Melkia
Small Business/Self Employed Revenue Agent

As an agent, what I do is, I audit small businesses, self-employed individuals. I call them on a daily basis, communicating to them that their tax return was selected for audit, and explain to them their taxpayer rights, explain to them the examination process, and walk them through
the entire audit.

This also includes me going out to their business and auditing their business, looking at their internal controls, looking at their books and records, looking at their financial statements, and just making sure that what's on the tax return is in compliance with the Internal Revenue Code.

As a Revenue Agent, every day is a different day. You may audit the same issue, but the issue, because it's a different taxpayer, there are different facts and circumstances, and the issue
will not be the same.

It will never be a boring day. When we get a tax return, we're just looking at a name and information and looking at numbers. The best part is actually meeting that taxpayer and see, who is this person behind this tax return, finding out, what's their story?

It's an honor to sit in front of a self-employed individual and see, what did they go through to get that company started?

The requirements for Internal Revenue Agent position is that you have to possess a four-year degree from an accredited college, which includes 30 semester hours in accounting. So the 30 hours has to include 24 credit hours of core accounting credits and six credit hours in business.

Coming to the IRS with an accounting degree, versus going to public accounting or private accounting, it opens up more opportunities for you. Also, one of the benefits is, I'm not required to work a 60-hour work week, as my girlfriend, who's a manager in a public accounting firm, and friends who are staff accountants are.

I work a 40-hour work week. Maybe sometimes I do do extra hours because of what I'm working on, but it's not a requirement. There are so many opportunities within the IRS. You start your career off as a Revenue Agent.

You work your career for five or six years. You can always look in other avenues within the organization, such as the Chief Financial Officer.

There are accountants there, doing the internal accounting work, preparing the financial statements, doing the audits for the IRS itself. There's also our Office of Procurement. 

So there are so many opportunities that someone with an accounting degree can do. You won't feel like you come here and you get stuck.