Practice management

The Internal Revenue Service is staffing up with high-powered talent to crack down on companies shifting profits from country to country to lower their tax bills, a hot strategy the agency has targeted before with only limited success.

House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., has introduced a Republican-backed alternative to the Obama administration’s fiscal 2013 budget, including a proposal to consolidating the current six individual income tax brackets into just two brackets of 10 and 25 percent.

Tax resolution chain TaxMasters has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

A former Internal Revenue Service revenue agent has been sentenced to nearly three years in prison for his involvement with a scam that bilked investors out of more than $8 million by persuading them to buy unregistered securities in various Internet companies.

The Internal Revenue Service has proposed regulations that would require taxpayers with Employer Identification Numbers to periodically provide the IRS with up-to-date information.

Only 16 percent of tax and finance departments are actively involved in corporate sustainability efforts, according to a new survey by Ernst & Young.

The Internal Revenue Service needs to do a better job of documenting whether it completed all of the necessary pre-screening steps before hiring new employees, according to a new government report.

Accounting and advisory firm Sikich has merged with Denver-based Microsoft Dynamics AX reseller Streamline Systems, rounding out its own Dynamics sales and consulting practice.

PricewaterhouseCoopers has unveiled an online risk management tool in conjunction with the release of an annual report on reviewing risk management trends.

A Southern California tax preparer was convicted in a Seattle courtroom for helping nearly 1,000 clients claim more than $763 million in fraudulent tax refunds by preparing falsified tax returns on their behalf.

Weaknesses in the Internal Revenue Service’s financial and tax-processing systems continue to jeopardize the confidentiality, integrity and availability of sensitive taxpayer information, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office.

This is the first year that the IRS requires payments made with a credit or debit card to be reported by merchants who processed more than $20,000 and 200 transactions.

A congressional subcommittee plans to hold a hearing next Thursday on the 2012 tax return filing season, with one of the main topics to be the recent reports of tax refund delays.

Accounting firm Skoda Minotti has acquired Core Information Management, a Cleveland-based IT auditing and IT security management firm, and is launching a new industry practice, Skoda Minotti Financial Institutions Services Group, built around the acquisition.

The Senate failed to pass an amendment that would have extended a set of expiring tax credits for wind energy, biofuels, energy efficient homes and other tax breaks.

Nearly two-thirds of tax professionals are unaware of the various tax incentives that are available to private investors in clean energy projects, according to a new poll by Bloomberg BNA.

CCH has expanded its Expert Treatise Library with two new titles on the subject of corporate taxation.

Tax prep chain Jackson Hewitt said that one of its tax preparers is among the first to receive the IRS’s new designation of Registered Tax Return Preparer.

Certain industries in which clients operate increase an accountant’s risk exposure and those with high risk scores are especially precarious.

The Internal Revenue Service has introduced an online search tool that will allow the public to easily check on information about tax-exempt organizations, such as charities and other nonprofits.