August 2017

Building the capacity of 

tax preparation providers 

to encourage saving

The CFPB Office of Financial Empowerment
August 2017

1 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Executive summary

In 2015 the CFPB published its first paper regarding practices employed by tax preparation 

providers to encourage consumers to save while filing their tax returns. Building savings is 

important for every consumer because it helps them to establish a financial foundation on which 

to plan for the future. It is particularly important for consumers with low incomes, because they 

often have to survive on a razor thin financial margin that creates economic stress for 

themselves and their families. There are three strong reasons for encouraging saving at tax 

time. For many consumers with lower incomes their tax refund is the biggest single lump sum 

they will receive all year. Many of those same consumers have little to no savings, which makes

them economically vulnerable to financial shocks. Finally, the process of filing a tax return 

provides an easy and automatic way to save some or all of their tax refund. 

In the 2015 paper, we identified ten practices that have shown promise for increasing consumer 

saving activity at tax time. In the intervening two years we have worked closely with both 

Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) providers and members of the commercial tax 

preparation industry to further explore consumer interest and engagement in saving at tax time. 

Our goal was to learn more about the context in which tax preparation providers operate while 

attempting to best serve their customers and clients. 

This paper builds on these additional observations of the tax preparation field and offers further 

information on the barriers and opportunities for tax filers to save. It also provides greater 

focus on how tax preparers can help consumers meet their savings goals and identifies areas 

where organizations like the CFPB, other federal and state agencies, and non-profits can 

collaborate to offer tax preparers the tools and training they need in order to have a productive 

savings conversation with their customers before and during the tax event. 

This paper refines the list of promising practices and provides deeper insight into the goals and 

intent of consumer behavior during the tax filing and refund process. It also complements other 
August 2017

2 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

research and findings of several national convening organizations such as the Prosperity Now

Taxpayer Opportunity Network (TON) and large VITA Programs such as the Center for 

Economic Progress in Chicago, Illinois, and Prepare and Prosper in St. Paul, Minnesota. These 

organizations have used their own unique approaches to successfully implement many of these 

practices in the field. Our collective goal is to provide the VITA community and other tax 

preparation providers a set of key learnings along with some practical applications that 

providers can employ to assist consumers in achieving their savings goals through the tax filing 

process. 

The practices and their application that we will describe in this paper include the following: 

Promising practices 

Helping Tax Filers to Choose to Save

1. Communicate with consumers about saving before they come to the tax site.

2. Offer saving choices more than once at the tax site.

3. Provider multiple product choices for saving.

4. Use “anchoring” and prompts to help consumers focus on a savings goal.

5. Don’t overwhelm consumers by offering too many different types of services.

6. Provide incentives, including non-financial rewards, to encourage saving.

7. Make saving fun and exciting.

Training and Motivating Staff and Volunteers to Help Tax Filers to Save

8. Build commitment among staff and volunteers to encourage saving.

9. Make sure tax preparers know how to help consumers save while filing.

10. Dedicate staff or volunteers to encourage saving.

We appreciate the many VITA program providers who have contributed to this report by sharing 

their stories, inviting us to visit their tax sites during the tax season, and openly engaging in 

conversations during and after the tax season about what they have learned from offering this 

valuable service to people with low incomes in their respective communities. 
August 2017

3 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

We thank the Internal Revenue Service SPEC1 division for its collaboration and the Taxpayer 

Opportunity Network, operated by Prosperity Now (formerly the Corporation for Enterprise 

Development), for providing a communications channel to the broad VITA community.

Thanks also to H&R Block for its willingness to share information about the nature of the tax 

preparation business and key consumer behavior insights it has developed before, during and 

after consumers file their taxes.

 

1 Stakeholder Partnerships, Education & Communication (SPEC) is the outreach and education arm of the Wage and 

Investment Division of the IRS. http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Become-an-IRS-Partner-to-Help-in-YourCommunity
August 2017

4 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Table of Contents

Executive summary.....................................................................................................1

1. Introduction...........................................................................................................6

2. What we have learned to date..............................................................................9

3. Why encourage saving at tax time?..................................................................12

4. Challenges and barriers for consumers to save at tax time ...........................15

4.1 A Challenging Tax Time Environment in 2017 .......................................17

5. The gap between measureable savings and consumer intent to 

save......................................................................................................................19

6. Setting the context for encouraging saving.....................................................21

7. Promising practices ...........................................................................................23

1. Communicate with consumers about saving before they come to the tax 

site... .......................................................................................................23

2. Offer the saving option more than once at the tax site ..........................24

3. Provide multiple product choices for saving .......................................... 25

4. Use “anchoring” and motivational prompts to help to focus the 

consumer on a saving goal. ....................................................................26

5. Don’t overwhelm consumers by offering too many different types of 

services.................................................................................................... 27

6. Provide incentives, including non-financial rewards, to encourage 

saving ...................................................................................................... 27

7. Make saving fun and exciting .................................................................28

8. Build commitment among staff and volunteers to encourage saving ...29

9. Make sure tax preparers know how to help consumers save while filing30
August 2017

5 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

10. Dedicate staff or volunteers to encourage saving................................... 31

8. Conclusion ..........................................................................................................32

Appendix I: Participating Organizations ........................................................34
August 2017

6 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

1. Introduction

The CFPB’s work to encourage saving at tax time is led by its Office of Financial Empowerment,

which focuses on helping economically vulnerable consumers to achieve their financial goals. 

The mission of the Office of Financial Empowerment is to promote a more inclusive and fair 

financial marketplace, and empower economically vulnerable consumers to make informed 

financial decisions by providing tools and information. To fulfill this mission Financial 

Empowerment focuses on increasing access to fair and affordable financial products, helping 

consumers to build and sustain good credit, offering providers of services to economically 

vulnerable consumers tools and resources to better serve their clients, and striving to provide 

greater opportunities for consumers to save. 

The CFPB also has a specific charge to provide opportunities for consumers to access “wealth 

building and financial services during the preparation process to claim earned income tax 

credits and Federal benefits.”2 3 Consumers determine their eligibility and claim the Earned 

Income Tax Credit (EITC) during the process of filing their federal and state tax returns.4 Our 

involvement in targeted ways to encourage savings at tax time has primarily focused on offering 

 

2 The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (“Dodd-Frank Act”), Pub. L. 111-203 §

1013(d)(2)(F), codified at 12 U.S.C. 5493(d)(2)(F).

