On Tuesday I walked off stage from a workshop I gave to a room full of realtors about what’s happening inside the IRS right now.
I looked at their faces when I told them. Some went pale. A few pulled out their phones mid-presentation to text their clients.
Let me give you the same briefing.
Last month, the IRS started grabbing IT workers and HR clerks from their regular jobs and shoving them behind desks to work as tax examiners and customer service reps.
No real training. No tax background. Just a body in a chair with your file in front of them.
The person who will decide what happens to your bank account, your paycheck, your home… that person might have been fixing printers four weeks ago.
Now I want you to sit with that for a second.
Because it gets worse.
- Since January 2025, the IRS has lost over 20,000 employees. That’s 27% of the entire agency. More than one out of every four people… gone.
- 28 of their top leadership positions are either empty or filled by someone keeping the seat warm with “acting” in front of their title. Nobody’s steering the ship.
- They dropped their own phone service goal from 85% to 70%. Plain English? When you call begging for help, there’s nearly a one-in-three chance nobody picks up. During filing season. When millions are calling.
- They walked into 2026 with almost two million unresolved cases from prior years. Two million files rotting in a pile while penalties compound every single day.
- Paper returns backed up 462% in one year. From 52,000 to nearly 300,000 just sitting there.
- Amended business returns now take 13 months to process. Individual amended returns over 5 months.
Now I know exactly what you’re thinking.
“Good. If the IRS is that much of a disaster, maybe they’ll never get to me.”
I wish I could let you believe that. I really do.
But I’ve been in the Tax Underworld too long to let you go to sleep tonight with that lie as your blanket.
Here’s what actually happens when the IRS breaks down like this:
- The machine doesn’t stop. It just stops being fair.
- The penalties don’t pause while they figure out their staffing crisis. Every single night you go to sleep, interest is being calculated on what you owe. Every. Single. Night. Including tonight.
- The IRS doesn’t charge interest like a bank. They compound it like a loan shark. And loan sharks don’t take holidays.
- When they finally pick up your file, and they will, the person on the other end has never worked a tax case in their life. Doesn’t know what an Offer in Compromise is. Doesn’t know you might qualify to settle for a fraction of what you owe.
- That person is overwhelmed, confused, and looking for the easy road. The easy road almost always means the road that costs YOU the most. Levy. Lien. Garnish. Stamp it. Next file.
But here’s the thing most people miss.
Chaos at the IRS can actually work in your favor.
Overwhelmed agents make different judgment calls. Offers in Compromise that might get rejected by a seasoned examiner on a light caseload?
They get approved by a buried one who needs to move files off their desk. Payment plans, Currently Not Collectible status, penalty abatements… the window for all of it cracks open wider when the system is buckling under its own weight.
That window is open right now.
But the IRS always rebuilds. And when they come back, they come back hungry.
Now I want to talk to you like we’re sitting across the table from each other.
I know why you haven’t dealt with this yet.
It’s fear. Plain and simple.
- The same fear that makes you shove the notice in the drawer.
- The same fear that hits you at 2 AM when the house is quiet and your brain won’t shut off.
- The same fear that makes you think if you just don’t look at it, maybe it’ll disappear.
It won’t.
They never do.
But here’s what I learned on the other side of that hell. The moment I stopped running and turned around and faced it, everything changed. Not because the IRS got nice. But because I finally had a plan. I had someone in my corner who knew the system. Who knew the villains. Who knew which doors to kick in and which ones to pick the lock on.
Don’t take my word for it.
My client Brantley Vigil said it best today when he posted this review on Google: “Carlos has been a great help as I navigate my tax issue process. He is diligent, knowledgeable, and most of all elevates the stress that comes along with a tax problem.”
That’s what the other side of action looks like.
And it starts with five minutes.
I built the Tax Crisis Triage Survey. Free. No sales pitch. No obligation. You answer a few questions and it tells us exactly how deep you’re in, what danger level you’re at, and what rescue plan to build.
Go to TaxDebtTriage.com right now.
Before you brush your teeth. Before you set your alarm. Before you convince yourself you’ll deal with it tomorrow.
Because here’s what tomorrow looks like if you don’t:
- The number is bigger.
- The backlog is deeper.
- The person assigned to your case has one less day of experience than they’ll have next week, which still won’t be enough.
- And that knot in your stomach? Still there. Tighter.
The IRS is wounded. That won’t last.
Move while you can.
Go. Right now. I’ll be on the other side.
Carlos Samaniego, EA, NTPI Fellow
The Tax Debt Detective
TaxDebtConsultant.com
909-570-1103
P.S. California FTB bank levy? That’s a different animal entirely. CaliClaw doesn’t warn you. Doesn’t knock. One morning you open your account and the money’s gone. Call 909-570-1103 directly. We get that money back 90% of the time if you reach us within 10 days. Don’t sit on it.
