To answer any questions you may have, we offer useful and extensive online help and customer service. We're open seven days a week, 24 hours a day. You can prepare your tax return and eFile it wherever you have Internet access.

Do my taxes online? What is IRS e-file (eFile)?

Free tax software & IRS eFile make taxes fast, safe and easy!

Today, most people are finding they can prepare and efile their own tax return in minutes, securely, online. The number of people preparing their own taxes and using IRS eFile has risen dramatically in recent years. Today most tax returns use eFile and many free tax software tools available today empower people to prepare and efile their own taxes.

The backbone driving this trend is federal IRS Efile (or "electronic filing") system. IRS Efile is the way to file your tax return directly with the IRS. For more and more Americans it has become the quick, easy, smart way to get your taxes where you want them to be -- Done!

Web-based tax preparation and IRS eFile has been very successful. Today most Americans eFile their tax return.

IRS eFile - Benefits

Easy, Low Cost Taxes: Tax returns can be prepared with web-based tax software and then efile for free or at most a few dollars. With online tax preparation there is no software to download or install. Complete tax efile packages range from about $10 for short-form (1040A and 1040EZ) services to about $50 for long-form (1040) tax services. Using a paid tax preparer is much more expensive -- the national average for a paid tax preparer is over $100.

eFile: Easy and Convenient: Using a secure account, online tax software leads you step-by-step and verifies the math. A user can access their secure account and work on their tax return wherever and whenever they access the Internet. Online tax help is offered. Then once your taxes are prepared use eFile and the IRS provides an official notice that the tax forms were received.

eFile Saves Time: With online tax software and eFile you can prepare and eFile your 1040EZ or 1040A tax return in about 30 minutes. About 70% of all individual tax returns use tax forms 1040A or 1040EZ. The IRS reports that over ten hours are needed, on average, to prepare a 1040A tax return using paper forms.

Rapid Tax Refund: With IRS efile, you can receive your tax refund in about half the time, compared to mailing paper tax forms, and with eFile your tax refund can be directly deposited into your check or bank account. With IRS efile, you receive your refund in 8-15 days. Compare this to mailing tax forms -- hope to get your tax refund in 3 to 6 weeks.

Reduce Tax Return Errors: Tax software greatly reduces the chance for tax form errors. If you eFile your tax return it is automatically checked for accuracy (99 percent accurate). If errors are detected, you will be notified of any tax return error and the IRS will allow the mistake to be corrected and eFile again without penalty. Compare this to paper forms: the IRS reports as much as a 20% error rate in paper tax returns. Also, persons using paper tax forms are more likely to receive an IRS penalty or have their tax payments misapplied.

Socially Responsible: Prepare and eFile your taxes and you are helping to save resources now and for future generations - less paper, less time, less energy; it's a more efficient, friendly way to prepare and file your tax return.

After you eFile your taxes the IRS confirms receipt within 48 hours. And eFile is secure.

Do your 1040A or 1040EZ taxes online. Getting started is easy at Taxhead.com

IRS e-File, 2008 Is a Record Breaker

According to the IRS, individual taxpayers e-filed almost 90 million tax returns during 2008, an increase of more than 12 percent over the prior year. Of the 155 million tax returns filed, about 58 percent were filed electronically.

Tax Returns Filed by Individuals

While the total number of returns has increased by 23 percent during the past decade, the number filed electronically has increased by 206 percent.

In 2008, almost 27 million returns were filed by individuals from their home computers, up from 22.6 million last year ― a 19 percent increase. Filings from home computers accounted for 30 percent of all returns e-filed by individuals. Even though individual tax filings were spurred to unprecedented levels by the economic stimulus payments, the percentage of those e-filed increased to 58 percent.

Free File

During 2008, taxpayers with an adjusted gross income of $54,000 or less, or about 70 percent of individual taxpayers, had the option of choosing to e-file for free through
IRS Free File, a partnership between the IRS and some software manufacturers. Almost 4.8 million tax returns were filed through Free File, an increase of 24 percent over last year’s total of almost 3.9 million returns.

Refunds: Direct Deposit and IRS.gov Set Records

More taxpayers chose to receive their refunds through direct deposit during 2008.  The agency made 66 million direct deposit payments in 2008, up 8 percent from 61 million payments at the same time in 2007.

Overall, the IRS issued 107 million tax refund payments in 2008, up almost 2 percent from 105 million refund payments for the same time in 2007. As of Oct. 31, the average refund for 2008 was $2,371, up 4 percent from $2,280 at the same time in 2007.

IRS.gov

The IRS Internet site, IRS.gov, continues to be a convenient source of federal tax information that consumers can trust, and the site’s popularity continues to increase. As of Oct. 18, IRS.gov had been visited 326,522,488 times.