3 Individual offices within the CFPB have collaborated to fulfill this mandate. The Office of Financial Empowerment 

works to empower low-income and economically vulnerable consumers to make informed financial decisions by 

providing them with tools and information and by promoting a more inclusive and fair financial marketplace. The 

Office of Financial Education and the Office of Consumer Engagement both develop and implement initiatives 

intended to educate and empower consumers to make better informed financial decisions. 

4 Forty-three states and the District of Columbia have a state income tax. In those states consumers are required to 

file both federal and state tax returns. Of those, twenty-five states and the District of Columbia have established a 

state or local Earned Income Tax Credit which is supplemental to the federal EITC. 

http://www.cbpp.org/research/state-budget-and-tax/policy-basics-state-earned-income-tax-credits
August 2017

7 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

support to the network of Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) providers that offer free tax 

help in many hundreds of communities around the country.5 We have also offered our tools, 

training and technical assistance to the companies in the commercial tax preparation industry 

that are interested in achieving better financial outcomes for their customers. 

The long-term vision of the CFPB in offering savings opportunities for people at tax time is: 

“Savings outreach and education to consumers at tax time should be available across all service 

and product platforms - both commercial and VITA.”

This vision is particularly achievable for the large majority of consumers who file their tax 

returns electronically, either on their own or with the help of someone else. A growing number 

of consumers are electronically filing their returns and an even greater percentage of consumers

are choosing to prepare their own returns using a variety of commercial software products. 

Between 2013 and 2017 the number of e-filed returns6 increased by 8% to a total of 88.6% of all 

returns filed.7 During the same 5 year span the number of self-prepared e-filed returns 

increased by 19.4% to a total of 37.4% of all returns filed. Still, a majority (57.8%) of all e-filed 

returns in 2017 were prepared by commercial tax preparers.8 

Regardless of who is preparing the return, the tax filer, a tax professional or a volunteer, as 

information is entered the software being employed typically calculates a running total of the 

amount owed or the amount of refund due to the tax filer. At the final summation page, if a tax 

filer is due a refund the next screen the tax filer or the tax professional sees could prompt them 

to consider saving a portion of their refund. This same page could also include information on 

 

5 The Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program offers free tax help to people who generally make $53,000 or 

less, persons with disabilities, and the elderly and limited English speaking taxpayers who need assistance in 

preparing their own tax returns. IRS-certified volunteers provide free basic income tax return preparation with 

electronic filing to qualified individuals. http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Free-Tax-Return-Preparation-for-You-byVolunteers

6 This includes all electronically filed returns whether they were prepared and filed by the taxpayer or prepared and 

filed with the assistance of a commercial or volunteer tax preparer.

7 2017 and Prior Year Filing Season Statistics. Internal Revenue Service. https://www.irs.gov/uac/2017-and-prioryear-filing-season-statistics

8 Ibid.
August 2017

8 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

easy ways to have the IRS automatically distribute the refund to multiple accounts of the 

consumers’ choosing. However, this is not yet the case for most tax preparation software. By 

making this relatively simple process available, a greater number of tax filers would be offered 

the saving option and would have the opportunity to leverage the tax time moment to make a 

financial decision that may benefit themselves and their families.

To provide greater saving opportunities for consumers, the CFPB has established five 

operational goals for its tax-time savings work. The five goals are to:

1. Identify and spread practices for providers to offer consumers who have low-incomes 

and/or low-wealth more information and saving choices while filing their tax return; 

2. Help tax preparation service providers to develop a deeper understanding of consumer 

decision-making and service provider capability before and during the tax season; 

3. Test the effectiveness of promising approaches in both the nonprofit and commercial 

environment to promote saving at tax time; 

4. Quantify, through research, the consumer benefits of saving, and of maintaining some 

amount of savings for short- to medium-term goals and needs; and

5. Learn how and where the CFPB can productively contribute to increasing the financial 

stability of low-income consumers through encouraging tax-time saving.
August 2017

9 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

2. What we have learned to

date

For the past five years, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has provided information and 

training to staff and volunteers at community VITA programs around the country to promote 

saving at tax time. Through these engagements with VITA providers and other experts in the 

field, we initially identified ten promising practices that may help tax preparation programs be 

more successful at informing and encouraging consumers about this opportunity to save, and 

their saving choices. This information may in turn help consumers follow through on their 

savings goals while filing their tax return. As our work has evolved and as we have learned more 

from practitioners and researchers we have refined these promising practices with an eye 

towards effectiveness, replication and practical application in different tax preparation 

environments.

We have collaborated with the Internal Revenue Service and engaged providers in the tax 

assistance field in pilots to develop and test tools and resources, and to learn how the CFPB 

could be most effective in offering help to consumers. In 2013, we worked with three 

communities on a direct-to-consumer outreach initiative. We provided the nonprofit 

organizations operating the VITA programs in those communities with basic outreach and 

information tools to assist them in encouraging saving. In 2014, we engaged in a 13-city pilot 

with local community VITA programs. This included providing enhanced consumer-facing 

informational materials along with training on promising practices to increase saving while 

consumers are filing their returns. After the end of each tax season, we asked for feedback from 

participating communities regarding the effectiveness of our approach. We used that 

information to make improvements to our tools and resources the following year. 
August 2017

10 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

In 2015 we made our informational materials and training available to all VITA programs via 

download from our website. In addition, we began a multiyear collaboration with H&R Block9

to learn about the effectiveness of targeted communications to offer consumers opportunities to 

save. H&R Block’s research study explores two major research questions: Can certain strategies 

encourage saving behavior? And; is saving behavior associated with better outcomes for 

consumers? 10

In 2016 we expanded our initiative to include 41 VITA programs located in 25 states. Results 

from the 2016 tax season included the following:

• 281,603 total consumers were provided free tax preparation services 

• 188,897 consumers had their taxes prepared at a site using CFPB information11

• 148,615 of those consumers received a refund; Of those;

o 47,450 claimed the Earned Income Tax Credit

o 86,595 used direct deposit to receive their refund

o 2,562 (1.7%) used Form 8888 to split their refund

o 639 purchased U.S. Series I Savings Bonds

o 70 deposited part of their refund into a myRA account

In 2017, the most recent tax season we expanded our saving initiative to include 58 VITA 

programs located in 26 states (See Appendix I for a list of participating VITA programs). With 

45 of the 58 programs reporting we identified the following results. 

