5.14.2021 CCACC 2021 Free Tax Filing Service Has Come to a Perfect End
In the past year, despite the ongoing pandemic, all departments of the Chinese Culture and Community Service Center (CCACC) remained open. The diverse range of community services and activities CCACC offers have not been reduced or suspended. Instead, they have changed in accordance with the current situation and have even been expanded, and the CCACC Free Tax Service (VITA) project is one of them.
This year is the 9th year that the CCACC has launched free tax filing services in the Greater Washington area. With the efforts of the center's leaders, staff and volunteer team, the CCACC 2021 Free Tax Filing Service successfully concluded.
Providing Service - Multiple Measures
Starting from March 2020, the center’s VITA service has responded to the pandemic and adjusted its service model in a timely manner under the guidance of the IRS, from face-to-face to virtual tax filing services. CCACC has facilitated a seamless transition by implementing several new measures to overcome the difficulties brought on by the pandemic, such as helping file tax returns through email and other virtual forms of communication in addition to walk-in appointments. The service period was originally scheduled to be from January 30 to April 7. In accordance with the new law on pandemic relief and the tax return extension policy of the IRS, the deadline was extended to April 21 as the volunteers strove to complete all tax returns before April 30.
Benefiting Community – Regardless of ethnicity
Tax filing service is one of the representative projects that the center consistently provides to the community. Although this service does not receive subsidies from the IRS, the center provides free venues, equipment, and stationeries every year for tax preparation stations to serve the public. Before the pandemic, tax filing services were all carried out in CCACC. Among the 150 tax filing families served in previous years, four out of five were Chinese families.
This year's pandemic has caused a very different situation: Montgomery County Libraries were closed, causing the AARP services to be completely suspended. Nearly 40 AARP members came to CCACC and Montgomery County Free Tax Service Center for assistance. As a result, CCACC has expanded its services. Among the 200 low- and medium-income households receiving our tax consulting or electronic tax filing services, half are members or community residents referred by AARP, Montgomery County VITA, and the IRS. The non-Chinese population served includes residents of White, Hispanic, African, Middle Eastern, Indian, Korean, Southeast Asian, German and Japanese ethnicities. This is a huge change which CCACC took on optimistically, treating each tax paper equally regardless of ethnicity. Even with the challenges of virtual service, we still adhere to the professional service process to protect the personal information of taxpayers.
The Volunteer Team – Dedicated and Professional
The center cooperates with the IRS to train volunteers every year, helping them study the new tax laws and participate in a series of training courses. Volunteers who pass the IRS exam and obtain a certificate are eligible to join the ranks of tax filing volunteers. Although the list of volunteers changes every year, more than half of the volunteers have followed the center's VITA service for nine years. There are 20 tax filing volunteers this year, including three youth volunteers who have passed the IRS examination to assist taxpayers in the community who can’t fill out forms to complete online tax filing.
Tax filing volunteers squeezed out all available time outside of their work and life. Every day, enthusiastic exchanges sharing updating tax information and discussing tax cases took place among the volunteer group, starting from 6 am in the morning to as late as 2am at night, to help taxpayers seek the best tax filing method possible.
A tax filing volunteer who has more than 10 years of experience said that this year's tax filing service was very challenging, that she had to keep describing the meaning of the numbers of each tax return, explaining, and communicating. She said that in the past three months, the first thing she thought about when she got up and the last thing I thought about a second before going to bed were both tax filing services. In previous years, things were over after signing face-to-face, but this year, everything from receiving, sorting out, and uploading documents, to coordinating the latest changes in tax information, tracking the progression of cases, software revisions, informing taxpayers of online talks, and closing inspections were almost all online tasks, making the workload of each tax case three to five times that of previous years.
Gratitude beyond words
The care and hard work of the volunteers will be remembered by every taxpayer whom they have assisted. Several non-Chinese-speaking tax filers wrote down their thoughts about the services of CCACC and the volunteers who helped them. While they wrote in no fancy language, nor could they say thank-you in person, every taxpayer sincerely hopes to convey their gratitude through words.
An 82-year-old German-American lady said that she has been a member of AARP for many years. Since last year, she has been unable to get through AARP's free tax service call. One day, it did get through, and AARP gave her CCACC’s number. Fortunately, CCACC’s tax service volunteer, Liu Jia, picked up her call and immediately arranged tax services for her. The volunteers kindly asked her about tax issues on the phone and explained the tax forms in detail, making her feel very relieved by the efficient service. She was very grateful to the CCACC team for offering her help. For more testimonials from taxpayers, please visit the CCACC website column, “Testimonials under the Epidemic” using the following link: https://www.ccacc-dc.org/OnePage.aspx?tid=209&id=2494
Or scan the following QR code for easy access:
As the CCACC tax filing service comes to an end, the center wants to give a special thanks to every volunteer’s selfless dedication. Without the contributions of the volunteers, and without the cooperation between you and me, we wouldn’t have been able to complete the tax consulting and filling services for about 200 families. At the start of the regular online tax filing station quality inspection work meeting, the IRS officials wants to first thank CCACC for not giving up this extraordinary service during the pandemic, and that after the inspection work had been done, we want to thank every volunteer from the phone center, with blessing from the air, warm hugs, and kisses. Thank you all.
The Volunteer list: Immanuel Tung, Chiali Chi, David Lee, Liu Jia, Wendy Pan, Rachel Jin, Susan Chao, Annie Tsai, Sarah Chen, Mei Chen, Liang Wang, Jiaqi Tao, Carl Xu, Jerry Wang, Heidi Huang, Chien Gao, Mary Kim, Joy Wang, Emma Chen, Crystal Li, Cindy Wang.
(2021 CCACC VITA Service Team)
If 2020 is when the pandemic has challenged mankind, then 2021 is the turning point where mankind fights back. With the continuous vaccinations, the battle between the pandemic and mankind is starting to have a better turn, and that people’s lives are slowly turning back to normal. Regardless of identity and race, we hope that everyone can all join as a volunteer, take care of our homes, community and neighbors.
