Clarification from the agency

Open to IRS Career/Career-Conditional, Treasury/IRS CTAP, & IRS RPP employees

WHAT IS THE TAXPAYER ADVOCATE SERVICEDIVISION?
A description of the business units can be found at: https://www.jobs.irs.gov/about/who/business-divisions

Vacancies will be filled in the following specialty areas:
Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS), Executive Director Case Advocacy (EDCA)


The following are the duties of this position at the full working level. If this vacancy includes more than one grade and you are selected at a lower grade level, you will have the opportunity to learn to perform these duties and receive training to help you grow in this position.

• Answers and manages incoming telephone call traffic and customer inquiries. This includes, but is not limited to: internal, taxpayer, congressional, and stakeholder contacts. Confers with customers who are dissatisfied with assistance or are experiencing a hardship. Interviews customer for the purpose of eliciting information to clarify the issues and identify Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS) criteria. Endeavors to correct to the extent of the incumbent's capacity erroneous interpretations made by the customer. Presents customers with options available, or possible courses of action, and explains consequences of actions taken. Requests forms and worksheets from within the Service for customer needs.
• Reviews, analyzes, and evaluates initial customer contact, case-related information received in TAS following Internal Revenue Manual (IRM) 13. Receives, reviews, establishes initial controls and distributes all incoming casework in accordance with management guidelines and timeframe specifications. Receipts are either by telephone, electronic or paper correspondence or in-person and originate from customers, their representatives, other IRS divisions and other TAS offices.
• Reviews and processes routine Congressional, White House and other priority inquiries received by the office to deal with constituent's problems. Makes appropriate referral of non-criteria cases. Ensures TAS transfer processing guidelines are met on cases received from other TAS offices. Directs inappropriate transfers to the correct office.
• Independently researches and interprets applicable databases including Integrated Case Processing (ICP), Servicewide Electronic Research Program (SERP), Integrated Data Retrieval System (IDRS), Taxpayer Advocate Management Information System (TAMIS), and other applicable information. Interprets relevant data including master file records, tax account history, etc. Inputs customer information outlined in IRM 13 into the ICP System and/or TAMIS and opens IDRS controls.
• Protects confidentiality of taxpayer information as outlined in IRC 6103 and 7803(c)(4)(a)(IV).

Conditions of employment

STANDARD POSITION DESCRIPTIONS (SPD):
PD94983, PD94984, and PD94985
Visit the IRS SPD Library to access the position descriptions.

• If you are in a telework eligible position, you may be directed to temporarily telework on a full-time basis due to COVID 19. Employees must be within a 200-mile radius of their official assigned post-of-duty (POD) while in a telework status. Once normal operations resume, employees may be directed back to the office to perform the duties of their position. Telework eligibility does not guarantee telework; employees must meet and sustain IRS telework eligibility requirements and supervisor's approval to participate in the IRS Telework Program. As a reminder - If you are selected for a position, you are responsible for reporting to your designated POD (location) on the negotiated start date or as directed by management.

Qualifications

Federal experience is not required. The experience may have been gained in the public sector, private sector or Volunteer Service. One year of experience refers to full-time work; part-time work is considered on a prorated basis. To ensure full credit for your work experience, please indicate dates of employment by month/year, and indicate number of hours worked per week, on your resume.

You must meet the following requirements by the closing date of this announcement:

SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: GS-5 Level: To be minimally qualified for this position you must have one year of specialized experience at a level of difficulty and responsibility equivalent to the GS-04 grade level in the Federal service. Specialized experience for this position includes: Experience that is related to the work of this position and has provided you with the competencies required for successful job performance. Examples of experience qualifying as specialized include: preparing, receiving, reviewing, and verifying documents; processing transactions; maintaining office records; and locating and compiling data or information from files and other data sources; and contacting customers through correspondence or telephone to obtain information, explain liability, and encourage compliance.
OR
COMBINATION OF EXPERIENCE AND EDUCATION: You may qualify by a combination of experience and education. Options for qualifying based on a combination will be identified in the online questions.
OR
Bachelor's degree or four years of education above high school in any field of study from an accredited college or university.An equivalent amount of combined education and experience. Only education in excess of 60 semester hours, 90 quarter hours or 1440 classroom hours is creditable toward meeting the specialized experience requirement for the GS-5 level. For example, one full year of academic study (30 semester hours, 45 quarter hours, or 720 formal classroom hours) beyond the second year is equal to 6 months of specialized experience. To be creditable, education must have been obtained in an accredited business, secretarial or technical school, college or university.

SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: GS-6 Level: To be minimally qualified for this position you must have one year of specialized experience at a level of difficulty and responsibility equivalent to the GS-05 grade level in the Federal service. Specialized experience for this position includes: experience that is related to the work of this position and has provided you with the competencies required for successful job performance. Examples of experience qualifying as specialized include: preparing, receiving, reviewing, and verifying documents; processing transactions; maintaining office records; and locating and compiling data or information from files and other data sources; processing a variety of tax returns and reports; examining tax returns and supporting documents for current and prior year and amended returns; and contacting customers through correspondence or telephone to obtain information, explain liability, and encourage compliance.

SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: GS-7 Level: To be minimally qualified for this position you must have one year of specialized experience at a level of difficulty and responsibility equivalent to the GS-06 grade level in the Federal service. Specialized experience for this position includes: experience that is related to the work of this position and has provided you with the competencies required for successful job performance. Examples of experience qualifying as specialized include: preparing, receiving, reviewing, and verifying documents; processing transactions; maintaining office records; and locating and compiling data or information from files and other data sources; processing a variety of tax returns and reports; ensuring that all required identification, schedules, income tax deposits, or other required information is available; and contacting customers through correspondence or telephone to obtain information, explain liability, and encourage compliance.

AND

MEET TIME IN GRADE (TIG) REQUIREMENT: For positions above the GS-05, applicants must meet applicable time-in-grade requirements to be considered eligible. One year (52 weeks) at the next lower grade level is required to meet the time-in-grade requirements for the grade you are applying for.

AND

TIME AFTER COMPETITIVE APPOINTMENT: By the closing date (or if this is an open continuous announcement, by the cut-off date) specified in this job announcement, current civilian employees must have completed at least 90 days of federal civilian service since their latest non-temporary appointment from a competitive referral certificate, known as time after competitive appointment. For this requirement, a competitive appointment is one where you applied to and were appointed from an announcement open to "All US Citizens".

For more information on qualifications please refer to OPM's Qualifications Standards.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

Your application includes your resume, responses to the online questions, and required supporting documents. Please be sure that your resume includes detailed information to support your qualifications for this position; failure to provide sufficient evidence in your resume may result in a "not qualified" determination.

Rating: Your application will be evaluated on the Critical Job Elements (CJE) of the position to be filled, in accordance with Article 13 of the IRS/NTEU National Agreement. Your application will also be rated and ranked among others, based on your responses to the online questions/assessment. Your experience, education, training, prior performance, and awards, relevant to the position being filled, will be considered throughout the hiring process. IRS employees may obtain most recent awards listing at https://persinfo.web.irs.gov/.

Referral: If you are among the top qualified candidates, your application may be referred to a selecting official for consideration. You may be required to participate in a selection interview (telephonic and/or in person at the discretion of the Selecting Official in accordance with hiring polices). We will not reimburse costs related to the interview such as travel to and from the interview site.

If you are a displaced or surplus Federal employee eligible for Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP), you must receive a score of 80 or better to be rated as well qualified to receive special selection priority.