SEC. 6. ELECTRONIC — Internal Revenue Bulletin 2000-47

.01 Electronically filed information may be submitted to IRS/MCC 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Technical assistance will be available Monday through Friday between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Eastern time by calling 304-263-8700 .

.02 The FIRE System will be down from December 29, 2000, through January 7, 2001. This will allow time for IRS/MCC to update its system to reflect current year changes.

.03 Data compression is encouraged when submitting information returns electronically. WinZip and PKZip are acceptable com- pression packages. UNIX COMPRESS may be acceptable; however, a test file is recommended to verify compatibility. IRS/MCC cannot accept self-extracting zip files or compressed files containing multiple files.

The time required to transmit information returns electronically will vary depending on the modem speed and the type of data compression used, if any. The time required to transmit a file can be reduced by as much as 95 percent by using software compression and hardware compression.

The following are actual transmission rates achieved in test uploads at MCC using compressed files. The actual transmission rates will vary depending on the modem speeds.

Transmission Speed in bps	1000 Records	10,000 Records	100,000 Records
19.2K	34 Sec.	6 Min.	60 Min.
56K	20 Sec.	3 1/2 Min.	33 Min.
128K (ISDN)	8 Sec.	1 Min.	10 Min.

.04 Files submitted electronically will be assigned a unique filename by the FIRE System (the users may name files anything they choose from their end). The filename assigned by the FIRE System will consist of submission type [TEST, ORIG (original), CORR (correction), and REPL (replacement)], the filer’s TCC and a four-digit number sequence. The sequence number will be incremented for every file sent. For example, if it is your first original file for the calendar year and your TCC is 44444, the IRS assigned filename would be ORIG.44444.0001. Record the filename. This information will be needed by MCC in order to identify the file, if assistance is required, and to complete Form 4804.

.05 Filers are advised not to resubmit an entire file if records were omitted from the original transmission. This will result in duplicate filing. A new file should be sent consisting of the records that had not previously been submitted.