ARE YOU READY FOR AN IRS AUDIT? PROTECT YOURSELF!

We have admissions during Senate Investigations this summer that specific political organizations and individuals have been targeted by the IRS for delaying or stopping the approval of organizing 501 C4 organizations. Key members of the IRS have pleaded the 5th Amendment in order to avoid revealing the truth. At present, Congressional Hearings have learned that the top legal IRS official is part of these efforts. Investigations are on-going with much pushback from the Administration. Given these facts, and as a citizen without or with a business, do you feel more or less at risk for an audit by the IRS? If you are identified for an audit, will you represent yourself or will you have professional legal and cpa’s represent you or will you do it yourself? This information is provided to allow you to prepare for what we hope never happens to you…

Are You Ready For An IRS Audit? Protect Yourself!

Probably the most dreaded event in the financial life of a U.S. taxpayer is when the IRS notifies you that you are to be audited!

And the reasons for this event being so dreaded is the fact that you will have a very strong chance of  being in worse shape than you were before the audit in many ways…emotionally, financially, time-wise and maybe you wind up with a pay-off period lasting several years.There is very limited opportunity that you will be more pleased than you were before the audit.

It will definitely cost you time for preparation for the audit just to complete the process. You will in all likelihood experience anxiety and be very concerned about where the results of the audit will lead. You may elect to have a tax attorney or your tax preparer represent you in the process and you will need to fork over money to get this done. These professionals cost in the range of $300 per hour and running up a $15,000 bill with 50 hours of counsel is not unusual.

Then you will need to set aside the necessary time to accomplish the audit…and we both know that you could be doing other things more constructive…like growing your business instead of spending money talking about why things cost you so much. Don’t get me wrong…in some cases an IRS audit may be justified. It is just the fact that the scales are tilted totally in favor of the government and this is very intimidating.

The IRS is armed with many thousands of pages of federal tax law,  has unlimited resources to interpret the outcome of such an audit, and in many cases of governmental authority,  raise questions as to the fairness and objectivity of their actions. We currently face major concerns in this country over how the new healthcare  law will be enforced. At present, several thousand additional IRS agents are to be hired to accomplish this task. And of course this raises the issues of the Constitutional Rights to the privacy of citizens personal data. These are all very important subjects to consider.

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What the Odds Are That Your Tax Return Will Be Audited, and What to Do If It Is

By Kevin McCormally | Kiplinger – Thu, Apr 4, 2013

……The 1-in-91 chance of being audited is the overall average. Your actual odds turn on the kind of return you file and the type of income you report…..

Read more:

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Daily Finance

Tax Audit Horror Stories: When the IRS Attacks

by Ross Kenneth Urken Feb 28th 2012 1:25PM

Joan Smith, 52, a Philadelphia-based artist, was preparing to go in for spinal surgery in 2010 when the IRS put a $10,000 tax lien on her bank account — which was more money than she had in the bank. It turns out she’d never received an audit memo that had been sent to her old address. She spent the next 11 months digging out from the paperwork avalanche that comes with a full audit.

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So you may be thinking ….what if I receive a Notice of IRS Audit…what should I do to prepare now before that awful event could ever happen?

To learn more please email me or call me.

 

Dan Norris

Small Business Consultant

Author