• 255,782 consumers were provided with free tax preparation services

• 187,941 consumers had their taxes prepared at a site using CFPB information;

• 140,308 consumers received a refund; Of those;

 

9 H&R Block is one of the largest commercial tax preparation firms in the nation. In fiscal 2014, H&R Block prepared 

24.2 million tax returns worldwide. https://www.hrblock.com/corporate/our-company/

10 CFPB Project Catalyst Announcement 2014-02. http://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201409_cfpb_summary_hrblock.pdf

11 Some VITA Programs with multiple tax preparation sites in their communities chose to implement savings 

initiatives in a portion of their sites, thus creating a difference between total number of people served and number 

receiving CFPB information about saving. 
August 2017

11 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

o 54,857 claimed the Earned Income Tax Credit

o 93,525 used direct deposit to receive their refund

o 3,179 (2%) used Form 8888 to split their refund

o 545 (.4%) purchased U.S. Series I Savings Bonds

o 44 deposited some of their refund into a myRA account.12

In addition to the quantitative information provided by the VITA programs we received 

significant qualitative feedback that helped to provide insights into the challenges the providers 

faced in effectively having saving conversations with tax filers and the responses and reactions 

to savings messages provided to them before and during the tax filing process. 

The findings and observations in this paper are based primarily on that qualitative data gathered 

in a variety of ways both during and after the 2017 tax season. The staff and volunteers of the 

VITA programs which participated in the 2017 cohort were extremely generous with both their 

time and their expert insights. Among the data collection methods we used were:

• Technical assistance calls conducted during tax season

• Site visits to a limited number of programs

• Online surveys of site leads, volunteers and staff of the VITA Programs

• Focus groups with program representatives including both site leads and frontline staff 

and volunteers

 

12 The U.S. Department of the Treasury has decided to phase out the myRA® retirement savings program and the 

program is no longer accepting new enrollments. For more information go to https://myra.gov/
August 2017

12 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

3. Why encourage saving at 

tax time? 

Research shows that having even a small amount of savings in reserve has a number of 

beneficial effects, including:

• increased resiliency (the ability to bounce back financially)

• reduced use of high-cost financial services in response to a financial emergency

• reduced household stress13

Tax time presents a unique opportunity for many consumers to save in part because of the level 

of economic vulnerability experienced by a large number of consumers. Included in a survey 

conducted for the Federal Reserve Bank’s 2015 Report on Economic Wellbeing were several 

questions designed to determine an individuals’preparedness for a smaller scale financial 

disruption. Respondents were asked how they would pay for a hypothetical emergency expense

that would cost $400. Just over half (54 percent) reported that they could fairly easily handle 

such an expense, paying for it entirely using cash, money currently in their checking/savings 

account, or on a credit card that they would pay in full at their next statement (collectively 

referred to as “cash or its functional equivalent”). The remaining 46 percent indicated that such 

an expense would be more challenging to handle and that they either could not pay the expense 

 

13 “Holding liquid assets of up to $1,999 (versus having no such assets) significantly reduces the incidence of multiple 

hardships, by 5.1 percentage points. Progressively larger effects are found with larger asset holdings: 10.6 

percentage points for $2,000–$9,999 and 13.7 percentage points for $10,000 and above.” Urban Institute: Can 

Savings Help Overcome Income Instability, 2010 http://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/alfresco/publicationpdfs/412290-Can-Savings-Help-Overcome-Income-Instability-.PDF
August 2017

13 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

or would borrow or sell something to do so.14 By comparison in 2015, 100.9 million people 

(31.7% of the population) had household income less than twice the federal poverty level which 

was $48,000 for a family of four.15 These comparative findings suggest that lack of sufficient 

liquid savings is not limited to the lowest income consumers but can also affect those who have 

more moderate incomes but are still potentially vulnerable to financial shocks. 

Tax time is the period between January and April of each year when the vast majority of 

households file their annual tax returns. Tax time offers a unique opportunity to save for many 

consumers. In tax year 2015, 100.7 million tax returns, or 73.6% of all returns filed resulted in a 

refund. The average refund was $2,701.16 In that same year 84.2 million tax returns (63.5% of 

all filers) reported adjusted gross incomes of less than $50,000.17 

To put this into context, a married couple with two children earning $50,000 per year, with one 

full time worker would gross $1,923 per each 2 week pay period assuming a standard work year.

Subtracting standard income tax and social security withholding and assuming that this family 

claimed no other tax credits their net income would be $1,718 per pay period. In other words if 

this family only received the average refund of all filers in 2015 that refund would be nearly 

$1,000 more than the biggest paycheck they received all year. 

For a similar family who earns less and receives the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) that 

refund could be substantially more. Consider, for example a couple with two children and an 

annual income of $25,000 per year. Taking standard deductions and assuming no other 

 

14 Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households; May 

2016. https://www.federalreserve.gov/2015-report-economic-well-being-us-households-201605.pdf

15 Proctor, B.D., Semega, J.L., & Kollar, M.A. (2016). Income and Poverty in the United States: 2015. Washington, 

D.C.: U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2016/demo/p60-256.html

16 TREASURY INSPECTOR GENERAL FOR TAX ADMINISTRATION Results of the 2015 Filing Season; August 31, 

2015 https://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2015reports/201540080fr.html

17 Internal Revenue Service. Late-May filing season statistics by AGI. https://www.irs.gov/uac/filing-seasonstatistics
August 2017

14 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

adjustments to income this couple would owe $0 net taxes and would receive back whatever 

income tax withholding they had paid in during the course of the year. In addition if the parents 

and dependent children met all the other qualification requirements18 for EITC eligibility they 

would receive an additional $5,300 based on the calculations for the 2016 tax year.19 

For those households that are saddled with debt or expenses, tax time can offer an opportunity 

to catch up by reducing or even eliminating their existing debt and helping them to maintain all 

their current financial obligations. For those households who have more manageable debt and 

obligations, tax time offers an opportunity to get ahead by building up their emergency savings 

fund and starting a nest egg for financial goals that at other times during the year may only be 

aspirations. Some families might want to use the tax refund for both debt reduction and 

savings, to reduce the need for incurring more debt.

Despite substantial refunds that in many cases represent the largest lump sum low-income 

families receive during the course of the year, the vast majority do not set aside funds into a 

separate savings account while filing their return. 20 Research from one study conducted by the 

Center for Social Development (CSD) at Washington University in St. Louis indicates that these 

households actually do “save” at higher rates by setting aside funds for planned purposes for an 

extended period of time, but they may do so through mental accounting by keeping money in 

their checking accounts where the funds are also readily available in the case of emergency.21

 

18 https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/earned-income-tax-credit/do-i-qualify-for-earned-incometax-credit-eitc

19Internal Revenue Service EITC Outreach Earned Income Tax Credit Calculator 

https://apps.irs.gov/app/eitc2016/CalculateAgiExpense.doTax Year 2016. 

http://www.eitcoutreach.org/help/married-2-children/

20 According to IRS data in 2017 only 1.1 % of all consumers that filed returns and received a refund through VITA 

programs split their refund using form 8888 and less than 1% purchased Series I Savings Bonds. .

