Harley's Blog Page
Definition: Blog is short for weblog. A weblog is a journal or newsletter, frequently updated for general public consumption. Blogs generally represent the personality of the author or the Web site.~
1/15/2012 IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING UNANSWERED E-MAILS
We have experienced anomalies with some incoming e-mails. If your e-mail in December or to January 15 included a question that we have not answered, please update and resend your request. We are confident your e-mails are being properly received, but some unanswered ones were incorrectly marked as "Responded to".
1/5/2012 STATEMENT OF SPECIFIED FOREIGN FINANCIAL ASSETS. Taxpayers with foreign assets above certain thresholds may have to file this new Form 8938. Unmarried taxpayers living in the US need to file if the total value of specified foreign assets exceeds exceed $50,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $75,000 at any time during the tax year. For married taxpayers living in the US the threshold is $100,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $150,000 at any time during the tax year. Note that the thresholds for filing are generally four times higher for taxpayers living outside the US.
12/25/2011 SANTA CLAUSE ARRESTED FOR TAX EVASION -- OTHER SERIOUS CRIMES
Check out the Newsletters page for this serious satire for Americans who live abroad!
12/16/2011 U.S. INCOME TAX RETURN FILING REQUIREMENT
As a United States citizen, you must file a federal income tax return for any tax year in which your gross income is equal to or greater than the applicable exemption amount and standard deduction. For information about whether you must file a federal income tax return for a particular tax year, including exemption amounts and standard deductions, see Publication 501(Exemptions, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information) for that year. Generally, you are required to report your worldwide income on your federal income tax return. This means that you should report all income, regardless of which country is the source of the income. Generally, you only need to file returns going back six years. From IRS FS-2011-13, December 2011
12/13/2011 SCAMS POSING AS IRS EMAILS
Emails posing to be from IRS agencies are not new, but this year they seem to have amped up. We want to bring to your attention the newest scam. This email is from support@irs.gov and
notifies the taxpayer they need to pay a failure to file fee for not filing Form 5471. The email tells the recipient to see the attached file for more information. Opening such attachments can compromise your computer. Unless you have subscribed to IRS e-newsletters, you will not receive email from the IRS.
6/27/2011 REPORTING REQUIREMENT FOR FOREIGN ACCOUNTS OVER $10,000
Please note this important notice from the IRS. Let me know if you have questions.
WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service today reminds everyone who has a bank or other financial account in a foreign country, or who has signature authority over such an account, that they may be required to report the account to the U.S. Department of the Treasury by June 30 each year.
Many people in the U.S. have foreign financial accounts. While there is nothing improper about setting up or maintaining such accounts, many people may mistakenly believe their accounts are not large enough on a combined basis to trigger reporting obligations. Foreign account owners may have to report their accounts to the government, even if the accounts do not generate any taxable income.
U.S. persons are required to file a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR), Treasury Department Form TD F 90-22.1, each year if they have a financial interest in or signature authority over financial accounts, including bank, securities or other types of financial accounts, in a foreign country, if the aggregate value of these financial accounts exceeds $10,000 at any time during the calendar year.
09/25/2010 I CAME TO WORK TO READ THIS?!! "Not since the Great Depression has Congress had so much tax work to do in so little time.
Congress must tackle a mountain of tax decisions in the coming weeks.
From the income tax to the estate tax, from the alternative minimum tax to levies on capital gains and dividends—plus much more—nearly every area of individual taxes is in limbo. Come January, for example, the top federal rate on dividends could be as low as 15% or, if nothing is done, as high as 40%.
It gets worse: Lawmakers have only four weeks to tackle these massive issues before Columbus Day, when they adjourn until November. During these weeks, each party will be looking for opportunities to make political theater ahead of the coming elections. The drama will likely slow things further, especially in the Senate, where lately it has been tough to muster a filibuster-proof 60 votes for any measure more controversial than a flag raising.
This past week, President Obama gave a barnstorming speech in favor of dropping the 2001 tax cuts for those making more than $250,000, and House Minority Leader John Boehner (R, Ohio) countered with a proposal to extend them for all taxpayers for two years.
Despite the theatrics, says veteran analyst Clint Stretch of Deloitte Tax LLP, "The unprecedented uncertainty on taxes is unlikely to be resolved until December." What's more, he warns, lame-duck sessions are unpredictable as well."
08/24/2010 If you are a small business owner who issues Forms 1099-MISC to your workers, check out the article on Employee vs Independent Contractor on the Newsletter page.
07/30/2010 $800 "PAY TO WORK" TAX CREDIT MAY DISAPPEAR AFTER 2010: Click on the Newsletters for a CNN article about this.
05/24/2010 SUMMERTIME HOURS AND ACTIVITIES: In our business, hours and activities change from quarter to quarter and often very quickly. For example, the week of April 15, we had employment for 16 of our 28 seasonal employees, but that number dropped to four the following week!
During the summer, our normal hours are Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm; and I will be available by appointment or e-mail most other weekdays. During this “off season”, we continue our Personal Management Services, providing payroll, accounting, bookkeeping and multiple other services within our range of competence. We are growing this part of our business and welcome your referrals.
Summer and fall are used for seminars, study and training. Tax, pension, investment, health care and other laws and policies are changing at a dizzying rate. All of our clients are affected, and we do our best to stay up to date. Fortunately, we usually have access to appropriate reference media and our national Liberty Tax experts.
Now is a good time to send your questions, comments and other communications that can help improve our service to you. Check the Contact Page to decide on the best way to stay in touch.
