Training, Testing & Certification

Volunteer Information Advisory Message 

Tue 10/28/2025 1:59 PM

Dear VITA Partners,

Please see the below alert which I wanted to share to everyone receiving this message.   I hope that all of you receiving this message have a wonderful week coming up!   What all of you and your volunteers do for the VITA cause is outstanding. 

This Information Advisory is being sent to provide filing season readiness information for Filing Season 2026.

Background: The Form 6744 VITA/TCE Volunteer Test/Retest questions are based on pre-OBBBA tax law. Therefore, all test answers are also based on pre-OBBBA tax law in effect at the time. This may cause volunteers to make inadvertent errors when completing certification tests.  

Message for volunteers: Volunteers should base their certification test/retest answers using the tax law content shown in the lessons of the Publication 4491 and Publication 4012. Volunteers should NOT base their test/retest answers on OBBBA tax law changes. The Link & Learn Taxes Certification site is programmed for pre-OBBBA tax law answers only.  

This page includes information needed to access Link & Learn Taxes online training, testing and certification resources, and Practice Lab. 

Training Resources

The focus for all online training and certification is the IRS site, VITA/TCE Central.

Each year before the start of the filing season, every volunteer must be trained and certified using resources at this site. In-person classes will also be held for new preparers, but certification depends on mastery of the following self-study resources at VITA/TCE Central:

• Pub 4961 - VITA/TCE Volunteer Standards of Conduct  (Revised for TY2025)

• Pub 5101 - Intake Interview and Quality Review Training (TY2025)

• Link & Learn Tax Lessons, Advanced Topics course (WAIT - this isn't ready for TY2025) and Pub 4491 - VITA/TCE Training Guide (TY2025)

• Pub 6744 - VITA Volunteer Assistor's Test/Retest (TY2025) 

• Pub 4012 - VITA Volunteer Resource Guide (TY2025)

These online pubs and course modules will be available at VITA/TCE Central sometime after Nov 15, 2025.

Problems and Exercises

• Form 6744 - VITA Volunteer Assistors Test/Retest (TY2025) contains all possible questions, problems and scenarios for all the certification exams.  These practice problems can be used to exercise and verify your mastery of the training material before you certify.  Pub 6744 is available through the Quick Link, "Certification Test/Retest PDFs" at VITA/TCE Central. Note that there are some errors in this PDF for Basic and Military tests. included here:  Errors in Cert Exams (Volunteer Tax Alert 2026-01 and VTA 2026-02). 

• !VITA Team TY2025 - As available, training handouts and practice problems with solutions from the local team will be posted in the Team Drive folder. 

TaxSlayer Software Training & Practice Lab

In addition to tax law training, training and practice for TaxSlayer software is available at the Practice Lab link at Link & Learn.  The Practice Lab home page contains training modules and practice problems for learning to use the software.

To get to Practice Lab

• • Go to VITA/TCE Central, and click the Practice Lab quick link.

  • Enter the gateway password "TRAINPROWEB" (not your personal password) and click Login.

  • On the next screen, enter your personal login ID and password, or click Create Account and enter the information required.  When creating an account, select VITA as the Program Type.  You may ignore the SIDN.  Be sure to record your password.

Tips for Using Practice Lab

• At the Practice Lab home screen, you can search for any returns you have created or create a new "fake" client return.

• Make up addresses and phone numbers and Social Security numbers (SSNs) for the clients.

• SSNs and Employer IDs (EINs) can be any 9 digits.   

• As you click the Continue button, Practice Lab saves all the information in the return and updates all calculated fields.

• Use "Save & Exit" on the left menu to close the return to go to your Practice Lab home screen. 

For more information on accessing TaxSlayer training and Practice Lab, see the TaxSlayer Software & Training of this website.

Certification Tests for All Volunteers

All volunteers must be certified annually.  Your certification is due by Noon on Friday January 30, 2026.  The following is a summary of the testing requirements. Two certifications are required by all volunteers with additional tests required for Tax Preparers, Quality Reviewers and Site Coordinators.

