Go big or go home. That's a common mantra down here in Texas. A variation applied this week in a federal bankruptcy courtroom in Big D. The judge there ruled that a former Lone Star billionaire's big attempt to shelter money offshore means he owes the Internal Revenue Service a big bill. Sam Wyly, a once legendary Dallas businessman, philanthropist and one of the wealthiest men in the country (shown at right on the October 2015 cover of D CEO magazine), was found on May 10 to have defrauded the IRS by shuffling assets among a network of offshore trusts... Read more →
Bankrate Taxes Blog
A little more than a month ago, inquiring tax eyes were focused on Panama. Specifically, folks were curious about a law firm in that Central American nation that allegedly helps the wealthy stash cash in global accounts that are out of reach of their nations' tax collectors. ICIJ has produced a video, The Panama Papers: Victims of Offshore, that shows what the organization says are the unseen victims behind the email chains, invoices and documents that make up the Panama Papers and the shadowy offshore industry. A couple of U.S. states, Nevada and Wyoming, were named as international tax haven... Read more →
Last week, millions of last-minute filers got their returns to the Internal Revenue Service. As of April 22, the federal tax collector had 136.5 million returns in hand. The tax gap is kind of like the break in the old Florida Keys bridge: Something's missing (Photo by Ewen Robert via Flickr CC) The number of Americans who completed their annual tax duties by this year's April deadline(s) was slightly ahead of the 2015 filing pace. Before the year is over (and the 13+ million of us on extension get our returns in by Oct. 17), the IRS expects total filings... Read more →
Trust no one. That X-Files admonition has been co-opted for just about everything, but it's particularly appropriate in this time of increasing tax identity theft and refund fraud. It also apparently is taken to heart by the federal office that keeps an eye on the Internal Revenue Service's operations. The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) says its Office of Investigations (OI) examines not only outside threats to the tax collecting agency, but also internal issues. "Specifically, OI investigates misconduct by IRS employees which manifests itself in many ways," said Timothy Camus, a Deputy Inspector General with TIGTA. Insider... Read more →
Tax returns are due tomorrow. Most of us have filed. But there are around 10 million procrastinating holdouts. Part of the reason we put off taxes is that it's a pain in, well, just about every body part. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) wants to make the process easier, especially for folks with simple returns. She's introduced the Tax Filing Simplification Act of 2016, which would require the Internal Revenue Service provide these taxpayers with prefilled 1040 forms, based on their tax documents that also are copied to the IRS. The process would be even easier next year, when a provision... Read more →
Nearly 10 million households didn't have bank accounts in 2013, according to the latest survey of individuals' banking habits by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). That's a lot of folks for whom cash is king. That's also a lot of people for whom paying a federal tax bill is not that easy … until now. Taxpayers who want to pay their Internal Revenue Service bills in cash now can do so at some 7-Eleven stores. Tax cash: As I noted last week at my other tax blog, the 7-Eleven cash tax payment option is available thanks to an arrangement... Read more →
The main 2016 tax filing season is almost over, and things definitely are slowing down, at least form the refund issuance standpoint. The Internal Revenue Service says that through March 25, it had received 89.4 million returns and processed almost 87 million of them. Both those amounts are slightly less than at this time in 2015. Refund amounts, too, are down a tad. The IRS has issued 70.8 million refunds totaling almost $203 billion. The average refund this year is, as of now, $2,866. In late March 2015, the agency had sent out 71.6 million refunds worth a total $204.4... Read more →
Each tax season, millions of folks get a large chunk of money. For many, this refund money is the largest lump sum they'll see all year. A lot of those folks, however, don't have bank accounts. So they either get their Internal Revenue Service refunds in check form or they have the money loaded onto a prepaid card. Reloadable prepaid cards are available from many tax preparation software programs. Or from tax preparation firms. Or from major retailers such as grocery, drug and big box stores. Just Google the term for myriad options. But there's one big problem with these... Read more →
The 2016 federal tax filing season so far is, for the most part, statistically identical to 2015. Through March 11, around 74.456 million taxpayers have submitted returns. At this time last year, the count was 74.455 million. The Internal Revenue Service is running a tad slower this year in its processing of those millions of 1040 forms. However, the pace is less than 1 percentage point behind last year's return handling rate. Still waiting for your tax refund? Federal refunds seem to be on pace, but things are slow in many states. As for the most important issue, refunds, the... Read more →
This was supposed to be the year that the Internal Revenue Service and its Security Summit partners clamped down on tax identity thieves. So much for the best-laid plans to fight tax fraud. The 2016 filing season has seen a series of tax security concerns, both among private tax service providers and the IRS. Identity protection site targeted:The latest trouble is a possible security problem with the IRS' Identity Protection Personal Identification Number, or IP PIN, online retrieval tool. An IP PIN is used by folks who've had their tax filing data stolen. They use their IRS-issued six-digit IP PIN... Read more →
