Tax department sees electronic filing as a chance to save the state money

With the majority of taxpayers filing their returns electronically these days, the Connecticut Department of Revenue Services (DRS) has announced that it will no longer be mailing you your tax booklets.

According to a press release issued today (Dec. 28), the DRS is following in the footsteps of the federal Internal Revenue Service and revenue service departments in several other states.

According to the CT DRS, this last filing season only 8 percent of individual returns were from the booklets that were mailed. In other words, only 125,000 of the 1.6 million returns came from the mailed booklets.

Of the 1.6 million that didn’t use the booklets, 1.2 million tax filers did so online. The others used forms they downloaded or picked up at the library, town hall or other locations such as tax preparation services.

Beginning in January 2011, booklets will be made available at the library, post office and town halls – as they have been, anyway.

The new booklets and forms will be available shortly after the New Year, the DRS release states.

And as is the case now, taxpayers also have the option of downloading and printing their own copies of the documents they need from the DRS Web site at www.ct.gov/DRS

Get even more info

By going to www.ct.gov/DRS, you not only can download forms, you can look for locations where you can find tax booklets and learn about electronic filing through the state’s free Taxpayer Service Center, and other electronic filing methods such as Fed/State e-file and tax preparation software.

The site also offers information about the free Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program for low income individuals and the Tax Counseling for the Elderly program.

Posted Dec. 28, 2010