Updated pub helps taxpayers understand an offer in compromise

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The IRS just issued an updated publication with information for individual taxpayers and business owners unable to pay their taxes. This electronic pub, Offer in Compromise Booklet, helps people understand how an offer in compromise works.

An offer in compromise is an agreement between a taxpayer and the IRS that settles a tax debt for less than the full amount owed. An offer in compromise is an option when a taxpayer can’t pay their full tax liability. It is also an option when paying the entire tax bill would cause the taxpayer a financial hardship. The ultimate goal is a compromise that suits the best interest of both the taxpayer and the agency.

When reviewing applications, the IRS considers the taxpayer’s unique set of facts and any special circumstances affecting the taxpayer’s ability to pay as well as the taxpayer’s:

  • Income
  • Expenses
  • Asset equity

The booklet covers everything a taxpayer will need to know about submitting an offer in compromise, including:

  • Who is eligible to submit an offer
  • How much it costs to apply
  • How the application process works

The booklet also includes the forms that taxpayers will complete as part of the offer in compromise process.

More information:

 

 

*This message was distributed from IRS Tax Tips. For more information on federal taxes please visit IRS.gov.

5 Tips To Close The Tax Season

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1. Back-Up and Protect Your Data
As the tax preparer, backing up and protecting your data should be a primary concern. Making regular backups to an external storage device at a minimum of once per week is important. Imagine next week your hard drive fails. The returns you’ve done, acknowledgement reports, PDF copies, and scanned documents are gone. Without a backup, your only hope is to take your computer to a technician who is going to charge hundreds of dollars to attempt to recover data and there is no guarantee they succeed. If they can’t recover the data, hopefully you had paper copies, but it could take hundreds of man hours reinputting data. If you don’t have paper copies, well, we hope you are lucky enough to never get audited. If you have a backup, you would only need to spend a couple hours bringing your data over and you’d be ready to go. Taxware does NOT store a copy of your data. Seek competent technical advice to keep your computers and data protected.

2. Don’t Forget to Pull in Acknowledgements
As a security measure we purge acknowledgement records every 30 days. This means after 30 days we will only be able to tell if the return was accepted or rejected, however we will not be able to read the reason why the return was rejected. If you have returns that are awaiting acknowledgement for longer than 5 days, call technical support and a technician will investigate why your acknowledgements have not come through.

3. Have Last Minute Rejects?
Don’t stress, if you get a rejected return on April 15th the IRS gives you a 3 day grace period to fix it!

4. Start your Free Trial with Textellent.com
Do you want to grow your business for the 2019 Tax year?  Now is the time to evaluate and start your free trial with Textellent, the text marketing and appointment scheduling platform that is fully integrated within your Wintax program.  Just one short on-boarding appointment and you will be up and running.  Doing this in the off-season should help you have the time to really delve into the many benefits and options this additional program could provide you and your business.

5. Celebrate!
Last but not least, plan and go on vacation! You deserve it! TripAdvisor is one of our favorites.

Client Comparison and Batch Extensions using Wintax NextGen

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Towards the end of tax season, we field some telephone calls helping clients transmit extension form 4868 for their clients. When the telephone call is about finished the client will make a comment something along the lines of “thanks, one down 40 to go!”. It’s about that time Taxware customer support becomes their best friend when they let them know that there is an easier way to do all their extensions in a batch.

In the program we have a utility that compares your current year data folder with your prior year data folder to build a database of the tax payers you haven’t recalled and worked with yet. With this database you can send extensions in a batch. In addition to its main functions there are some other great reports and tools.

Here is a link for a step by step guide showing how to use the comparison tool and how to batch e-file extensions.

Business Owners Can Claim a Qualified Business Income Deduction

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Eligible taxpayers may now deduct up to 20 percent of certain business income from domestic businesses operated as sole proprietorships or through partnerships, S corporations, trusts, and estates.  The deduction may also be claimed on certain dividends.  Eligible taxpayers can claim the deduction for the first time on the 2018 federal income tax return they file in 2019. This provision is the result of tax reform legislation passed in December 2017.

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Use Text Marketing to Grow and Win Amazon Echo

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Taxware Systems is always looking to provide information and technology that could benefit and improve the tax practices of our clients.

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Protecting Your Client Data

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As the 2019 tax year approaches, we at Taxware Systems would like to remind tax preparers that protecting taxpayer information is extremely important. This includes protection from environmental risks (e.g. fire, water, tornado, earthquake), business resources (e.g. equipment failure, supply chain disruption, employees) and hostile actors (e.g. hackers, criminals, nation-state actors). The latter has been […]

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Taxware Systems Client Benefit: Special Offer on TheTaxBook

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As a client of Taxware Systems you are entitled to receive 10-25% off all TheTaxBook products and free shipping year-round!

Excitement is in the air for the 2018 Tax Year! Your clients want to know how the changes in tax law affect their tax return and financial situation. TheTaxBook has three publications to help you understand and master all of the updated provisions from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act!

When ordering, be sure to use Taxware’s Promo Code 785 to ensure you receive the negotiated discount.

Order at: www.thetaxbook.com/TaxwareSystems

Taxware Promo Code: 785

Taxware Systems clients receive 5 free services with any order from TheTaxBook:

  • Tax Industry News
  • Free Online Credit Hours
  • Tools for Tax Pros
  • Message Board
  • TheTaxBook Updates!

Tech Tips – Acknowledgements

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With the NextGen Wintax program, you can reprint and reprocess “rehang” your previously electronically filed acknowledgements whenever you may need them.

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A Comprehensive Look at EFINs and PTINs

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Electronic Filing Identification Numbers (EFINs):
An EFIN is a six digit number assigned by the IRS for identifying tax firms.
Anyone filing more than 10 returns in a tax year must do so electronically through their firm’s EFIN.

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Congratulations on a successful tax season!

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Congratulations! You made it!

The high pressure of an even more compact tax season has come to an end. All of us at Taxware Systems congratulate you on making it through and hopefully having a great tax season. The IRS made it interesting at the end with their servers going down on the last day but they are back up now and the systems should get caught up tonight with acknowledgements.

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