Last week already showed signs of severe weakness. This week confirms it.
Total ERC dollar volume has now dropped to its lowest level since December 2024, another step down from an already soft prior week and a consistently weakening trend. At this point, it’s hard to characterize what we’re seeing as “processing” in any meaningful sense.
What’s left is almost entirely a cleanup of special situations. There’s still no real movement where we hope we’d see it.
Here’s how this week compares to last week:
Total Refunds: 59 (vs. 122 last week – down 63/-52%)
Total Dollar Volume: $3.18M (vs. $14.7M — down $11.5M / -78%; lowest since Dec. 2024)
Average Refund: $53,931 (vs. $120,742 — down ~$67K / -55%; lowest since March 2025)
Denials: 2 (vs. 14 — down 12)
New Audits: 0 (vs. 1 — no meaningful change)
The week-over-week drop isn’t just another pullback; it’s a marked reversion to the underlying reality of the ERC environment.
Last week showed what happens when a few larger, special-situation refunds hit the system. This week shows what’s left when they don’t.
And what’s left is telling:
Meanwhile, the real story continues to build beneath the surface: a massive inventory of pending appeals and audit outcomes that have yet to fully work through the system.
One additional observation: every time we’re asked to review a transcript tied to an ERC claim, there’s almost always something off once you dig in. Misapplied credits, unexplained freezes, partial adjustments, or signals that don’t reconcile cleanly with the original filing position.
The easy claims are gone. The clean ones are too.
What remains is messy, inconsistent, and far from resolved.
Amid the somber ERC situation, we’re seeing a noticeable shift in where advisors are spending their time. As ERC becomes more uncertain, more complex, and more expensive to pursue through appeals or litigation, attention is increasingly turning toward penalty and interest recovery tied to the pandemic.
Not because it’s trendy, but because it’s simply more practical, and the opportunity expires in fewer than 80 days.
That's exactly the gap PenaltyBack was built to address: the short window of opportunity.
We’ve also begun partnering with a growing number of ERC processors through our PenaltyBack affiliate program (see www.penaltyback.com/partners/signup).
Last week’s ERC spike gave the illusion of momentum.
This week reinforces the reality:
ERC isn’t progressing — it’s being slowly and unevenly cleaned up at the margins.
Disclaimer: *𝘋𝘢𝘵𝘢 𝘴𝘦𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘹𝘪𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘺 15,000 𝘣𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘌𝘙𝘊*
