While the numbers show that most professional tax return preparers use computers to prepare tax returns but still give their clients a paper tax return to mail to the IRS, the tide is shifting, and this year 39.4 million tax returns - approximately 30% of all returns expected to be filed - were filed electronically. This news makes the folks at the IRS happy, since they are trying to meet a goal mandated by Congress that 80 percent of taxpayers use electronic tax filing by 2007.

Other statistics for this filing season, according to the IRS, include:

• 109.5 million federal income tax returns have been filed so far, down 3.7 percent from last year.
• 39.4 million federal income tax returns have been filed electronically, up 13 percent from last year.
• It is anticipated that the IRS will issue 72.8 million tax refunds this year at an average of $1,714 per refund. This quantity is down .2 percent from last year.
• The IRS Web site showed a 100 percent increase in tax forms downloaded and recorded 1.5 billion visits this spring.
• The IRS answered more than 59 million phone calls this spring, up 16 percent from last year.
• The IRS claims to have answered tax law questions correctly 78 percent of the time.
• 83 million tax returns have been processed to date.