Where to get tax forms

To order a Maine income tax form or booklet for 2009, taxpayers may either go online at www.maine.gov/revenue/forms to get the forms or call the Maine Revenue Services forms line, available 24 hours a day, and leave name, address and order at 207-624-7894.

The paper forms may also be ordered online via the electronic request form, www.maine.gov/forms, and scroll to the category “Income/Estate Tax” and select last item on the list. That’s according to an e-mail from Anthony Gould, Tax Division assistant director.

The link is also available in the right legend at wwww.main.gov/forms/1040/2009.htm.

Forms may be ordered as well at the addresses available on the contact information page at www.maine.gov/revenue (select the “Contact Us” link and scroll to “Income/Estate Tax Division”). The mailing address is Maine Revenue Services, 24 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333-0024 and the e-mail address is [email protected].

There is also an e-mail address of [email protected].

Many taxpayers can also file online via the Maine I-file program at www.maine.gov/revenue/

Select Electronic Services in the left legend, Gould said.

Individuals may also order forms by calling the taxpayer assistance line at 207-626-8475 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, except holidays and state shutdown days. NexTalk (TTY Service) is available at 888-577-6690.

Information on how to get forms is included on the information sheets Maine Revenue Services provided public service agencies at banks, libraries, legislators, post offices, Internal Revenue Service offices and others.

FARMINGTON — If you’re one of those who wait to the last minute to get your state income tax forms, you better change your strategy. They’re not where they used to be.

If you didn’t file an individual income tax form by paper last year, you wouldn’t have been mailed one of the 93,000 packages that included the tax information booklets for 2009 that the state directly mailed to those individuals in late December.

In past years, libraries and post offices around the state carried tax forms for the state. They do still carry the federal forms, at least one library director said.

Elizabeth and Patrick Lundy, senior citizens from Weld, were surprised Thursday to learn that the forms were not available as they have been in the past. Fortunately, they have a computer and a printer and know how to use it, Elizabeth Lundy said. But the information booklet is 90 pages, she said.

“We are awfully concerned for people who don’t have the education, and elderly people would find this very confusing,” she said.

There is also the issue that even if someone has a computer and printer, they may not have high-speed Internet, especially in rural Maine.

In an effort to be more efficient with taxpayers’ dollars, government officials sent libraries and post offices only a one page sheet giving residents a telephone number, a Web site address, or a mailing address where they could get those forms and the booklets, said Dennis Doiron, director of Income Tax at the Maine State Revenue Service on Thursday. For those people who filed online last year, he said, they were sent e-mails with the information.

Farmington Public Library Director Melanie Coombs said the state has been pulling back on sending forms for the last few years. They had an abundance of them, but last year they only received one box of forms and they were gone in a few days, she said.

She called to order more and was told they were not going to get any more, she said. However, they did send 50 to 100 fliers saying where people could get them.

This year, they didn’t get any forms at all, she said.

They sent out the fliers listing where the booklet and forms could be ordered or downloaded, she said.

“It’s not even a toll free number to call or you could order them and they’ll send you them by snail mail,” Coombs said. “We had no way of knowing this was coming and we were left fielding the complaints.”

“We do have the federal forms and we can reorder,” she said.

The library, like other libraries around the state, does have computers the public can use. But if someone wants to print something, Coombs said, such as a form then it will cost 10 cents a page.

The state should have changed the way it made the booklets to make it more cost efficient, she said. The federal booklets are made out of a newspaper type paper, while the state booklets were formerly made of good quality paper.

“But to have no forms, it’s crazy,” Coombs said. “It’s definitely a problem for us. We want to provide the service we can to the public.”

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