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Wednesday, April 28th, 2010
Jim Angle of FOXnews.com reports that Americans involved in hiding offshore funds in Swiss Bank UBS have inspired the IRS to establish a new unit which will track high-wealth individuals operating globally. The IRS is ready to get to the bottom of the $300 billion tax gap that has been haunting the federal government for the past few years. They’ve invested $20 billion in the program in order to guarantee its success. With the assistance of whistleblowers like Bradley Birkenfeld they’re likely to catch numerous tax evaders.
Birkenfeld, an American citizen and former UBS employee, ratted out the 19,000 Americans participating in offshore tax evasion. Ironically, he is facing 40 years in cuffs for participating in the scheme himself, pending clemency from President Obama.
UBS account holders who now face federal courts plea guilty with hopes of a lesser punishment, but whether or not their wishes will be granted is yet to be determined. They were duped into a false sense of security by Swiss bankers who marketed UBS bank secrecy in the U.S. over a span of 3,800 trips. Don’t end up in their position. Tax Resolution Services recognizes bad things happen to good people, and we’re here to help.
Read full article here: IRS Targets Taxpayers Hiding Income in Offshore Accounts
If you are currently withholding funds overseas, now is the time to come forward to the IRS before someone blows the whistle on you. Be proactive. Our tax attorney and Certified Tax Resolution Specialists can help you disclose funds and avoid serious FBAR penalties.
Tax Resolution Services has a special division for overseas tax evasion defense. This special division is led by one of the nation’s leading tax help experts, Brian Compton. If you are in IRS trouble for undisclosed foreign funds, call our office today at 1-866-IRS-PROBLEMS for a free, no-risk tax resolution consultation or visit www.taxresolution.com.
Tags: foriegn bank and financial accounts, irs problems, offshore accounts, offshore tax evasion, Overseas Banking, tax cheats, tax problems, tax resolution
Posted in Offshore Tax Settlements, Tax Relief News, Voluntary Disclosure | No Comments »
Thursday, December 3rd, 2009
It may resemble a chapter out of 1984 but the recent surge of whistle blowers to the IRS about tax cheats comes as no surprise since these whistleblowers are getting paid enormous sums of money for “telling on their neighbors” for owing back taxes.
A recent Forbes article revealed that a new federal rewards program dishes out cash to people who turn in friends, relatives and employers for fudging their tax returns.
Take Bradley C. Birkenfeld, a former employee of UBS AG, who came to U.S. officials with documents in hand and laid out how his former employer, UBS AG, helped wealthy Americans hide money offshore. So far the investigation he triggered has produced a $780 million payment in back taxes and penalties to the U.S. government from UBS, Switzerland’s largest bank.
Consequently, Birkenfeld, who is facing 40 months in the federal pen, may now leave prison with millions of dollars in reward money.
The IRS is changing its attitude towards Whistleblowers–ten years ago, anyone who had enough knowledge of a company’s accounting books were not eligible for reaping any reward money for being the whistleblower because they were inevitably involved in crafting the tax evasion activities. Now, these same people who may have faced prison sentences for their crimes may be entitled to received a reduced reward amount (which could still be very substantial, depending on the case and how much back taxes owed).
This whistleblower rewards program has motivated many more people to rat out the “bigger guys.” From 2004-2005, the IRS was mostly dealing with small cases of tax evasion. But according to Forbes, “in fiscal 2009, ended Oct. 30, the IRS Whistleblower Office also logged big case leads on 1,900 taxpayers, up from 1,246 in fiscal 2008, the first full year the new law was in effect. Dozens of these tips involve purported tax losses of $100 million or more.”
In many of these instances, the whistleblower could walk away from it with anywhere between 15% to 30% of the back taxes owed by some of these corporations–amounting to rewards of millions of dollars.
The important thing to learn from this development is that the only way to ensure that no one will hand you on a silver platter to the IRS is if you do not commit any tax fraud. The rewards are high for whistleblowers and who’s to resist the temptation of a large payoff in this economic slump?
Get your accounting number straight. Make sure that your tax numbers are legitimate and correct. If you have someone else do your accounting for you, make sure to verify the accuracy of the numbers you submit to the IRS. Once you sign off on your tax forms, you are technically liable for what you have “approved” on it. Don’t risk being accused of being a tax cheat–hold your accountants accountable.
Also check out this great cartoon we posted last month on the whistleblower program.
