.

During FY 2003, the IRS received over 41 million call attempts into the toll-free system from taxpayers seeking assistance from a customer service representative. The additional costs associated with developing and implementing a survey of this type, coupled with the telecommunications costs associated with lengthening a large number of these calls to accommodate a survey, are prohibitive.

Based on these two factors, the IRS cannot support the implementation of this recommendation.