21 Findings from Refund to Savings, a large scale randomized control trial study being conducted by the Center for 

Social Development in collaboration with Intuit, distributors of the Turbo Tax Freedom Edition software, indicate 

that participants say that they save approximately 1/3 of their refund with the other 2/3 being distributed to 

spending and paying off debt. http://csd.wustl.edu/Publications/Documents/RR13-11.pdf
August 2017

15 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

4. Challenges and barriers for 

consumers to save at tax 

time

The majority of tax filers of all incomes receive a lump sum refund. The amount of the refund is 

dependent on a variety of factors including the amount the consumer chooses to have withheld 

in income taxes during the course of the year, 22 and their eligibility for a variety of credits and 

benefits built into the tax code. 

People living paycheck-to-paycheck, may fall short at times throughout the year. Many of the 

people who fall short count on their refunds to catch up by paying off past due bills or to meet 

current expenses. Qualifying for less than their expected refunds (which could happen, for 

example, due to a change in filing status or income from the previous year) can be extremely 

stressful. 

Because of this potential stress and the need for short term planning many consumers may have 

already mentally committed their refund to other known expenses before learning the precise

amount of the refund. Both commercial and volunteer providers report that this is by far the 

most common response by consumers as the reason they don’t choose to save.

 

22 The most common reasons cited for “over-withholding” are planned forced savings, taxpayers taking precautions 

against changes in filing status, and inertia, i.e., the failure to change withholding amount when filing status 

changes. Damon Jones, “Inertia and Over-withholding; Explaining the Prevalence of Income Tax Refunds,” 2012.

http://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/pol.4.1.158
August 2017

16 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Tax filers may not be offered or may not be aware of the opportunity to save while filing their 

return. People who self-prepare their taxes with software generally see an option to direct 

deposit their refund, but often without an explicit offer to save. People who seek assistance from 

commercial or volunteer preparers do not consistently hear about their savings choices. 

Tax filers do not have account information on hand. In tax assistance centers, even if a 

consumer wants to save they may not have the necessary information with them to route their 

money into a savings account. 

The majority of low-income filers seek assistance from a trained preparer to file their taxes.23 

VITA preparers annually prepare approximately 4 million returns serving around 3% of all 

taxpayers. However, the majority filers with low incomes use commercial preparers that charge 

a fee. For consumers with limited incomes and resources, paying for tax preparation services 

may reduce the amount of money available for saving.24

Tax filers may worry that savings will affect their benefit eligibility. Some consumers who 

receive public benefits to supplement their income are aware that having too much savings may 

jeopardize eligibility. These “asset limits” can cause recipients to be cautious about saving 

money in a formal account that they have to report or that could be tracked.25 

 

23 In tax year 2012 the IRS reported that 44.2% of tax filers with adjusted gross incomes less than $50,000 and 39.8% 

of tax filers that claimed the EITC prepared and filed their own tax returns. IRS Market Segment Summary Report. 

24 The average cost of a professional income tax preparer to handle a "typical" 2014 tax return (the one filed by April 

15, 2015) was $273 this year. This includes an itemized Form 1040 with Schedule A and a state tax return, according 

to the National Society of Accountants. Fees vary by region, as well as by the complexity of the return being filed. 

http://www.cpapracticeadvisor.com/news/12065684/average-income-tax-preparation-fees-increased-in-2015

25 Rourke O’Brien. Ineligible to Save? Asset Limits and the Savings Behavior of Welfare Recipients. New America 

Foundation 2006. http://newamerica.net/publications/policy/ineligible_to_save
August 2017

17 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

4.1 A Challenging Tax Time Environment in 

2017

In addition to the general challenges consumers face when considering saving at tax time the 

most recent 2017 tax season presented some unique additional barriers for both tax assistance 

providers and tax filers. 

1. The IRS provides tax filing software and training for free to all VITA programs. 26 In this 

most recent tax season the IRS changed software vendors. As often happens with 

upgrades or major software changes many users experienced a significant learning curve 

which drained resources from their tax time savings efforts. Participants in the 2017 tax 

time savings cohort reported a variety of challenges including difficulties with return 

processing and reporting that made preparing and filing returns plus processing savings 

requests more difficult than in past years. 

2. A number of adjustments to the tax code went into effect in 2017, one of which required 

the IRS to hold refunds which included either the EITC or the Additional Child Tax 

Credit (ACTC) (which are typically larger refunds offering potentially greater 

opportunities for savings) until after February 15. 27 Due to additional delays in check 

processing and funds transfers, the first refunds containing these two credits were not 

distributed to consumers until the last week of February in 2017.28 The rationale for this 

delay was to give the IRS more time to match tax returns with information provided by 

employers and also to reduce the incidence of tax fraud. 

 

26 The Internal Revenue Service, through its Stakeholder Partnerships, Education & Communication (SPEC) Division 

provides free software and corresponding training to VITA programs around the country. Through a competitive 

federal procurement the IRS selected a new software vendor starting in the 2017 tax season. 

27 The PROTECTING AMERICANS FROM TAX HIKES ACT was enacted in late 2015 and the tax code changes 

associated with EITC and ACTC payments went into effect in the 2017 tax season. 

https://waysandmeans.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/PATH_Act_xml.pdf

28 IRS Press Release. Avoid the Rush: EITC and ACTC Refunds Expected to Arrive the Week of Feb. 27. 

https://www.irs.gov/uac/newsroom/avoid-the-rush-use-irs-gov-to-track-status-of-tax-refunds
August 2017

18 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Both consumers and tax assistance providers were affected by this change in policy from 

previous years. Consumers who normally filed their tax returns in January as soon as 

tax season opened, and were used to receiving their refund within 2 to 3 weeks after 

filing, this year had to wait up to two to four additional weeks to receive their refund. 

For those tax filers that have in the past relied on their refund to pay necessary expenses 

the delay may have caused additional financial stress which might have been likely to 

decrease their inclination to save. 

