So true. Due to an IRS administrative error I was out of a $5,000 I Bond that should have been earning interest since last October. That is about $350 lost interest so far. Since I can't purchase this bond directly , I lost the opportunity to get this bond. That will amount to thousands of dollars of lost interest over the years.
I tried to contact the IRS. You cannot get through to a live person. If you are lucky enough to even get to be put on a "over 60 to 90 minute hold" chances are your phone will be disconnected after waiting for 45 minutes or so. It happened to me twice now.
One time I did get through and the agent said this is a "tax law" question. Huh? It was an administrative error. Then he said I was ineligible, not true. Got nowhere with the agent but they did connect me to the tax law department. I asked for a direct number and they didn't have one. The transfer went through; it was a 60 minute wait. After 45 minutes the line was disconnected.
For future reference I suggest you don't file manually in the future. It took 8 MONTHS for the IRS to process my manual return. When I contacted an agent two months ago they said it was due to covid. Huh? Odd as I live in California, one of the worst hit states from Covid, and they processed my return quickly. Sadly the office is filled of ignorant and incompetent people that can only answer basic questions.
