Practice management

The U.S. Senate sent a $42 billion package of tax incentives to President Obama for his signature, reviving dozens of lapsed breaks for 2014 and setting them to expire two weeks from tomorrow.

The Internal Revenue Service received fewer phone calls from taxpayers this year than in recent years, according to a new government report, but the percentage of callers seeking help who received it remained low while wait times remained high compared to prior years.

When I was starting out I read a number of books by master salesman Elmer Wheeler, who said, among many other things, “Sell the sizzle, not the steak.” This left me with thoughts of always telling clients, or whoever I interacted with, about the value and benefits of dealing with me while de-emphasizing the cost.

Companies planning for a merger or acquisition have various issues to consider as they prepare for the transaction. One of the issues is golden parachutes.

Federal prosecutors in Iowa have agreed to drop a controversial civil asset forfeiture case in which the Internal Revenue Service seized nearly $33,000 from the owner of a Mexican restaurant whose cash deposits at her bank had aroused suspicion of criminal activity.

New York accounting firm O’Connor Davies has launched a new Risk Advisory Group with the help of two veteran accountants formerly with Rothstein Kass, which is now part of KPMG.

U.S. life insurers take billions of dollars in undeserved tax deductions by shifting capital to states with looser reserve requirements and the practice should be halted by the Internal Revenue Service, a New York regulator said.

Some of our favorite recent tax fraud cases.

In the waning days of the congressional term, a lawmaker has introduced legislation that would offer a reduced tax rate of 8.75 percent on corporate profits repatriated from abroad and use the money to pay for infrastructure improvements.

The Internal Revenue Service released a revenue procedure Friday providing rules for the nationwide rollout of post-appeals mediation for both Offer in Compromise and Trust Fund Recovery Penalty cases.

If you intended to start a new health regimen after the first of the year, you would start planning for the change, right? Maybe you’d research gym memberships or look into the cost of joining a programmed diet. Perhaps you’d start reading motivational articles to psych yourself up for the new commitment. At a minimum, you’d stock your pantry with healthy food choices or begin making a list for the grocery store.

Capstone Marketing president Jean Marie Caragher offers advice to CPAs on how to plan and focus their marketing activities, in an interview with AccountingToday.com editor-in-chief Michael Cohn at Accounting Today's Growth & Profitability Summit in Boca Raton, Fla.

The surge in U.S. companies avoiding taxes by taking a foreign address has been condemned by President Barack Obama and stirred a policy debate in Congress. What’s often overlooked is that these “inversions” are typically a final step in a hopscotch of multinational tax dodging.

The U.S. House of Representatives rejected an $11 billion bill that would have provided tax incentives for charitable donations of food, money from retirement accounts and land-development rights.

Financial data provider Powerlytics has crunched the numbers and created a ranking of the most profitable states in which to operate an accounting practice.

The Internal Revenue Service used its legislative authority to hire employees at salaries higher than those typically given to senior executives in the federal government, according to a new government report that found the practice appropriate, even though Congress has now stepped in to change it.

With the advent of the holiday season, now may be just the time to market yourself and your staff to potential clients, according to Chuck McCabe, president and chief executive of Peoples Income Tax and The Income Tax School.

Outgoing House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., officially introduced Thursday the comprehensive tax reform package he has been laboring over in recent years.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., has released a report highlighting billions of dollars in tax breaks for “special interests.”

Highlights of some of our favorite tax-related blogs from the past week.