It affected tax assistance providers because, based on filing patterns early in tax season,

it appears that knowledge of the new refund schedule spread among affected 

communities and individuals, and as a result many came into the tax sites later than 

usual. In 2017 early filing and return acceptance rates through February 17 were 

approximately 13% behind 2016 rates.29This may be an indication that some consumers 

heard about the refund delays and were adjusting their filing patterns accordingly. This, 

in turn, required adjustments to sites’ staffing and changed the timing of resource needs. 

 

29 Internal Revenue Service. Filing Season Statistics for Week Ending February 17, 2017. 

https://www.irs.gov/uac/newsroom/filing-season-statistics-for-week-ending-february-17-2017
August 2017

19 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

5. The gap between 

measureable savings and 

consumer intent to save

The IRS provides choices for filers to designate portions of their refund to be automatically 

deposited into up to three separate accounts. This is done through IRS Form 8888. Tax filers

can designate that funds be sent to their checking account, savings account, an individual 

retirement account (IRA), a health savings account (HSA), an Archer Medical Savings Account 

(MSA), other education savings accounts, or Treasury Direct online accounts. Consumers can 

also purchase up to $5,000 in Series I savings bonds.30 The IRS will automatically distribute the 

funds to whatever accounts the consumer chooses while filing their return. 

Despite the availability of a variety of saving choices a relatively small number of tax filers take 

advantage of this opportunity to save. In 2017 only 1.1 % of all consumers who filed returns and 

received a refund through VITA programs split their refund using Form 8888.31 The IRS does 

not track the number of consumers that choose to deposit their entire refund into a savings 

account or other savings vehicle, so there are limited ways to objectively measure savings rates

based on available IRS data. 

There are indications from the Center for Social Development (CSD) research that despite the 

low rates of formal saving while filing a return, consumer intent to save may be considerably

 

30 IRS Form 8888 Instructions. https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8888.pdf

31 IRS 2017 Tax Filing Season_May_Final.
August 2017

20 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

greater than what is demonstrated by available statistics. The CSD randomized control trial 

study32 involves embedding into the Intuit Turbo Tax Freedom edition (TTFE) software several

types of savings prompts which appear to the consumer immediately after they find out they are 

receiving a refund and before they actually file their tax return. Several of the prompts have 

demonstrated a statistically significant increase in people choosing to save a portion of their tax 

refund. 

As part of that research CSD conducts a survey immediately after the tax return is filed and a 

follow up survey approximately 6 months after the return is filed. CSD has found that at the 

time of filing, 7.5% of TTFE filers directly deposited at least some of their refunds into a savings 

vehicle (saving accounts or bonds). By contrast in the first survey, immediately following the 

filing of a tax return, 32% of respondents indicated an intention to save some of their refund, 

and 27% of the second survey respondents reported six months later that they still had at least 

some portion of the refund saved. These results are consistent with the preference, reported by 

a portion of savers, to transfer funds to savings accounts outside of the tax-filing process.33

The Refund to Savings findings indicate that there is a mismatch between the rate of savings we 

can easily measure with available IRS data and the intent and behavior of consumers in 

managing their tax refund. 

 

32 REFUND TO SAVINGS 2013: Comprehensive Report on a large-scale tax-time savings program. Center for 

Social Development CSD Research Report No. 15-06. https://csd.wustl.edu/Publications/Documents/RR15-06.pdf

33 Ibid.
August 2017

21 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

6. Setting the context for

encouraging saving 

Many VITA programs already offer additional services, including targeting efforts to encourage 

tax filers to consider savings through their tax programs. Some providers have identified and 

use a combination of communication, focus on specific services and consumer contacts that they 

have found effective. However, other VITA programs have tried these approaches with less 

success. 

From conversations conducted through our tax time saving project we have made some basic 

observations about the tax preparation environment that may shed light on why these initiatives 

demonstrate varying degrees of success.

1. Historically, filers with low incomes who expect refunds generally file their returns early in 

the tax season typically making the first month an extremely busy time for tax preparers. 

Volunteer staffed sites frequently have turnover from year to year and new volunteers need 

some time and repetition to feel fully confident in helping people file their returns. As a 

result they may find it difficult to have additional conversations with their clients about 

saving. Overcrowded sites can also make it difficult to offer additional product or service 

choices without disrupting customer flow. Thus, the primary audience for a saving initiative 

arrives at a difficult time for providers to talk about saving with their customers. It is 

possible that this trend of early filing will shift somewhat as a result of the permanent policy 

change prescribed by the passage of the PATH Act to delay refund payments which include 

either EITC or ACTC to at least February 15. While the delay may cause some burden for tax 

filers who are depending on receipt of their refunds it may also smooth out some of the early 

rush of customers at tax sites that has traditionally occurred in previous tax seasons.

2. For a variety of reasons consumers can find tax time stressful. Filing taxes is a once per year 

event. It’s complex because the tax code is a complicated body of laws and regulations. It is 

often high stakes because the consumer may be anticipating a refund of an unknown amount 
August 2017

22 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

which can change from year to year, or in some cases may be worried about how much they 

may owe in additional taxes. As a result many tax filers may be focused exclusively on 

getting their return completed and finding out whether they will get a refund. Approaching 

filers about additional services, including saving, may result in rejection even if at a less 

stressful time they might appreciate the information and assistance offered.
August 2017

23 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

7. Promising practices

Despite the challenges, what we have learned from our pilots and conversations is that many tax 

preparation assistance providers have successfully adopted strategies to engage consumers 

about additional opportunities and services during the tax event, including saving. Through our 

feedback from the 2017 tax season we learned that many VITA programs adopt a combination of 

these practices, sometimes to experiment which are the most effective, and often because of the 

nature of their relationships with their customers, funders and community make certain 

practices a natural fit within their VITA programs. This list of practices is by no means 

exhaustive, and there are many variations on how they are implemented. However through our 

inquiries we have found that these are among the most common practices that have shown the 

most promise of helping programs dedicated to assisting clients to meet their savings goals.

Helping Tax Filers to Choose to Save

1. Communicate with consumers about 

saving before they come to the tax site

Early engagement can contribute to an increased interest and an increased readiness to save. 

The most common refrain we hear from tax assistance providers, both volunteer and 

commercial, is that consumers are already mentally preparing how to spend their refund in 

advance of filing. There are a variety of opinions about when that planning starts, some 

providers say that it is an ongoing and annual planning process, while others believe that tax 

filers really start focusing on how to distribute their refund prior to the end of year holidays as 

they consider other major expenses that often occur during that season. Suffice it to say that 

each consumer has their own set of circumstances, including income spikes and dips, debt 

incurred, and other financial obligations that may focus them on the tax refund as a means to 
August 2017

24 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

escape from a negative financial situation or to advance their financial goals through the receipt 

of their tax refund. 

