FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 7, 1998

South Carolina residents file tax returns with home phone

The telephone is the cheapest, fastest and most effective tool to use in filing your 1997 South Carolina income tax return.

About 400,000 South Carolina residents are eligible to use Telefile, the South Carolina Department of Revenue's system for filing tax returns by telephone. Telefile was first introduced last year and used by 52,000 people.

The Department of Revenue is taking extra steps this year to encourage more people to take advantage of Telefile, by offering more benefits:

1. Taxpayers who use Telefile will be able to use the direct-deposit option for their refunds. This will shave several more days off an already quick turnaround on refunds.

2. Taxpayers who had income from unemployment compensation will be able to use Telefile this year.

3. Taxpayers who live in Greenville, Spartanburg, Myrtle Beach and Charleston - as well as Columbia - will be able to call Telefile as a local call saving money on long distance charges. Last year, our only phone number was for the Columbia area.

"Telefile is simple," said Department of Revenue Director Burnet R. Maybank III. "You file by phone and get your refund back in less than three weeks. What could be easier than that?"

"The benefit to us as taxpayers," Maybank added, "is that Telefile costs just a fraction of what paper returns cost to process."

The benefits of Telefile include:

• No complicated return to fill out and the computer does all the math.

• Telefile cuts the time it takes to get a refund in half.

• Taxpayers save money with Telefile. Because the tax return goes directly into the computer, no one has to handle the mail, open and sort tax returns and enter the information into the computer, saving taxpayer dollars.

• It's convenient - call any time, night or day.

• Telefile eliminates the fear of a tax return being "lost in the mail".

Because Telefile is completely automated, the Department of Revenue saves money because it does not handle the returns. And if taxpayers take advantage of direct deposit, the savings is even greater. It costs the state about 45 cents to issue a paper check versus about 10 cents to issue a direct deposit refund.

Special tax packages are mailed to eligible taxpayers to allow them to use the Telefile program. Telefile is available to single taxpayers with no children and taxable incomes of $50,000 or less. Only those receiving the Telefile package in the mail may participate.

Taxpayers with a touch-tone phone may call the Telefile phone number and enter all the tax information over the phone. The information goes directly to a computer which calculates the amount of the refund or additional tax due. Before hanging up, the computer will provide the taxpayer with a confirmation number as proof that the tax return has been filed.

The refund is automatically processed and sent to the taxpayer in fewer than three weeks, less than half the time it takes to receive a refund from a paper return. If additional tax is owed, it does not have to be paid until April 15. Using direct deposit offers an even faster refund.

Taxpayers may call Telefile 24 hours daily from any telephone. The typical call takes about 8 minutes to complete. Peak times for Telefile calls are Monday-Friday, 4 p.m. to midnight, so taxpayers may wish to call at other times to ensure getting an open phone line.