The IRS's Independent Office of Appeals (Appeals) has announced its fiscal year 2024 organizational priorities.
These priorities align with the Inflation Reduction Act’s Strategic Operating Plan and reflect Appeals' core values. The Strategic Operating Plan puts modernization, employee engagement and taxpayer service at the forefront of its mission. The four broad focus areas for fiscal year 2024 are: employee engagement, recognition and retention; hiring, training and employee development; alternative dispute resolution; and modernization and process improvements.
"Investing in our workforce is one of our top priorities," stated IRS Appeals Chief Andy Keyso and Deputy Chief Liz Askey in the Appeals focus guide. "Building an engaged and collaborative team of properly equipped personnel is the key to how we'll meet our mission to America's taxpayers. We're excited about our robust recruiting efforts to attract strong candidates to Appeals and new streamlined hiring procedures that allow us to hire more quickly than in the past…In addition to expanding our workforce, Appeals will focus this year on the experience of our existing workforce.”
The guide reports that Appeals hosted a series of “Art of the Conference” training sessions this past year for its taxpayer-facing workforce and started fiscal year 2024 with another in its series of “Practitioner Perspectives” panel discussions, in which Appeals partnered with practitioners to discuss some hazards of litigation. Keyso and Askey wrote that these programs will continue “to ensure [that] taxpayer interactions with Appeals are a positive and productive experience for all parties.”
Keyso and Lasky also said that Appeals would continue to implement modernization efforts and find opportunities to expand and improve our paperless processes.
Appeals was formerly the IRS Office of Appeals and was renamed under the Taxpayer First Act of 2019. Its stated mission is to resolve disputes, without litigation, in a way that is fair and impartial to the government and to the taxpayer.