Providing a saving option for customers to consider while making that calculation about how to 

distribute their refund may be helpful. In many circumstances, “plan-making helps people to 

both remember their intentions at appropriate times and to activate pre-determined strategies 

for overcoming challenges they anticipate facing while acting on their intentions.”34 This 

“planfulness” may also make it more likely that consumers will take the additional steps 

necessary to follow through including predetermining which savings vehicle to use and to bring 

their account information with them when they come to a tax site to have their return prepared 

and filed.

A number of VITA programs in the 2017 cohort implemented this practice. The most 

comprehensive approach used was to include savings messaging in pre-tax season 

communication which a number of programs did through email and / or text messages to 

previous year customers. Programs that make appointments with customers were able to 

incorporate saving information and reminders into the appointment conversation. 

These types of pre-season communications allow for at least several consumer touches to offer 

saving choices so that the program is effectively “setting the table” for on-site communications 

through educational materials and through conversations with staff and volunteers at key stages 

during the time that the consumer is at the tax site. 

2. Offer the saving option more than once 

at the tax site

People may be more likely to follow through and save if the offer is made more than once. A 

common marketing principle is that it takes seven distinct communications or “touches” before 

someone will internalize and/or act upon a call to action. In this age of social media, with 

significantly higher rates of messaging input, that principle may mean an even larger number of 

 34 Rogers, T., Milkman, K. L., John, L. K., & Norton, M. I. Making the Best Laid Plans Better: How Plan-Making 

Prompts Increase Follow-Through. Behavioral Science and Policy; 2016.
August 2017

25 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

touches might be required. While executing multiple touches may not be practical for many 

VITA providers, attempting to reach consumers at least a few times before tax season and 

varying the means of communicating about the benefits and ease of saving may be beneficial. 

Some of the most successful VITA programs make sure their customers hear about their saving 

choices multiple times. Sometimes they provide advance information as described above in 

Promising Practice #1, and often staff and volunteers give each customer more than one 

opportunity to hear about their saving choices at key moments while at the tax site. Dedicated

staff, discussed in more detail below in Promising Practice #10, also provided several VITA 

programs in the 2017 cohort with additional capacity to have multiple conversations with 

customers. 

Multiple touches may help overcome consumer unfamiliarity with savings choices which would

lead to indecision. Sites and staff are reluctant to “pepper” tax filers with information, especially 

if they are resistant, but successful savings initiatives have found that the right level of “soft 

sales” of the saving opportunity may increase uptake while maintaining customer satisfaction.

3. Provide multiple product choices for 

saving 

Many tax filers who want to direct deposit their refunds know to bring their checkbook or their 

account and routing numbers to the tax site. But few of them remember to bring savings 

account information. Some tax filers do not have a savings account. Tax filers who want to save, 

but do not have a savings account, can purchase Series I savings bonds easily and quickly 

through IRS Form 8888, yet the uptake rate for savings bonds is extremely low . Only about .1% 

of tax filers receiving a refund at VITA sites purchased savings bonds through Form 8888 in 

2017.35 A relatively small number of VITA programs host staff from financial institutions on site 

to open accounts (checking and/or savings) on the spot for those consumers who want these 

accounts. This strategy has worked in some instances but many programs have abandoned this 

approach. Reasons include low demand relative to the time on site spent by financial institution 

staff, the cumbersome nature of opening an account; and the time and space that some 

 

35 IRS 2017 Tax Filing Season_May_Final.
August 2017

26 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

programs cannot afford to spare. A number of programs have found success in signing people 

up for prepaid products, allowing unbanked tax filers to receive refunds electronically. 

Fundamentally it is important to recognize that programs dedicated to encouraging saving have 

at least a few different saving choices for customers that may want to save but may not already 

have access to the saving product that is satisfactory prior to coming to file their tax return By 

offering a few alternative product options, programs may be more successful at “meeting some 

customers where they are” and helping them to fulfill their savings goals. 

4. Use “anchoring” and motivational 

prompts to help to focus the consumer 

on a saving goal.

Anchoring is a “particular form of priming effect whereby initial exposure to a number serves as 

a reference point and influences subsequent judgments about value.”36 Anchoring is used very 

commonly in all sorts of communications and marketing, such as suggested list prices for 

particular products. For people who are considering saving, providing a concrete 

recommendation of the amount, combined with a suggested purpose for saving, has been shown 

to be effective at increasing saving activity. This may be especially valuable for tax filers who 

have not considered saving previously and who may be inclined to forego the opportunity 

because they don’t know what the “right amount” is for them to save. 

Findings from the CSD Refund to Savings research have demonstrated that when tax filers were 

given a suggestion to save 25% or 50% of their refunds, and in some cases also offered suggested 

purposes such as for family or for an emergency, they were more likely to save.37 While this 

research was performed in an online environment using the Turbo Tax Freedom product, the 

approach may translate to in-person consumer engagements as well. 

 

36 Behavioral Economics.com. Anchoring (heuristic ). https://www.behavioraleconomics.com/mini-encyclopedia-ofbe/anchoring-heuristic/

37 Washington University in St. Louis. REFUND TO SAVINGS 2013: Comprehensive Report on a large-scale tax-time 

savings program 2015. http://csd.wustl.edu/Publications/Documents/RR15-06.pdf
August 2017

27 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

5. Don’t overwhelm consumers by 

offering too many different types of 

services 

Preparing and filing a tax return is often a stressful activity for any consumer. The high stakes 

of trying to anticipate whether you will receive a refund, how much the refund will be, or 

alternately whether you will end up owing money, can make it difficult to focus on any other 

information, even if it that other information could be beneficial. That is why our experience 

from working with VITA programs and with commercial preparers has led to the conclusion that 

overwhelming the tax filer with multiple offers of various types of services and opportunities can 

be counterproductive. 

Some programs in the 2017 cohort attempted to get a better understanding of consumer interest 

through short surveys or interviews conducted at intake. They used the intake information to 

tailor their conversation with clients and to direct them to the additional services in which they 

were most interested. In some cases, customers indicated that they only wanted to have their 

returns prepared and that sent a signal to the program staff and volunteers not to approach 

them about other services. Other programs made the up-front decision to only focus on one or 

two services in addition to tax preparation such as encouragement to save. 