As millions of us are still working on our current tax returns, the Internal Revenue Service and its in-house watchdog the National Taxpayer Advocate's office are debating the future of the agency and how that will affect us and our filings in coming years. The IRS is working on what it calls its Future State plan, an outline of agency activities in five years and beyond. One of the plan's central components is online taxpayer accounts. These accounts, says the IRS, will substantially reduce the number of telephone calls and visits it receives every year from filers. The IRS says... Read more →
There are many reasons folks are leery of the Internal Revenue Service, but asset seizures have to be at the top of the list. The IRS isn't the only tax collector to seize assets for nonpayment of taxes. State revenue officers use the process, too. This extreme step generally is taken by Uncle Sam's tax collector when a taxpayer has failed to pay the legal tax due either because of neglect or willful refusal. In these cases, there are guidelines the IRS must follow, including giving the taxpayer notice of the tax assessment and conducting a hearing if requested by... Read more →
If you drive you've got to be thrilled with the price of gas right now. Every time I've filled up my car over the past six months, I've snapped a shot of just how cheap it is. That $1.419 a gallon photo to the left was from last weekend. As I drove past my local gas station yesterday, I saw that it had dropped two more cents. Low pump prices, however, could mean more taxes for motorists in nine states where, says the Tax Justice Blog, lawmakers are seriously considering gas tax hikes. So which drivers should be worried? Those... Read more →
One easy -- and scary -- way to know that we're at the peak of tax filing season is to look at the number of questionable emails, text messages and phone calls you're getting from folks seeking details about your taxes. Just this month, I've received two calls from the ubiquitous fake Internal Revenue Service agents threatening me with legal action. The first one, which was left as a message on my office answering machine, was obviously a poorly done mechanical scare tactic. The second call came a few days later, also from a bot, but better quality. I answered... Read more →
Super Bowl winners get it all. More fan adoration. Parades. A flashy piece of jewelry. Trips to Disney World. More taxes. Around a million Denver Broncos fans, including 24,000+ truant schoolchildren, thronged the Colorado capital on Feb. 9 to welcome home their NFL Champions. Photo by Enrico C. Meyer via Twitter. For many of the players in the NFL championship game, that last "benefit" is more than they bargained for. In fact, note a couple of tax attorneys, some of the Denver Broncos and Carolina Panthers players actually lost money by playing in Super Bowl 50. Wait. What? How is... Read more →
Tax filing season is tax crime season, with yet another tax software company reporting that some of its customers' data apparently has been compromised. Computer hacking ID theft image by Don Hankins via Flickr TaxSlayer notified customers that it became aware on Jan. 13 that hackers had accessed some accounts. The Evans, Georgia-based company believes that the usernames and passwords used to get into around 8,800 accounts were taken from a third party vendor. "We have no evidence indicating that the technical security of TaxSlayer systems has been compromised," the company said in a letter to affected customers. This is... Read more →
Here in the United States, the income gap between the very wealthy and the rest of us is getting a lot of attention, thanks in large part to the Democratic presidential nominee race. Sen. Bernie Sanders has made the wealth gap a key part of his effort to dislodge former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton from the front-runner spot. Image source: ZMEScience But the battle is waging far beyond the U.S. borders and the 2016 presidential campaign. Global inequity off the charts: There's also a global inequality crisis, says Oxfam in a new report, and it is reaching new extremes.... Read more →
Everybody loves a bargain, even when it comes to paying someone to prepare our taxes. But, say consumer watchdogs, too often taxpayers don't have a good way to comparison shop for a tax pro and find the one that provide them the best service for the price. "The price of preparing a tax return is often only disclosed to a consumer after the return is completed," according to the report "Public Views on Paid Tax Preparation," released on Jan. 20 by the Consumer Federation of America (CFA). The CFA says that mystery shopper tests have found tax prep fees that... Read more →
The buzz about the biggest U.S. lottery ever continues, as we wait for the rest of the Powerball winners to come forward. So far, just Jim and Lisa Robinson, the Tennessee ticket buyers, have claimed their portion of the $1.5 billion prize. Many lottery veterans and financial experts have questioned the couple's public acceptance of their millions (they're taking the lump sum payment), but what's done is done. Jim and Lisa Robinson (she's in the fuchsia jacket, with her husband to the left of her in this screenshot), America's newest lottery millionaires, talk about their good luck. Click image to... Read more →
What's the biggest hassle, aside from complex tax laws, that you face in trying to do your taxes? The National Taxpayer Advocate believes it's the Internal Revenue Service's increasing efforts to make most taxpayer interaction interactive. National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson is required by law to include in her Annual Report to Congress a summary of at least 20 of the most serious problems that taxpayers face. Given how taxpayer troubles have increased over the years, be they from inappropriate or inept IRS actions or because the agency is understaffed and underfunded, it's no surprise that in her 2015 report,... Read more →