As a business owner, you are responsible for everything including recordkeeping – a task that small businesses sometimes don’t do very well. The IRS has released a very helpful recordkeeping FAQ webpage for small business and the self-employees that emphasizes the benefits of and reasons for good recordkeeping. Here are six practical FAQ’s the webpage highlights:
· Why should I keep records?
· What type of records should I keep?
· How long
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A recent IRS Press Release aims to remind taxpayers with foreign bank accounts and assets that their filing deadline to report them to the IRS is June 17, 2013. This applies to U.S. citizens and resident aliens, including those with dual citizenship who have lived or worked abroad during all or part of 2012 and military personnel outside the country. Also, some U.S. citizens abroad may be required to submit
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This was a short, yet busy week for tax relief news. Stories ranged from celebrity tax woes and prison sentences for tax evaders to tax tips and benefits for military personnel.
Actor Chris Tucker Pays Nearly $1 Million toward Tax Debt – Chris Tucker has been in the spotlight over the last few years, not so much for his talent but sadly, for his huge $12 million tax debt. A recent
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Just last week, the IRS Criminal Investigation (CI) released its Annual Report for 2012 showing strong increases in enforcement actions and IRS penalties imposed on convicted tax criminals for the year ending Sept. 30, 2012. According to the IRS bulletin announcing the report’s release, the criminal investigation division investigates potential criminal violations of the Internal Revenue Code and related financial crimes in a manner to foster confidence in the
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Apparently, Lauryn Hill’s “Miseducation” may relate to how badly she handled her IRS tax problems. According to Accounting Today’s article titled: Fugees Singer Lauryn Hill Sentenced to Prison for Tax Evasion, Hill was sentenced Monday to three months in prison plus three months home confinement for failing to file tax returns for five years and not reporting more than $2.3 million in income. The article explains the terms of her
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Every year after the tax day, clients inquire as to what tax documents they need to keep and for how long. Last tax season I wrote a blog post on the subject, inspired by a Forbes article by Tax Girl, Kelly Phillips Erb titled: “How Long Should You Keep Records after Tax Day?” I thought the information would be helpful for those who may be wondering what documents to hold
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I recently wrote a post for the Tax Matters blog about a newly released Government Accountability Office (GAO) report showing IRS budget cuts forcing the furlough of 100,000 employees therefore reducing the ability to audit taxpayers at the same rate. A Huffington Post article titled: “Offshore Tax Havens: Sequestration Damages IRS Battle with Tax Evasion“ provides additional GAO report information shining a light on how the sequester/IRS budget cuts will
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I wrote a post for the Tax Matters blog post about a recent report that revealed higher IRS audit rates in five major metropolitan areas. The culprits: small businesses attempting to tax dodge. An article by the Los Angeles Times titled “Los Angeles, San Francisco top cities for tax dodgers, study says” cites a new study from the National Taxpayer Advocate that analyzed IRS data of five metropolitan areas: San
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Thanks to Frank Byrt at The Street, we learned that the IRS announced the release of their “2012 Internal Revenue Service Data Book [1],” This annual report provides an overview of agency activities, including information and statistical tables dating from October 1, 2011, to September 30, 2012. The report provides helpful data and information on the following: returns filed, taxes collected, enforcement actions, taxpayer assistance, IRS budget and workforce, and
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Reminder: 18 days left until Tax Day!
Here’s a review of the tax relief news covered this week. Featured topics include: IRS releases 2013 Dirty Dozen Tax Scam/Scheme List, businessmen guilty of tax evasion and filing false returns, IRS apologies for expensive Star Trek training video and hiring a tax professional versus tax preparation software.
IRS Releases 2013 Dirty Dozen Tax Scam-Scheme List – as well as a video to remind taxpayers
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As Tax Day April 15th draws near, I will be reaching into archive blog posts to gather useful and informative posts that can help taxpayers avoid IRS issues and find tax relief. Today’s topic: small business tax audits.
In a previous post and TaxMan episode for the Big Biz Show, I discussed how small business owners often make themselves targets for harmful tax audits citing a tragic story of business owners
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For some reason the IRS did not release an updated “Dirty Dozen Tax Scam List” for 2013. This annual list of tax scams and “phishing” expeditions warns taxpayers about scams that range from tax identity theft to tax evasion. As tax day draws near, scams and schemes tend to peak as people get their tax returns ready for the April 15th deadline. I updated information from the Tax Resolution University
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Happy Friday! Just a reminder: there are just over four weeks left until Tax Day! Right now we will round-up this week’s tax relief news. The topics include: Offshore Tax Enforcement, Snoop Dog slapped with a tax lien, a massive tax fraud/shelter scheme, two TaxMan episodes featuring yours truly, and taking care of your IRS tax debt before Tax Day.

Un-Reported Offshore Bank Accounts
I wrote a post titled “Fed’s Still
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A recent Wall Street Journal article titled “Offshore Tax Probe Picks Up” shows the Feds continuing to go after Swiss banks both big and small. The government has also expanded their search for U.S. tax cheats in countries such as Israel, India, Singapore, China and elsewhere they believe citizens might be sheltering their secret accounts to evade paying taxes on them.
The article reports that on Monday Switzerland’s oldest private bank, Wegelin
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Donna Guerin, 52, former CPA and tax attorney for Jenkens and Gilchrist, received an 8 year prison sentence and will be required to pay $190 million in restitution for her participation in what the Treasury Department calls “the largest criminal tax fraud in history.” An Accounting Today article titled: “Tax Attorney CPA Sentenced to 8 Years for Massive Tax Fraud Scheme“ provides some details of this landmark case:

Guerin ran a massive
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