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Happy Tax Day! (Words I never thought I’d tweet 
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😆" title="Lächelndes Gesicht mit geöffnetem Mund und fest verschlossenen Augen" aria-label="Emoji: Lächelndes Gesicht mit geöffnetem Mund und fest verschlossenen Augen">) This year’s tax day feels special because of all the work we’ve been doing with http://GetYourRefund.org"> http://GetYourRefund.org (a thread)
I joined the team in November, there were a total of 4 of us working on this pilot project. At that point, I honestly didn’t know much about the Earned Income Tax Credit or the IRS VITA program https://www.irs.gov/individuals/free-tax-return-preparation-for-you-by-volunteers">https://www.irs.gov/individua... (The IRS has a program that provides free tax prep services?!)
Yes, that’s right FREE. There are millions of Americans who qualify for free tax assistance, but get tricked into paying for TurboTax, H&R block, or other for profit tax prep services.
More on that from @propublica @hasanminhajhttps://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="👉" title="Rückhand Zeigefinger nach rechts" aria-label="Emoji: Rückhand Zeigefinger nach rechts"> https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-turbotax-20-year-fight-to-stop-americans-from-filing-their-taxes-for-free
https://www.propublica.org/article/i... href="">https://www.youtube.com/watch...
More on that from @propublica @hasanminhaj
Back to VITA, they had a mostly in person model. So in January, we built out a location search for VITA sites. https://www.getyourrefund.org/en/vita_providers">https://www.getyourrefund.org/en/vita_p...
By February we launched the MVP of http://GetYourRefund.org"> http://GetYourRefund.org and had our first client go through the process! They were skeptical at first, but delighted when they received a nice refund https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😄" title="Lächelndes Gesicht mit geöffnetem Mund und lächelnden Augen" aria-label="Emoji: Lächelndes Gesicht mit geöffnetem Mund und lächelnden Augen">
Between February and March, we collaborated with our 4 pilot partners in CA, CO, AZ, GA. We worked on improvements to identity verification. Our team slowly grew.
and then COVID hit.
and then COVID hit.
VITA sites across the country had to close and couldn’t offer in person service. So we rolled up our sleeves and started to scale our pilot.
We worked with amazing @codeforamerica brigades from across the country, hired more folks on our team, and we went from 4 partners to 46+. We scaled to serve all states across the US. https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="😅" title="Lächelndes Gesicht mit offenem Mund und Angstschweiß" aria-label="Emoji: Lächelndes Gesicht mit offenem Mund und Angstschweiß">
As of today we’ve helped deliver $25M+ in returns and we’re still going!
If you know folks who earned less than $66k and don’t owe this year, they can still file for 2019 (and 2018, 2017) for free with http://GetYourRefund.org"> http://GetYourRefund.org
Our tax specialists know all about tax credits and will maximize your returnhttps://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="💸" title="Geld mit Flügeln" aria-label="Emoji: Geld mit Flügeln">
Our tax specialists know all about tax credits and will maximize your return
