Practice management

A former Internal Revenue Service employee has been sentenced to two years in prison for identity theft and filing fraudulent income tax returns.

The Newark Field Office of the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation division has stepped up its efforts this year to investigate tax fraud and other financial crimes.

The focus of most taxpayers on their income taxes, small business taxes and potential estate taxes, with a gripe now and then about local sales taxes, misses a big chunk of the portion they pay every year: property taxes.

Three Republicans from the House Committee on Oversight and Government have written a letter to IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman demanding he explain a recent rule that would extend tax credits to individuals who buy health insurance from an exchange set up by the federal government when their state has failed to set up such an exchange.

CCH has released a special tax briefing providing guidance and analysis of the Internal Revenue Service’s temporary regulations for repairs of tangible property and how they may require companies to change their accounting methods.

By teaching your small business clients how the income statement and balance sheet dictate operating performance and business longevity, you will solidify your role as trusted advisor.

The Internal Revenue Service announced that many of its services will be unavailable over the Labor Day weekend, to accommodate an annual power outage and electric upgrades.

J.H. Cohn CEO Tom Marino said Wednesday that his firm will remain in the Nexia International accounting firm network after it merges in October with Reznick Group, and will be renamed CohnReznick, with him and Reznick managing principal Ken Baggett leading the combined firm as co-CEOs for the next three years.

The Internal Revenue Service is offering a sneak preview of its revamped Web site, which is slated to go live at the end of the month.

The optional reporting of Announcement 2012-19 should be made permanent on the Form 990, according to the American Institute of CPAs.

David Williams, director of the IRS Return Preparer Office, has issued a Facebook “heads up” to preparers who haven’t yet scheduled an RTRP test.

A former tax return preparer from Macon, Ga., has pleaded guilty to filing a false claim for tax refund, theft of government money and aggravated identity theft.

A federal court in Kansas City, Kan., has permanently barred Ahferom Goitom from preparing federal tax returns.

A former Internal Revenue Service revenue agent and tax preparer has pleaded guilty to charges that he tried to hire a hit man to kill four of his former clients who were scheduled to testify against him in a tax fraud case.

Illinois Governor Pat Quinn has signed legislation imposing a new tax on strip clubs that will be used to fund assistance to victims of sexual assault.

Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan paid effective federal tax rates of 20 percent in 2011 and 15.9 percent in 2010, tax returns released Friday night show.

David R. Williams, head of the Internal Revenue Service’s Return Preparer Office since its inception three years ago, is leaving at the end of August.

Tax and accounting solutions provider CCH Small Firm Services has launched a new resource center to help tax and accounting professionals improve their marketing and increase their knowledge of the field.

To maximize your accounting firm’s overall efficiency, effectiveness and productivity in researching and resolving a tax issue and determining the sustainability of a client’s tax return filing position, the appropriate tax research processes must be meticulously designed, implemented and executed.

On Friday, the Securities and Exchange Commission leveled charges and an emergency asset freeze on the perpetrators of an alleged $600 million Ponzi scheme that was on the verge of collapse.