Procedural Issues
90-Day Letter

Procedural Considerations on Collection (Assessment) – Part Two: Authority and Limits on Assessment

In the first article in this series about the IRS’s ability to assess tax and additions thereto, we explored the basics of assessment.  In this second article, we’ll examine deficiencies.  In the third article, we’ll examine termination and jeopardy assessments. Deficiencies, Generally For purposes of income, estate, gift, and excise taxes, a deficiency is the amount by which the tax imposed by the Code exceeds the amount of tax shown on the taxpayer’s return, plus

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Procedural Issues
Assessment

Procedural Considerations on Collection (Assessment) – Part One: Authority and Limits on Assessment

Assessment and collection of taxes are the IRS’s bread and butter, and arguably the very reason that the IRS exists at all.  Consequently, it is no surprise that two whole chapters of the Code are dedicated to assessment and collection.  In this article we will examine the statutes of limitation for assessments, as well as some of the idiosyncrasies of the assessment regime.  In two separate series of articles, we will delve into the IRS’s

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Procedural Issues
Filing Date

Procedures for Signing and Filing Returns

So, you have to file a tax return. Congratulations. Throw on your grown-up pants, and let’s look at when returns are due, signing of the returns, extensions of time for filing returns, and where to file the returns – all of which are contained in Subchapter A of the Code. If you need a refresher on what makes a return satisfactory to the IRS, check out the article “What is a Return, and When is

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Procedural Issues
Abatements

Abatements, Reconsiderations, and Adjustments

There are three types of administrative remedies that a taxpayer may avail itself of in the event that the taxpayer believes that a tax, penalty, or interest has been improperly assessed.  Reconsiderations deal with original determinations made during an audit/examination, and generally apply when the taxpayer has additional information that was not taken into account during the original examination. Reconsiderations are requests to reevaluate the results of an audit assessment when a taxpayer disagrees with

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Income Tax Issues
Alter Ego Liability

Successor Liability in a Purchase of Corporate Assets

As a tax controversy lawyer, most of your clients come to you in quite a predicament with the IRS, rather than coming to you to avoid said predicament. Such is the case when Cousin Elmer comes to visit you one dismal winter day. You may remember Elmer from our article on FBARs, but if not, Cousin Elmer has seven and a half fingers from trying, rather unsuccessfully, to eradicate his attic’s squirrel population through the

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Procedural Issues
Cousin Jedediah

Understanding Parallel Civil and Criminal Investigations

Jedediah was an entrepreneurial soul.  You may remember him from the Deductibility of Criminal Restitution article, but if not, he may or may not have been pinched for embezzling money from Ned’s Tire Rack.  It turns out that he had embezzled the money from Ned, a true southern gentleman, who could sell a whitewall to a Goodyear heir, in order to finance a pyramid scheme involving ethnocentric vitamins and supplements, like his personal hero Joseph

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
Income Tax Issues
IRC § 446

Examining the Method of Accounting and the IRS’s Broad Discretion to Change Them

The Practical Limits of IRC § 446(a) A taxpayer must compute taxable income under the method of accounting it regularly uses in keeping its books.[1] The IRS has rather broad statutory discretion to change a taxpayer’s accounting method in certain circumstances.[2] If the method of accounting used by the taxpayer does not clearly reflect income, the IRS generally will see fit to change the taxpayer’s method of accounting to a method that, in its not

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Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021
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Procedures for Signing and Filing Returns

So, you have to file a tax return. Congratulations. Throw on your grown-up pants, and let’s look at when returns are due, signing of the returns, extensions of time for filing returns, and where to file the returns – all of which are contained in Subchapter A of the Code.

Read More »
Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021

Abatements, Reconsiderations, and Adjustments

There are three types of administrative remedies that a taxpayer may avail itself of in the event that the taxpayer believes that a tax, penalty, or interest has been improperly assessed.  Reconsiderations deal with original determinations made during an audit/examination, and generally apply when the taxpayer has additional information that

Read More »
Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021

Successor Liability in a Purchase of Corporate Assets

As a tax controversy lawyer, most of your clients come to you in quite a predicament with the IRS, rather than coming to you to avoid said predicament. Such is the case when Cousin Elmer comes to visit you one dismal winter day. You may remember Elmer from our article

Read More »
Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021

Understanding Parallel Civil and Criminal Investigations

Jedediah was an entrepreneurial soul.  You may remember him from the Deductibility of Criminal Restitution article, but if not, he may or may not have been pinched for embezzling money from Ned’s Tire Rack.  It turns out that he had embezzled the money from Ned, a true southern gentleman, who

Read More »
Scott St. Amand April 29, 2021