Last week, the Internal Revenue Service advised that tax refunds could be deferred a week this tax season. The delay is due to new anti-fraud safeguards that have been implemented to provide stronger protection against tax refund fraud.

In an email sent to tax preparers, the agency stated that the filing season had opened successfully and refunds had already started to go out to tax payers. However, "As with the start of any tax season, there are system validations that occur requiring some fine-tuning of our systems. As part of this, some taxpayers will receive refunds approximately one week later than initial projections they may have received, but these are still in line with historical refund delivery times."

Due to increased criticism for the increasing number of identity theft cases related to tax refunds, the IRS implemented a much more rigorous anti-fraud system. According to the IRS, the one-week delay is related to the fine tuning of this system.

Though there will be additional screening for fraud before issuing refunds, the IRS states that the vast majority of taxpayers can still to expect to receive their refunds in a timely fashion.