Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA)

Many retirees – and non-retirees – look for a meaningful way to give of their spare time in service to others.  My husband, who retired eight years before I did, found the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program a few years ago.  VITA is an IRS-sponsored program, funded (at least in Utah) through the Community Action Program.  Its purpose is to provide income tax preparation, free of charge, to low income individuals and couples.  I joined “Team VITA” this past tax season.

“Now let me get this straight,” you may ask. “You do other peoples taxes for free?  And you like it?”

The answers are yes, and surprisingly, yes. 

Our clients are low income families, many headed by single mothers.  Our clients include the disabled.  And our clients include fellow retirees. 

It is humbling to see how these families get by on what appears to me to be so little income.  It is rewarding to see the gratitude on the face of a single mother when I tell her that her refund, including the Earned Income Credit and the Child Tax Credit, is far more than the amount withheld from her paychecks.  And it is encouraging to see retirees with pensions – since I’ll never see pension income. 

To volunteer, you need to pass two tests on the tax code and learn the TaxWise software used at VITA sites.  The program offered classes and/or self-study.  Of course, as most of you have already experienced, taking a class or two doesn't make you an expert in anything.  This is especially true of the US Tax Code, which is anything but simple.  I learned far more actually doing the tax preparation – mistakes and all – than I did in the classes. 

Yes, I made mistakes.  Lots of them.  Some, if uncorrected, could have cost the taxpayers hundreds of dollars in unclaimed refunds.  As one of the new kids at our site, I was grateful for the experienced volunteers’ quality review of my work – and for their subsequent explanation to me of what I had done wrong.  At VITA sites, every return is quality reviewed by another preparer – to catch little mistakes like a transposed employer ID or direct deposit account numbers, and to catch bigger mistakes like checking the wrong radio button on the EIC worksheet and costing the taxpayer their Earned Income Credit.

So to those taxpayers on whose returns I made errors, I thank you.  I will be a better preparer for it.

Was VITA worth my time?  Absolutely.  I’ll do it again next tax season.  If you’re interested in volunteering, search the web for VITA in your city or state, as volunteers are coordinated at the local level rather than at the federal level.

Once a Process Engineer, Always a Process Engineer

My husband has been a tax preparer and site coordinator for the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program for several years.  VITA helps low-income taxpayers by preparing their taxes at no charge, by ensuring they get the maximum refund, and by helping them with options for saving their refunds.  Earn it – Keep it – Save it.

He asked me last fall if I would volunteer at his site and be a Greeter.  Greeter!?!  Pah!  If I’m going to volunteer for VITA, I’m going to prepare tax returns.  I took the classes this month and passed my certification tests on January 18.

My first opportunity to put my new-found skills into practice was at a “soft opening” on January 24.  In theory, a soft opening allows new tax preparers – like me – the chance to work with real clients on real returns with an experienced volunteer looking over their shoulders.  In reality – the new tax preparers showed up but only one of the experienced volunteers made it.  The nice, gentle, hand-holding session turned into baptism by fire.

I did fairly well.  I made a couple of mistakes that our quality review process discovered, fixed, and told me about, so all in all it was a good learning experience. 

My number one lesson learned:  I was all over the map preparing the returns.  All my mistakes were either mistakes of omission or mistakes of preparing forms in the wrong order.  I needed a process. 

So I did what every good former process engineer does:  I researched the tax forms and the most likely scenarios in VITA and drafted my own personal tax-preparation process.  OK, so it’s not done in Visio graphics – actually, it’s on a recipe card – but having it in front of me as I prepare taxes should help me become both more accurate and more efficient.

We were told in class that it would take three returns to “get the hang of it” and then the fourth return would “kick our butts.”  For me, it was the fifth return.  Looking back, if I had had my process in place, I could have saved her (and me) a lot of time preparing her itemized deductions and looking up why she couldn’t deduct private school tuition or HOA fees.  Itemizing didn’t help her.  Her refund was exactly the same with the standard deduction.

I expect my "tax process" to evolve and improve through experience using it.  By the end of tax season I should have a process that would make the IRS proud.