Last Days of Tax Season Busy Ones for IRS
Preliminary numbers are in on income tax return filings for Tax Year 2016, and they add up to a busy season.
The Internal Revenue Service says more than 135 million returns were filed during the entire Jan. 1 - April 18 filing period. On the last week of filing, more than 17 million tax returns were filed; more than 13 million of those were e-filed.
Refunds issued over the entire filing period numbered some 97 million, work over $268 billion. The average refund, the IRS estimates, was $2,763, which was up a bit from last year’s average of $2,711.
Taxpayers filed just under 1 percent more extensions than last year. Over 11 million extensions were filed. Nearly 10 million of those extensions were e-filed, an increase of 11 percent from the year before.
| Individual Income Tax Returns: | 2016 | 2017 | % Change | ||
| Total Returns Received | 136,528,000 | 135,638,000 | -0.7 | ||
| Total Returns Processed | 129,456,000 | 128,789,000 | -0.5 | ||
| E-filing Receipts: | |||||
| TOTAL | 122,546,000 | 122,164,000 | -0.3 | ||
| Tax Professionals | 70,864,000 | 70,401,000 | -0.7 | ||
| Self-prepared | 51,682,000 | 51,763,000 | 0.2 | ||
| Web Usage: | |||||
| Visits to IRS.gov | 325,525,568 | 312,255,666 | -4.1 | ||
| Total Refunds: | |||||
| Number | 97,079,000 | 97,104,000 | 0.0 | ||
| Amount | $263.197 | Billion | $268.296 | Billion | 1.9 |
| Average refund | $2,711 | $2,763 | 1.9 | ||
| Direct Deposit Refunds: | |||||
| Number | 81,221,000 | 81,646,000 | 0.5 | ||
| Amount | $234.269 | Billion | $239.410 | Billion | 2.2 |
| Average refund | $2,884 | $2,932 | 1.7 | ||