The primary lesson from this targeted approach is that discerning each customer’s level of stress 

and interest in other services helps programs be more effective and efficient in encouraging 

savings.

6. Provide incentives, including nonfinancial rewards, to encourage saving 

A number of programs around the country have adopted a practice of providing incentives to tax 

filers who choose to save. Some are monetary and some are prized based. One example is 
August 2017

28 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

SaveYourRefund,38 a sweepstakes where the consumer can enter without any fee, to win cash 

prizes throughout tax season and a grand prize at the end of tax season. Even small financial 

incentives appear to increase the number of people who save. And, once they make the decision 

to save, tax filers often set aside more than the minimum to qualify for the incentive. 

In the 2017 cohort, programs utilized several incentive-based strategies to encourage saving. 

Some programs partnered with local businesses to give low denomination gift cards to savers. 

Others utilized straight cash incentives while one program collaborated with a corporate partner 

to give a scratch off card to anyone who split their refund. In this instance all the cards were 

winners but the cash value varied from $5 to $50. Some programs find non-cash merchandise 

rewards (such as a coffee mug or water bottle) are enough to increase saving take-up. 

7. Make saving fun and exciting

Many VITA programs have found ways to make saving fun for both tax filers and for their 

volunteers and staff. Sharing success stories and celebrating saving can provide inspiration to 

staff. Some VITA programs offer incentives like recognition and celebration at the tax site to 

acknowledge tax filers who follow through and save a portion of their refund. VITA programs 

with multiple sites or volunteer teams have set savings goals for each site or team, with friendly 

competitions to see which one generates the most savings. The good natured competition is not

just a way to score points—it increases enthusiasm on the part of front line service providers and 

in turn it offers volunteers a positive way to promote increased financial stability for customers. 

Successful programs that try to build some fun activities into their savings program are careful 

to underscore the importance of recognizing the very real economic challenges faced by the 

taxpayers they serve. “Fun” can backfire if tax filers see it as minimizing the challenges of 

savings and judging them for not saving. The excitement should come from overcoming the 

challenges to saving and celebrating that personal achievement. 

 

38 SaveYourRefund is a program of Doorways to Dreams (D2D) Fund. https://saveyourrefund.com/home/. The 

CFPB believes that these kinds of incentives programs can benefit consumers, but it does not officially endorse any 

particular incentives program.
August 2017

29 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Programs in the 2017 cohort utilized several approaches to make saving fun and exciting. For 

example some programs gave out stickers to each person who saved similar to the “I voted” 

stickers that people receive in many jurisdictions when they participate in elections. Others 

gave the stickers to the tax preparers or savings specialists who facilitated the savings as a gentle 

way of making progress visible and creating a sense of friendly competition among staff. A 

number of programs incorporated SaveYourRefund in their fun promotional efforts, while 

others used devices like a spinning wheel to award small prizes to people who saved. 

Training and Motivating Staff and Volunteers to Help Tax 

Filers to Save

8. Build commitment among staff and 

volunteers to encourage saving

Saving initiatives may be more successful if everyone—from leadership to volunteers—makes a 

commitment to the initiative. The business of running a tax site, or a full program with many 

sites, is technical, demanding, and fraught with challenges, especially early in tax season when 

volunteers have the least experience and the flow of customers is at its peak. Often,

understandably, activities other than tax preparation are not added. To encourage saving and 

limit distraction, all staff and volunteers need to be committed to encouraging saving and 

coordinated in their efforts. A Saving Specialist can be helpful, but it is difficult for that person 

to succeed alone. When a customer walks into a tax assistance site, they are typically met by a 

receptionist or greeter who checks them in and gathers any required intake information. When 

a tax preparer is available, they work with the customer to fill out the tax return. Finally, a 

quality control person likely will review the return for accuracy and gather any final information, 

signatures, or authorizations before completing the return. The tax preparer and the quality 

reviewer are in a position to help tax filers complete their requests to direct a portion of their 

refund to savings. When all of these key personnel believe in the savings goal, and understand 

their role in helping people consider and use savings choices, they will be more willing to take 

the time to explain choices, have tax customers fill out the necessary forms, and help the tax filer

direct money to savings. 

VITA programs in the 2017 cohort implemented this practice in several ways. Some started with 

recruiting volunteers who show a commitment to providing financial education or other 

financial empowerment strategies. That is an ideal approach but it is not always practical for 
August 2017

30 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

VITA programs that struggle to find a sufficient number of volunteers. Other programs 

appealed to volunteers by noting the additional benefit that providing opportunities for clients 

to save can enhance the benefit they derive from quality free tax service. Still other programs 

used terminology that resonated with volunteers’ desire to offer savings choices, which 

acknowledges that the decision lies with the individual tax filer. 

9. Make sure tax preparers know how to 

help consumers save while filing

Volunteers and staff should be trained on the steps for completing a tax return with saving. In 

post-tax season interviews, lack of training on how to help a person make savings choices 

emerged as a specific challenge. In 2017 this challenge was exacerbated because the large 

majority of VITA programs and their volunteers had to learn how to prepare taxes using an 

entirely new software platform provided by the IRS. Under normal circumstances volunteer 

training time is limited and it is understandably filled with information associated with 

completing an accurate return. Because of the software change in 2017 more of that limited 

time was dedicated to training on basic operations and less time was available for additional 

training on other services the programs might have wanted to provide to their clients such as 

encouraging saving.

Programs in the 2017 cohort attempted to overcome this challenge in a variety of ways. Some 

programs depended on the additional capability of a limited number of trained financial 

educators and coaches to serve as tax preparers so that at least one tax preparer on site had the

additional training and the requisite knowledge and experience to help tax filers follow through 

on their savings goals. Other programs that did not have the additional expert level staff 

available to serve as tax preparers relied more heavily on site coordinators who receive 

additional training to take the steps necessary to complete savings transactions. 

Under normal circumstances after basic training, most volunteers need an opportunity to 

completely work through mock returns or scenarios to understand the complicated process of 

using the tax preparation software. Training should introduce the process for how to help a 

consumer save while filing. Training should include at least one, and hopefully several,

scenarios or mock returns that includes splitting refunds and/or purchasing a bond to help the 

preparer feel more confident when a real consumer asks to save. 
August 2017

31 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

10. Dedicate staff or volunteers to 

encourage saving

Having dedicated staff or volunteers that focus on encouraging saving can make a difference in 

saving activity, as shown by several participants in the 2017 cohort. Many VITA programs have 

limited capacity to keep up with tax preparation demands and also devote attention to other 

related services offered at the tax site. Some successful programs have dedicated staff or 

volunteers as Savings Specialists to focus on saving outreach, without having the additional 

responsibility of preparing returns. The dedicated staff can engage with people when they check 

in to the site or in the waiting room to provide basic information about saving choices and to 

gauge consumer interest. Then, they can talk to tax filers again as the returns are being 

prepared or as they are reviewed before filing. This multiple-touch approach lets the staff 

member or volunteer develop a relationship, build trust, and provide information at key points.

