WASHINGTON ― Few Americans take advantage of free online tax filing, opting instead to pay for services such as TurboTax, and consumer advocates say Congress is trying to keep it that way.

The Internal Revenue Service would be disallowed from creating its own system for free online tax filing under a bipartisan bill the House passed Tuesday.

The IRS currently partners with private companies to provide free online tax filing services to the lowest 70% of taxpayers by income, but only about 3% of taxpayers use it. Others fork over $1 billion annually to tax prep companies like H&R Block, according to an estimate by ProPublica.

The free filing provision is a small part of a broader IRS reform bill authored by Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) and Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.). It passed the House Tuesday by voice vote, meaning it was so popular lawmakers didn’t think it was worth having a roll call vote.

“The bill is a good bill,” Lewis said. “Whatever the problem may be, we will fix it.”

The Taxpayer First Act does things that consumer advocates like. One section prevents the IRS from referring lower-income cases to debt collectors, and another exempts poorer people from certain fees.

The bill specifies that the IRS should continue to operate its free filing program “cooperatively with the private sector,” which effectively prohibits the IRS from creating its own free program. In its memorandum of understanding with a consortium of tax software companies know as the Free File Alliance, the IRS promises not to provide free online tax filing itself. The language in the bill codifies the arrangement between the companies and the IRS, which had not previously been a matter of law, according to the bill’s critics.

“The provision very clearly prohibits the IRS from ever developing and offering free tax preparation and filing products to taxpayers,” said Mandi Matlock, a tax attorney who works for the National Consumer Law Center on a contract basis.