1. All Volunteers

• Volunteer Standards of Conduct (VSOC) certification exam after mastering Pub 4961 - VITA/TCE Volunteer Standards of Conduct. (TY2025)

• Appointment Schedulers & Receptionists must pass one certification exam in order to volunteer.

2. Tax Preparers & Quality Reviewers

• Intake/Interview and Quality Review Certification exam, after mastering Pub 5101 - Intake Interview and Quality Review Training. (TY2025)

• Advanced Topics exam after mastering the online training courses under the "Advanced Menu" in the Link & Learn Tax Lessons, and Pub 4491, VITA Training Guide. (TY2025) You will find relevant references to Pub 4491 content in the various modules of the Advanced courses.

• Tax Preparers, do not take the Basic course or exam.  Basic topics are completely covered by the Advanced Topics course and exam.

• Tax preparers must complete three certification exams in order to sign-up and volunteer (sections 1 & 2).

3. Quality Reviewers and Site Coordinators

• Site Coordinator certification exam after mastering Pub 5088 - Site Coordinator Training (TY2025) and Pub 5683 - Site Coordinators Handbook. (TY2025)

• The Site Coordinator Test will be added to your certification test list if you answer 'yes' to the option, "Do you want to take the Site Coordinator certification?" when you create or update your Certification Account profile.

• Quality Reviewers and Site Coordinators must complete four certification exams in order to volunteer (sections 1, 2 & 3).

Testing Process

Certification is accomplished online by logging into Certification Tests at VITA/TCE Central.  

• VITA/TCE Central may be accessed at https://linklearncertification.com. Users will be able to use their old username and password to access the site, you must login using the email address you used to access the system last year. If you don't recall your password, use the forgot password link (as shown below) and follow the prompts.

• New volunteers will need to click on the Create new account button and follow the prompts. 

  • Use Group 01- VITA Volunteer

  • Include your cell phone number 

  • Area 1

  • Orange County Dept on Aging VITA for your sponsoring organization name 

  • Provide the other required information.  

  • Click the green Save button at the top of the screen

When taking the certification tests, be sure to select the "Advanced" tests tab.

• • The VSOC test is a prerequisite for all other tests.  You may take any other test at any time.

  • You have two tries to pass each test (80% correct).  You may "re-test" only once.

Registering Your Certification

Once you have passed the Advanced Exam, submit your signed Volunteer Agreement with test results before noon on January 30, 2026, as follows:

• On the testing menu, select "Sign your Volunteer Agreement", then click to open the agreement as a pdf file.

• Check your agreement for your Legal first and last name, current address, cell phone number, Sponsoring organization name and the number of years you've volunteered (including this upcoming season.

• If you need to update any information, go the profile section, make changes, Save them, then go back to the Volunteer Agreement section of the website and click the button to Regenerate and sign again. Download thee updated agreement and check it again.

• Change the file name to your last name and save it to your desktop or other convenient place on your device.

• Open an email and attach your Volunteer Agreement to the email.  Add your cell phone number to body of the email and send to vitacertify@gmail.com.

• Please remember to include your cellphone number in the email.

NC Tax Law Training

The IRS does not require certification in state tax law, but North Carolina supports VITA training in NC tax law at the NC Department of Revenue site.  

NC Tax Manual and self-test for VITA can be found at http://www.dornc.com/practitioner/vita/index.html. (TY2024 - check back for updates)

TaxSlayer typically releases current year support for NC tax returns later than for Federal returns. 

Training Tip:  Viewing Multiple Windows

You can use multiple windows to put Practice Lab and the PDF version of the practice problem on the screen, side by side:  

• Open a browser window

• Click the "restore down" (middle) icon the box in the upper rightmost corner, 

• Key CTL-n to open a second browser window.

• In Windows 10

• Drag one window all the way into the right edge of the screen and release.

• Next click on the window you want to be on the left half of the screen.

• You should have the two windows side-by-side on the screen.  If you drag the dividing line between the screens right or left you can change the proportional size of both windows, simultaneously.

The windows can be any open program windows.  For instance, one could be your browser with Practice Lab open, and the other could be Adobe Acrobat open with a practice problem PDF file.

>>> For example, the figure below shows browser windows with the PDF of a Practice Return and Practice Lab .