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Washington, D.C.—The leader of the national union representing Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employees today sharply criticized the agency for plans to close call centers in three major cities —Boston, Chicago and Houston, a move she said would clearly make it much more difficult for taxpayers to get help they need to comply with the nation’s tax laws.

The closings of the call sites in the three cities, which the agency apparently has set for later this year, is one of several IRS actions designed to cut back on live assistance for taxpayers and force them to use the Internet not only to obtain forms and publications but to get help with their taxes.

President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said that even as the IRS is closing the three call sites along with dozens of walk-in Taxpayer Assistance Centers in cities across the nation, it is cutting back the number of hours the remaining call sites will be open and available to help taxpayers.

“Taken together,” the NTEU leader said, “these actions by the IRS demonstrate its lagging commitment to customer service. You can’t continually cut back on opportunities for taxpayers to meet face-to-face with IRS employees or to speak with them on the phone and claim that customer service is a priority,” she said.

Since the 1998 IRS Restructuring and Reform Act (RRA), customer satisfaction is one of the key standards by which the agency’s performance is being judged, Kelley said. The other standards are employee satisfaction and business results.

Under the agency’s cutback plan, about 175 employees will be adversely impacted at the three call sites slated for closing—some 60 in Houston, 80 in Boston, and 15 in Chicago. The Boston and Chicago call sites include a number of disabled employees.

IRS call sites are largely aligned with specific operating divisions within the agency; the Boston, Chicago and Houston sites are closely linked to the IRS Wage and Investment (W&I) Division, which deals with wage earners, the largest single group of taxpayers.

The closing of these three call sites appears to be a small part of larger customer service cutbacks the IRS is planning. The agency’s budget proposal for the next fiscal year includes a plan to cut more than $134 million from IRS customer service functions—including 1,385 positions. Eighty-seven percent of the employees in these positions, President Kelley said, deal directly with taxpayers and their representatives.

As the largest independent federal union, represents some 150,000 employees in 30 agencies and departments, including 98,000 in the IRS.