Read the full Forbes article on IRS whistleblowers.
Tax Resolution Services is a team of expert tax attorneys, CPAs, and tax resolution specialists who help people with their tax problems every day. We have successfully settled thousands of cases for taxpayers with tax debt both big and small. Call us today at 1-866-477-7762 for a free tax resolution consultation or visit www.taxresolution.com
Tags: Back Taxes, Forbes article whistleblower, IRS debt, IRS whistleblower reward, tax attorney, tax cheats, tax evaders, tax evasion, tax fraud, tax help, tax relief, tax resolution, UBS AG, whistleblower money
Posted in Back Taxes, Offshore Tax Settlements, tax help | No Comments »
Monday, September 28th, 2009
The end is near for U.S. taxpayers who are using the world’s most famous tax haven to shield assets and avoid paying Uncle Sam his due. If you have an offshore account where you’ve been evading taxes, you should be worried! Did you know that the IRS is offering an extension to the voluntary disclosure program to come clean about undeclared income?
By Michael Rozbruch
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In one of the latest — and among the highest stakes — battles for the U.S. government in its war on tax cheats, the Internal Revenue Service won an agreement that will give it an unprecedented amount of information on account holders at Swiss bank UBS.
Under the agreement, the IRS will submit a treaty request to the Swiss government describing the accounts for which it is requesting information. The Swiss government will then direct UBS to initiate procedures to turn over information on as many as 4,500 accounts to the IRS.
The IRS will receive information on accounts of various amounts and types, including bank-only accounts, custody accounts in which securities or other investment assets were held and offshore company nominee accounts through which an individual indirectly held beneficial ownership in the accounts.
The agreement is a huge blow to the Swiss economy, which has long depended on its financial services industries and bank secrecy laws.
For the U.S. government, the agreement creates one of the hottest tip sheets in the tax-compliance game.
“We’re finding out about financial institutions that facilitated tax evasion and we’re going to pursue them,” IRS Commissioner Michael Schulman said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “We’re finding out about other intermediaries, like law firms and others who promoted tax evasion.”
Information provided to the IRS from the Swiss will be examined for all potential civil and criminal tax violations. The IRS will assess any additional tax, interest and a number of applicable penalties. This includes the penalty for the willful failure to file a report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR). This penalty can be up to 50 percent of the value of the account for each year an FBAR was not filed.
The U.S. agreement with the Swiss government follows an admission by UBS that it aided Americans in evading taxes. In fact, two UBS bankers and four U.S. clients were prosecuted after UBS banker-turned- whistleblower Bradley Birkenfeld, 44, helped investigators probe $20 billion in taxpayer assets hidden overseas.
In many ways, the U.S-Swiss agreement to disclose information on UBS accountholders is a symbolic victory, since the Swiss banking veil was largely considered impenetrable. The IRS has demonstrated that isn’t true, and in doing so, the tax-collecting agency shows that no tax haven in the world is completely safe.
In fact, U.S. tax cheats are finding fewer and fewer places to hide. Recently, the IRS won agreements with U.S. credit card companies that disclosed to the government card members whose accounts were linked to overseas bank accounts — a formerly common tax evasion tactic.
Whatever tax avoidance or evasion scheme you’re considering, you may want to rethink picking a fight with the heavyweight IRS.
The IRS has generously extended the deadline for voluntary disclosure to October 15th, giving taxpayers an extra few weeks to come clean about undeclared income, specifically from overseas accounts. I blogged about the voluntary disclosure recently where one can reduce their chances of criminal prosecution. If you are ready to come forward, you need the help of a tax professional and that is what we are at Tax Resolution Services.
Michael Rozbruch is a Maryland CPA and a Certified Tax Resolution Specialist. You can contact him at 866-477-7762 to obtain a free subscription to his newsletter titled The IRS Times & Inquirer.
Tags: delinquent returns, filing late tax return, Offshore Banking, professional tax help, swiss bank working with IRS, tax attorney, tax cheat, tax evasion, tax professional, tax relief, tax resolution services, Tax Resolution Specialist, tax shelters, tax specialist, UBS and IRS, US and Swiss Bank Account Agreement, Voluntary Disclosure, Working with the IRS
Posted in IRS Tax Cases, IRS Times and Inquirer, Seeking Professional Tax Help, Taxpayer Rights, Unfiled Returns - Delinquent Tax Returns, Voluntary Disclosure, Working with the IRS | No Comments »
