New Regulations Issued by IRS Change Return Due Dates and Extensions

Last Week, July 19th the IRS issued a package of regulations which change due dates and extensions of time to file for various tax returns and information. The regulations reflect statutory changes made by the Veterans Health Care Choice Improvement Act of 2015, P.L. 114-41, and the Protecting Americans From Tax Hikes Act of 2015, P.L. 114-11. These newly issued …

Retirement Planning By The Numbers

Small Business Accounting Checklist

Managing the finances of your business does not have to feel like pulling teeth. A well planned budget, good record keeping, and a timeline for accounting functions can make end of the year tax preparation easy and painless. One of the first things to do is break down your finances into daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual tasks. Daily Accounting …

Revised Health Bill Retains Taxes on Higher-Income Individuals

Yesterday, July 13th, Senate Republications released a revised version of the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017. If enacted, the new version would retain several taxes originally imposed as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act(PPACA). This includes 3.8% net investment income tax, and 0.9% Medicare Surtax under Sec. 3101. The net investment income portion (Sec. 1411) imposes …

Treasury To Propose Reform of Eight Regulations Deemed Burdensome

The US Treasury has identified 8 regulations which it will soon be targeted for reform. These regulations will be changing in accordance with Executive Order 13789. These regulations includes Sec. 385 implementing rules that would re-characterize certain transactions between related parties that are ostensibly debt as equity, curbing the practice of “earnings stripping,” and proposed regulations under Sec. 2704 that …

Senate Health Care Bill Tax Provisions

On June 22nd Senate Republicans released a draft bill that would repeal many provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). The Senate bill, called the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017, differs in many respects from the House-passed American Health Care Act, H.R. 1628, but like the House bill, it would repeal many of the tax provisions …

Business Payroll Taxes and The IRS

Payroll Tax Problems Business owners are well aware that life happens: A client’s check may bounce, a huge customer might have just shut their doors – sometimes as a business owner you might have to pick between paying IRS payroll taxes, or paying your employees their regular paychecks. It can definitely be hard these days, sometimes money is short and …

Be Wary of New Phone Scams

Private Debt Collection Program Earlier this year the IRS moved forward with a controversial “Private Debt Collection” program. This program has had a shadow cast over it amid a sharp uptick in instances of fraudsters and scammers who pose as IRS Debt collectors. This ‘Private Debt Collection’ program was originally authorized under a federal law enacted by congress in December …

New Features added to IRS Online Tax Account Tool.

The IRS online tax account tool debuted in December of 2016, and at the time offered basic features such as balance lookup and different payment options. Last week the IRS announced that it had upgraded several aspects of the tool, including tax payment history lookup up to 18 months back, and online transcripts of 1040-series tax returns among other functionalities. …

IRS Issues Guidance Permitting Certain Estates Portability Election

Taxpayers should be pleased with the IRS’s issued guidance permitting certain estates to make a late portability election if they did not make a timely election What is a Portability Election A portability election allows a decedent’s unused exclusion amount (deceased spousal unused exclusion amount, or DSUE amount) for estate and gift tax purposes to be available for the surviving …

Louisiana Legislative Session Reaches Last Day

There is still strong disagreement in the House and Senate about how much money to spend and trying to broker a compromise before the legislative session ends at 6 p.m today (Thursday June 8th). Awaiting final passage are measures to pay for state government agencies, public services and colleges in the fiscal year that begins July 1 and to finance …