IRS YouTube Videos

Preparing for Disasters: English | Spanish | ASL

IR-2017-145, Sept. 6, 2017

WASHINGTON — For September's National Preparedness Month, the Internal Revenue Service is offering advice to taxpayers who may be affected by storms, fires, floods or other disasters. After the devastation of Hurricane Harvey and with Hurricane Irma threatening parts of the U.S. and Caribbean, the IRS reminds taxpayers that the agency is here to help, including offering a special toll-free number to taxpayers in federally-declared disaster areas that's staffed with IRS specialists trained to handle disaster-related issues.

Managed and sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Ready Campaign, National Preparedness Month encourages individuals, businesses and organizations to prepare for a variety of disaster and emergency situations.

Create Electronic Copies of Key Documents

Taxpayers can help themselves by keeping a duplicate set of key documents, including bank statements, tax returns, identifications and insurance policies in a safe place. Store them in a waterproof container and away from the original set.

Doing so is easier now that many financial institutions provide statements and documents electronically, and much financial information is available on the Internet. Even if the original documents are only provided on paper, these can be scanned into an electronic format. This way, taxpayers can download them to a storage device such as an external hard drive or USB flash drive, or burn them to a CD or DVD.

Click here to read the full article.