A number of approaches were employed to implement this practice in the 2017 cohort. Several 

programs positioned trained financial coaches at each tax preparation session so that they 

would be available to help tax filers identify and follow through on their savings goals. Because 

of their work as financial coaches, these staffers drew on their training and experience helping 

consumers set personal financial goals and then commit to taking action toward those goals. 39

Other programs that may have not had financial coaches or counselors available provided 

special training on savings outreach to their greeter or intake specialist to engage the people 

when they entered the site or when they are filling out paperwork in the waiting room prior to 

having their tax return prepared. 

 39 Financial coaching draws from solution-focused therapy, an approach grounded in the idea that clients want to 

change their financial behaviors, are able to direct the changes they most want to achieve, and can actively work to 

practice and sustain their achievements. Financial coaches view clients as being self-directed, resourceful, and 

creative problem solvers. The coach is not there to fix problems for the client, but rather to support clients in making 

their own decisions about their goals and actions. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Implementing financial 

coaching: Implications for practitioners October 2016. 

https://s3.amazonaws.com/files.consumerfinance.gov/f/documents/102016_cfpb_Implementing_Financial_Coachi

ng_Implications_for_Practitioners.pdf
August 2017

32 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

8. Conclusion

The benefits of having even a small amount of savings include increased resiliency (the ability to 

bounce back financially), reduced use of high-cost financial services in response to a financial 

emergency, and reduced household stress. However, many consumers have no savings 

whatsoever and nearly half of all consumers could not easily come up with even $400 to fund an 

emergency expense. Tax time represents a unique opportunity for many consumers, 

particularly consumers with low incomes, to make that important decision by saving all or some 

of their tax refund. 

Given this opportune moment, it is important that VITA programs and other tax assistance 

providers that target communications for saving utilize effective strategies to help tax filers 

understand their choices and set and reach savings goals. Our work over the past five years 

suggests that some high level approaches, which have been empirically tested, include delivering 

a consistent message about the benefits of saving, encouraging consumers to commit to save 

before they receive the funds, and using an automated method to have their funds deposited 

into an account.40 A number of the practices we have identified in this paper reinforce those 

approaches. Taking advantage of the tax-time moment to encourage saving for financial goals, 

and assisting tax filers in following through, can help millions of consumers who may be assetpoor to begin to build wealth and to increase their financial security and resiliency.

To advance toward our long term goal of making savings outreach and education to consumers 

at tax time available to all and to test and refine promising practices for achieving that goal, the 

CFPB will continue to collaborate with both VITA programs and commercial tax preparers, as 

appropriate, in the coming years. We will also work with other government agencies, nonprofit

intermediaries and experts in the field to provide tools, resources and training to tax assistance 

 40 Sondra Beverly, Daniel Schneider and Peter Tufano; Splitting Tax Refunds and Building Savings: An Empirical 

Test. 2005. http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=814007
August 2017

33 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

providers to help them with their savings initiatives. Finally, we will collaborate with 

researchers to better understand consumer intent to save and the downstream effects of saving 

on consumer financial wellbeing.
August 2017

34 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Appendix I: Participating Organizations

Organization City State

Athens-Limestone County RSVP, Incorporated Athens AL

Southern Bancorp Community Partners Little Rock AR

Pio Decimo Center Tucson AZ

Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business 

Affairs Los Angeles CA

Tax Aid San Francisco CA

United Way California, Capital Region Sacramento CA

United Way of the Bay Area Oakland CA

United Way of the Wine Country Santa Rosa CA

Community Renewal Team Hartford CT

Connecticut Association for Human Services (CAHS) Hartford CT

LifeBridge Community Services Bridgeport CT

Nehemiah Gateway CDC Wilmington DE

Catalyst Miami Miami FL

Florida Prosperity Partnership Sanford FL

Hispanic Unity of Florida Hollywood FL

United Way Suncoast Tampa FL

Ladder Up Chicago IL

Community Action Program, Inc. (CAP) of Western Indiana Covington IN

Indiana Association of United Ways Indianapolis IN

John Boner Neighborhood Centers Indianapolis IN

Capital Area United Way Baton Rouge LA

Boston Tax Help Coalition Boston MA

Cambridge Economic Opportunity Committee (CEOC) Cambridge MA

The Neighborhood Developers - CONNECT Chelsea MA

Prince George's Community College Largo MD

Prosperity Center of Frederick County Fredrick MD

Unity Economic Development Corporation Suitland MD

Accounting Aid Society Detroit MI

Asset Independence Coalition Lansing MI

United Way of Bay County Bay City MI

United Way of Washtenaw County (UWWC) Ann Arbor MI

Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Detroit MI

RDI – Rural Dynamics, Inc. Great Falls MT

The Human Resource Development Council District 9 Bozeman MT

RSVP of Durham County VITA Durham NC

United Way of Greater Greensboro Greensboro NC
August 2017

35 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU 

Organization City State

Granite United Way Manchester NH

Citizen Action of New Jersey (aka New Jersey Citizen Action) Newark NJ

United Way of Central Jersey (UWCJ) Milltown NJ

United Way of Northern New Jersey Bridgewater NJ

Ariva, Inc. New York NY

The Upstate Institute Hamilton NY

Urban Upbound Long Island City NY

Potter's House Sciotoville OH

CASH Oregon Portland OR

Campaign for Working Families, Inc. Philadelphia PA

United Way of Lackawanna & Wayne Counties Scranton PA

The Cooperative Ministry Columbia SC

United Way of Greenville County Greenville SC

Texoma Council of Governments (TCOG) Sherman TX

United Way of Greater Houston Houston TX

United Way of Metropolitan Dallas Dallas TX

United Way of Tarrant County Fort Worth TX

United Way of the Coastal Bend Corpus Cristi TX

Rappahannock United Way Fredericksburg VA

United Way of King County Seattle WA

United Way of Kenosha County Kenosha WI

West Virginia Alliance for Sustainable Families Charleston WV