(Newser)
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Ever had a run-in with a rude IRS agent? Well, Douglas Shulman’s sorry about that. The IRS commissioner offered a rare apology today to three identity theft victims who said they’d been mistreated by his employees, the AP reports. “We need to walk in each taxpayer’s shoes,” Shulman told the House Oversight subcommittee. “We obviously need to do better.”
The victims all testified as well, detailing their abuse at the hands of Shulman’s employees “When I asked her about my case, she proceeded to yell and scream at me,” one victim said. “When I asked for her name and ID number again ... she hung up the telephone.” The hearing was ostensibly not about rude employees, but about the growing problem of identity thieves filing fraudulent tax returns. There were 248,357 such cases in 2010, up from 51,702 in 2008.
