In life, nothing is certain except death and taxes -- unless it is confusion with taxes. Less than two weeks remain in the rush before the April 15 deadline, and baffled taxpayers are descending upon tax preparers across the nation. Filling out a 2001 tax return has proven difficult for some this fiscal season. The advance payments on Bush's rate reduction credit have taxpayers filling out their 1040 forms incorrectly, according to the Internal Revenue Service.

"The rebate problem has been the biggest problem we have been having this year," said Laurie Ruffino, IRS media specialist. Ruffino said a lot of people sent their tax returns in only to have them returned because of mistakes. Tammy Chronister, general manager of Jackson Hewitt Tax Service, 1786 N. Atherton St., said she has been seeing some similar confusion.

"The main thing that has been causing a lot of grief is the rate of reduction," she said. People came in with their taxes prepared incorrectly this year and needed help, Chronister said. Some thought they had to include the advance payment in their return. Others received the rebate and now are trying to claim it. Sometimes, depending on how many W2s there are, preparing the returns might take a couple of hours.

"People are just not understanding the whole rebate," she said. But the reduction credit is not the only twist in this tax season. Timothy Marshall, certified public accountant of Marshall &Associates, 1375 Martin St., said his clients are not having problems with the reduction credit, however new laws are surfacing.

"They're changing the laws all the time," Marshall said, adding some new laws hit the books after people have already filed their returns. The newest law was enacted last month.

"There was a tax law on March 9 that retroactively affects tax returns," he said. The new law is a fixed asset law, and it affects property purchases after Sept. 11.

"Any property purchased after Sept. 11, you're allowed an extra 3 percent depreciation expense," Marshall said.

Thomas Kirsch, senior tax advisor at H&R Block, 2071 S. Atherton St., said there are 441 new tax laws this year.

The IRS stated on its Web site that taxpayers who are worried about errors on their tax returns should wait to see if it is caught during processing.

"If people received the full amount from last year, or even if they're not sure, leave the line blank," Ruffino said emphatically. "If they leave it blank, we'll check for them."