It was a question posed to US taxpayers by the IRS in the wake of the UBS scandal: do you feel lucky? The US offered US taxpayers the opportunity to voluntarily disclose offshore bank accounts as part of an amnesty program earlier this year. The choice? Come forward now and escape criminal prosecution or take…
The IRS amnesty program for taxpayers who had previously failed to disclose income from offshore accounts ended last week on October 15. By all accounts, it was wildly successful. According to IRS Commish Doug Shulman, nearly 7,500 taxpayers came forward to make voluntarily disclosures in hopes of avoiding criminal prosecutions. Dollar amounts ranged from $10,000…
The voluntary disclosure program which allows US taxpayers to avoid criminal prosecution for not reporting foreign accounts ends on Thursday. No, you’re not reading an old post. The amnesty deadline was extended last month from September 23 to Thursday, October 15. How successful is the program? It’s estimated that between 3,000 and 4,000 taxpayers have…
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has announced an extension of the deadline for its Offshore Voluntary Compliance Program. The deadline, which was initially September 23, 2009, has been pushed out until October 15, 2009. While more than 3,000 have come forward so far, the program is expected to garner considerably more taxpayers before the deadline….
Taxpayer asks: Hi Kelly, With all the publicity about UBS and foreign bank accounts, I have some concerns that a lot of parents may be sharing… I know you’re a mom too (though your kids are too young for you to have to worry about this right now!) But, if you were in my shoes,…
Um, that’s all we know. Really. I’ve been sent a trillion links on this today and despite pages and pages of content, nobody has any real details. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has requested the names of more than 50,000 US taxpayers with accounts at UBS. The Swiss bank handed over about 300 names so…
Those Housewives of New Jersey better brace themselves: the IRS has announced that it’s focusing its audits on wealthy individuals and corporations as part of a broader effort to crack down on international tax cheats. IRS Commish Doug Shulman, a Bush appointee, has declared international compliance his “top priority.” He told the US House of…
For years, it was believed that you had to be mega-rich to have accounts in exotic locations. Switzerland, for example, was the millionaire’s playground. Billions and billions of dollars were *allegedly* stashed in secret accounts, “safe” from the probing fingers of Uncle Sam. Along with Switzerland, countries such as Liechtenstein developed successful industries based on…
The NBA playoffs feel like they’ve gone on forever this season… But even they must pale in comparison to the feeling that Chris Cohan gets when he checks his mail. His tax nightmare just won’t end. I know what you’re thinking… who is Chris Cohan? (Or maybe you already know, I didn’t – I tend…
A federal court in San Jose, California, gave the IRS permission to ask PayPal Inc. for account information for American taxpayers who have bank accounts, credit cards or debit cards issued by financial institutions over the last ten years in more than 30 countries reputed to be tax havens. This is similar to a summons…