IRS Is Looking For Tax Volunteers. Here’s Why I Flew 4,300 Miles To Be One.

Greetings from balmy Anchorage, Alaska!

That’s how I started writing about my trip to Alaska last year. And yes, “balmy” was doing a lot of work in that sentence.

Screenshot showing weather is 25 degrees

Anchorage was in the middle of an unusually warm spell—warm enough that the start of the Iditarod had been moved north to Fairbanks. But I wasn’t staying in Anchorage for long. I was headed to rural Alaska, where the “real feel” at our first village stop was forecast to be -1 degree Fahrenheit (spoiler: it got much colder as the week progressed).

So what was a Philadelphia-area tax lawyer doing hauling snow pants, tax forms, and computer equipment across Alaska in February?

Preparing tax returns.

For free.

I was part of a team of tax attorneys participating in a volunteer tax preparation program organized by the Alaska Business Development Center (ABDC) and conducted in partnership with the American Bar Association Section of Taxation and the IRS’s Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program.

Three tax attorneys in alaska — Tax attorneys and volunteers karen lapekas mandi matlock and i in alaska

It turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences I’ve had as a tax professional. Now, as the IRS issues its annual call for VITA and Tax Counseling for the Elderly (TCE) volunteers and community partners, I’ve been thinking about that trip again.

In 2026, more than 84,500 VITA and TCE volunteers helped taxpayers file nearly 2.9 million tax returns at no cost, according to the IRS. The programs serve taxpayers across the country, including lower-income taxpayers, seniors, people with disabilities, taxpayers with limited English proficiency, and residents of rural communities like those in Alaska.

While my VITA experience involved single-engine airplanes, snowmobiles, and some truly impressive winter gear, yours almost certainly won’t.

What VITA Looks Like

VITA has provided free tax preparation services for more than 50 years. TCE offers similar assistance, with a particular focus on taxpayers age 60 and older and on questions involving pensions and retirement.

The programs largely rely on partnerships with local organizations. Last filing season, schools, nonprofits, financial institutions, faith-based groups, and other community organizations hosted approximately 9,000 VITA and TCE sites.

In Alaska, ABDC was that community partner. Our team of three tax attorneys trained for weeks before flying to Anchorage, where we met our team leader and completed additional training. Then we headed out to the villages.

We carried laptops, peripherals, intake forms, tax forms, and other supplies in a large tote that weighed about 50 pounds. Because taxpayer information is private, we couldn’t simply toss misprinted or unwanted documents along the way—we carried them with us until we could properly shred them. And since many of the communities weren’t connected by roads, we traveled between them by single-engine plane, pickup truck, and, occasionally, snowmobile.

My commute home from the office in alaska

We worked long days, typically 10 to 12 hours, though we stayed as long as taxpayers were waiting. One night, that meant working until nearly 1 a.m.

The returns were interesting, too. We prepared returns for commercial fishermen, helped a whaleboat captain with her recordkeeping, and reported Alaska Permanent Fund dividends and other distributions. Since children can receive dividends, they can also have federal tax filing obligations. That meant that more than once, what initially looked like one taxpayer coming through the door turned into several returns for the same family.

I clearly remember one taxpayer with a very simple return. She lived in Kotzebue, a community of about 3,000 people. The year before we arrived, she had spent nearly $2,000 to have her Form 1040 prepared. The commercial tax preparer charged about $500, but that wasn’t the expensive part: she had to fly 547 miles to Anchorage and stay in a hotel for a couple of nights while she waited to see whether the preparer had questions. There were no tax professionals in her village.

That year, she’d heard on the local radio station that volunteers from the Lower 48 were coming to town to prepare tax returns for free. She was delighted.

That experience changed how I think about access to tax preparation. It’s easy to assume that a taxpayer who needs help can simply hire someone, use tax software, or hop online to find an answer. But those options don’t work equally well for everyone.

In another village, mail service had become unreliable after one postmaster died and the replacement quit. Without reliable mail—and with spotty internet access—getting tax documents could be difficult.

Some areas of alaska were incredibly remote

And sometimes technology isn’t the answer. In one case, we helped one taxpayer figure out how to obtain a paper Form W-2 directly from his employer. Another time, we used a courier to deliver a paper return (that could not be e-filed) to a village with a functioning post office so we could file it on time.

We also saw the kinds of problems that show up everywhere, not just in Alaska: questions about the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit, name mismatches, injured spouse claims, and errors on prior-year returns.

One taxpayer had used DIY software and incorrectly reported rental income. Her husband, who had recently died, had always handled those matters for her. We couldn’t fix everything on the spot, but we could identify the problem and direct her to a clinic that could help. She was so grateful that she cried.

That’s the part of VITA that doesn’t show up in the statistics. Tax preparation involves numbers and forms, of course, but it also involves listening. People tell you about jobs, marriages, divorces, children, and deaths. Sometimes they need help with a tax form. Sometimes they need someone to tell them what to do next. You can learn a lot about a person from a tax return.

You Don’t Have To Be A Tax Pro

Here’s the good news if that sounds interesting but you don’t have an LL.M. in Taxation: You don’t need one. In fact, you don’t need any prior tax experience to volunteer.

The IRS provides free training for a variety of VITA and TCE roles based on volunteers’ skills, interests, and availability. Some volunteers prepare returns, while others serve as greeters, interpreters, quality reviewers, or in other support roles. Depending on the site, flexible hours and virtual opportunities may also be available.

For those who want to prepare returns, training and certification are part of the process. That’s an important distinction: VITA doesn’t simply hand someone a stack of Forms 1040 and wish them luck.

Experienced tax professionals are welcome, too. I found the experience enormously valuable even after years of practicing and writing about tax law. The tax issues were interesting, but what stayed with me was seeing how the tax system works—or sometimes doesn’t—for people whose circumstances were very different from those of many of my clients back home.

You also don’t have to fly 4,300 miles to participate. VITA and TCE sites operate in community centers, libraries, schools, and other locations nationwide.

Organizations can get involved, too. The IRS is looking for schools, nonprofits, financial institutions, faith-based groups, and other organizations willing to host or sponsor VITA and TCE sites. These partnerships help bring free tax preparation services to communities where they’re most needed.

How To Get Involved

The IRS encourages people interested in volunteering for the upcoming filing season to sign up between October and January. After submitting the VITA/TCE volunteer and partner sign-up form, prospective volunteers should receive information about local sites and an invitation to a virtual orientation, typically within two weeks.

Organizations interested in becoming partners can use the same sign-up process. An IRS relationship manager will follow up to discuss next steps.

And if you’re wondering whether people really will show up for free tax preparation, I can answer that. Near the end of our Alaska trip, a blizzard hit Point Lay. The weather was bad enough that school was closed, and our plane was temporarily grounded. The forecast warned of dangerously cold wind chills, and the official measurement eventually hit -62 degrees Fahrenheit. Taxpayers still came to the community center.