June 17, 2015
Reduced budgets and collection resources at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) have resulted in declines in taxpayer service, case closures, and dollars collected, according to a report released today by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax ...
June 17, 2015
Taxpayers are all smiles when they are able to sell their principal residence at a sizeable gain and avoid any tax liability. Under the home sale exclusion, they can generally exclude up to $250,000 of gain from tax or $500,000 if they are married and ...
June 16, 2015
Congress created Empowerment Zones in 1993. Most zones had an expiration date of Dec. 31, 2009. This is the third extension of the expiration date.
June 11, 2015
Under the Internal Revenue Code, the rate of interest is determined on a quarterly basis. For taxpayers other than corporations, the overpayment and underpayment rate is the federal short-term rate plus 3 percentage points.
June 10, 2015
The fiscal year 2016 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill, which provides funding for the Treasury Department, the Judiciary, the Small Business Administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and several other agencies.
June 5, 2015
As if getting audited wasn’t bad enough, now the IRS has added a new twist: the short timeframe audit. With these types of audits, it is possible that an audit case could be closed by the IRS before your client has a chance to show you the letter. This ar
May 28, 2015
The extent of the IRS’s ability to stem this problem is still limited because it does not have access to third-party income and withholding information until well after tax return filing begins.
May 27, 2015
A whopping 11 percent of Americans believe that it is okay to cheat on their taxes, according to the most recent IRS Oversight Board Survey of Taxpayer Attitudes. Unfortunately, successful fraud for many individuals will require either lying to their ...
May 27, 2015
Taxpayers whose accounts were compromised will be notified by the Internal Revenue Service. Individuals who believe their identities have been compromised in this, or any other attempt, should review the IRS “Taxpayer Guide to Identity Theft,” which ...
May 27, 2015
A serious security breach at the IRS has the agency scrambling to beef up its ID theft efforts while the public and lawmakers stew. The IRS announced on May 26 that hackers had gained access to the personal information of more than 100,000 American househ
May 19, 2015
Concerned about the impact of IRS service reductions on taxpayers and tax practitioners, the AICPA Council on May 17 adopted a resolution urging policy makers to create a bi-partisan forum to “make recommendations that enable the IRS to achieve its ...
May 12, 2015
So you think you’re a progressive firm, right? You’re committed to going digital and eliminating, or at least minimizing, paper. Your engagement letters are all electronic and are emailed to clients and prospects for signature.