We got our refund today, but when I checked our account, it seemed it had come up a couple thousand dollars light. We’ve been off on our math before but not two grand off, so my wife went online to figure out what happened and it turns out she had accidentally entered a wrong digit for one of our kids’ SS#'s. The number didn’t match the name, so we didn’t get credited for that deduction.
So I had to call the customer service number and see if I could fix it. I was not exactly optimistic about my chances of even talking to a human, but after only two disconnects, I was finally able to get automaticallly put on hold and enjoy some Mozart for only about 15 minutes until I got a live person. At that point, I was expecting to have to run a gauntlet of red tape and unsympathetic bureaucracy and demands for arcane forms to be submitted by snail mail, but to my surprise, the lady on the other end was nice, reasonably quick, clear about what information she needed from me and was able to make the neccesary adjustments (with only a couple more short interludes of classical music) and conclude everything within about 15 minutes. We have to wait three more weeks for the rest of our cash, but at least we’re going to get it. I thanked the lady who heped me (whose name I’ve already forgotten) and told her that was much more painless than I had worried it would be. She laughed. She sounded like she was actually happy that she was able to help me. My entire IRS call center experience, from soup to nuts (including the disconnects) was about 35 minutes, and I was able to achieve my goal and get my money back.
So much bad bad shit (most of it legitimate) gets said about the IRS and call centers in general, that I wanted to share a positive experience and give kudos where they are due. It was the last customer service call center I would have expected to go so seamlessly. Much better than dealing with phone companies or credit card companies. Sometimes the government is better, I guess.