02/3/2010 PASSWORD SECURITY CHANGES: Within the past week (about January 25) we received the following information from Accountants' World, the software company we use for Tax Organizer and CyberCabinet. If you are a client of ours who uses either of these applications, note that you now must use the temporary password assigned and e-mailed to you by Accountant's World. From our office, we can reset your password to a new temporary one unknown to us. You will be automatically be sent an email with the new password. Following is the text of Accountant's World message:
"We know that you, the accountant, are extremely concerned about the confidentiality of your data on the Internet. As a result of a security audit, our prior login/password scheme was identified as the weakest link in our web security system. We did not want any possibility that the data you trust with us could be compromised by waiting even another day to implement a new complex password process – the risk was too great in our eyes. In addition, over the course of this year we will be taking additional steps to ensure your data in our cloud environment meets SAS70 certification (the highest cloud computing certification for the Net). We apologize for any inconvenience. Thank you for taking steps to ensure your data is that much secure.
"To create a strong password, use a combination of letters and numbers, minimum 7 characters. If you already use a password in this format, no further action is needed. It is a good practice to follow across all of your web-based accounts. Also for best security, change your password every three months or so."
1/12/2010 WINDOWS EXPLORER BEST WAY TO ACCESS "TAX ORGANIZER" AND "CYBERCABINET". If you are among our clients with access to these two applications, please note the suggestion about MAC from our software provider: "You can install Windows on the MAC using a program on the MAC called "bootcamp". This allows you to dual boot the computer into the operating system of your choice. So, in theory, when you start up the Macintosh, you can either start it in the default operating system (MAC OSX), or you can choose to start in Windows."
1/03/2010 2009 TAX FORMS: IMPORTANT MAILING DATES FOR BROKERAGE ACCOUNTS:
Many of the brokerage firms like Merrill Lynch, Schwab, etc will be mailing Forms 1099 in two waves. The first wave will be mailed by the end of January. The second wave will follow in mid-February after issuer tax information is available. These types of investments will most likely include:
· K-1s from trust accounts
· Mutual funds
· Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs)
· Certain foreign and domestic equities
· Original Issue Discounts (OIDs)
12/14/09 ESTIMATED INCOME TAX PAYMENTS: If you must make estimated income tax payments, the fourth quarter installment is due January 15, 2010. To avoid late payment penalties, individuals are required to pay in the lesser of: (1) 100% of the prior year’s taxes (line 63 on your 2008 Form 1040), or (2) 90% of the current year’s taxes. If your Adjusted Gross Income in 2008 was greater than $150,000 ($75,000 if married filing separately), then you must pay in 110% of your 2008 taxes rather than 100%.
If you itemize your deductions, consider making your state estimated tax payment on or before December 31, 2009, even though it is not due until January 15, 2009. You are allowed to deduct your state tax payments on your federal return in the year you make your payment.
Keep in mind that estimated payments must be made for both income taxes and social security taxes. If you have non-wage income from services you have provided as a contractor, a personal business, independent sales agent, clergy member, etc., social security taxes are usually not withheld. These must be paid by including the tax of 14.13% with other estimated payments for income tax.
12/13/2009 Pigeon Forge, TN. Last week Mary and I did a three-day weekend around Pigeon Forge. On Saturday, we had a light blanket of snow. We took the mountain route between Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, and saw lovely scenes of God's handiwork. Here are two photos for you to enjoy!
UPLOAD PENDING
09/11/2009 If you or your child is attending the first four years of college, you will want to go to the Newsletters page and read the article about expanded education credits. It could mean UP TO $2,500 LESS TAX OR A REFUND for tuition and textbook costs!
04/16/09 The 15th is now behind us. Many of you told us you were praying for us, and we greatly appreciated those prayers! We believe we accomplished what was necessary by April 15th, but we have much work to complete between now and June 15. What follows is a description of our office activity late in the tax season.
In the weeks before the 15th, we first “work” the files for “Out-of-towners” that have the W-2s and the Tax Organizer, Part II. Without knowing “where in the world” the taxpayer is located, it’s not possible to do an accurate return. Next, as mail, emails and faxes arrive, we update the files as completely as we can.
The 10 days preceeding the 15th is “Crunch time”. By then, we are receiving 15 to 20 emails a day, last minute documents are coming in, and we are transferring files from “processing” to “verification and sending”. We constantly assess whether we have all information and whether the taxpayer will have a balance due that should be paid by the 15th.
Not all emails and phone calls receive the individual attention we’d like during these days, and we regret that. Our first goal is to inform those who must pay by early April, or just as soon as we can. Nearly all penalties are calculated on the unpaid balance at April 15, making it important to have enough estimated payments in the IRS or state account by then.
About April 8th each year, our emphasis changes from completing returns to having them adequately prepared to apply for an extension. From then on, we are adding information to files, creating extension documentation and continuing to complete some files. The status of a file can change within hours, sometimes resulting in two or more emails seemingly in conflict with each other. We apologize for the confusion from those instances and try to avoid them as much as possible.
By 11:45 pm, we had e-filed or mailed extension forms for all outstanding returns. I trust we were able to send timely notice to those with payments due. Those who haven’t received completed return or extension information don’t have a payment due to the IRS or state. These have a 60 day automatic extension to June 15 and make up the majority of the returns we will complete between now and then.
We look forward to your feedback on how we handled your return this year. We want to improve our services and appreciate your help to alert us on our weak points. If everything went great, let us know, too. Those notes provide encouragement and motivation to our staff.<span style="m
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