the genius of bureaucracy

Happy Tax Day, U.S. readers. Today's utterly-dumb-Web-site anecdote is brought to you by none other than the U.S. Treasury.

If, like many business owners, you have to make quarterly tax payments, you might at some point decide that filling out paper vouchers and mailing them in along with your checks might not be all that convenient. And so you might go looking for a Web site where maybe you can just make your payments online. If so, you would likely find the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System.

Sounds handy, right? Wait 'til you try to set up an account. Here are the steps:

1. Register online for your account.
2. Wait roughly two weeks for a letter via the postal service, supposedly containing further instructions and a PIN number for setting up your account.
3. Receive the letter containing said PIN and attempt to use it to log on to the Web site -- and then realize that, in addition to the PIN, you need an "Internet password".
4. Re-read the letter and realize that you must call a customer service center to receive your Internet password.
5. Call the center and provide the PIN... and a separate 16-digit "enrollment trace number" noted on the PIN letter.
6. Return to the Web site yet again and provide your PIN, and Internet password... and Social Security Number.
7. Make yourself a stiff drink.

It takes fewer steps to launch Russian warheads. Banks, online brokerages, credit card services, and pretty much all other types of financial institution long ago figured out a security model that takes less than 5 minutes to complete -- and doesn't require the triangulation of your Internet, postal, and telephony services. Why can't the IRS follow suit?

Oh, and keep in mind that if you wait until April 14 before logging on and trying to schedule a payment for the next business day, you'll get a peculiar error telling you that you have entered an invalid date. That's right, April 15 -- Tax Day -- is an invalid date, according to the EFTPS. Why? This "24 hours a day" service doesn't accept payments after 8PM Eastern on the day before taxes are due. Silly you.

The best part? For sure, it's the first line of the EFTPS enrollment letter, which states: We have received your enrollment information for EFTPS, the easiest way to pay your federal taxes.