John Koskinen, President Barack Obama’s nominee to run the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, said at a Senate panel’s confirmation hearing that he would work to restore the public’s trust in the tax agency. “With 95,000 employees and the range of challenges the agency faces, mistakes will happen,” Koskinen said today in prepared testimony for the […]
The IRS is starting this year’s Earned Income Tax Credit due diligence compliance audits of return preparers. To select preparers for audits, the service will “look at returns with a high chance of errors competed by the same preparer,” according to the IRS.gov. The audits review at least 25 EITC returns for the preparer’s due-diligence […]
This coming tax year will be host to some new tax forms that will probably be around for the long haul. The new forms relate to the impending facilitation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) and the child tax credit. New forms to the 1040 series package: -Form 8959, Additional Medicare Tax […]
Tax planning help may be needed for taxpayers who, through a combination of tax credits, usually receive a tax refund as opposed to owing, which may be just the opposite in the next couple of years as many common and often used tax credits are set to expire. The following common tax deductions and credits […]
Warning letters are being sent this month and throughout December to tax preparers who potentially have filed erred or inaccurate EITC claims. The IRS is also planning on continuing their “knock & talk” campaign for preparer education this tax season, where they will be physically visiting offices with high percentages of EITC recalculation due to […]
The IRS has their preparers test in place and is now scheduling for preparers to take the examination. To avoid having to take the examination prior to Dec 31st, 2013 preparers must act soon. 2011 PTINs expire on December 31st, 2011, and are now scheduled to expire on the close of each calender year going […]
Along with the slew of changes and new regulations that have come down from the IRS and the Registered Return Preparers Office over the past 2 years was a provision mandating that all registered tax return preparers be fingerprinted. IRS Commissioner, Doug Shulman, stated yesterday that the fingerprinting requirement associated with registering all tax return […]
IRS released new information today highlighting increases in EITC preparer fraud penalties. The standard monetary penalty has increased from $100 to $500 per compliance issue on returns filed after 12/31/2011. For more information on avoiding preparer compliance penalties visit the IRS’ EITC Website for more information. This recent update was just released today, 11/7/2011, and […]
The IRS will be filing all returns through the new Modernized E-File (MEF) system this coming tax season. This translates to your clients getting their refunds in as little as 5 days. This represents a reduction in refund delays by 2 days. The IRS reserves the right to delay returns with questionable Earned Income Tax […]
For the coming 2011 tax season, the IRS has changed the date they will start accepting e-filed returns to January 17th, 2012. This is a Tuesday and return filed should be acknowledged by the IRS within 24 hours, as opposed to previous seasons where the first days’ acknowledgements would be delayed for 48 – 72 […]