Tax planning

Former KPMG tax partner Robert Pfaff has been indicted on new charges alleging he participated in a tax shelter scheme involving the Big Four firm and a company located in Saipan in the Northern Mariana Islands.

The American Institute of CPAs said its members have been answering tax questions for USA Today as part of an annual effort to provide online tax assistance to readers.

The AICPA said it has sent a letter to the Internal Revenue Service urging its agents to be aware of "scriveners' errors," or unintentional mistakes, in the drafting of employee benefit plans.

The Internal Revenue Service said it has approximately $1.2 billion in unclaimed refunds waiting for 1.3 million people who did not file federal income tax returns for 2004, but they need to file by April 15, 2008, to claim the money.

Eight employees of the Monongalia County, W.Va., sheriff's department tax office are sharing the proceeds of a Powerball lottery ticket worth $273.6 million.

CCH has released Worldwide Tax Rates and Answers: Central and Eastern Europe, an online tax compliance and research product for companies doing business in those parts of the world.

Gilman Ciocia's personal tax team is giving away tickets to New York Mets games as part of a contest it is holding for the second year in a row.

A federal judge has ruled against some of the main provisions of a New Jersey law restricting interest rates and fees that can be charged on tax refund anticipation loans, even though the annual percentage rates average 115 percent.

There are a lot of very good research tools on the market. But what's available for the small practitioner who needs less than high-powered products?

Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I.-Conn., has written a letter to the Internal Revenue Service asking for an explanation of its investigation of a speech by Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., at the United Church of Christ.

The Internal Revenue Service is putting together its next Taxpayer Advocacy Panel to make the tax administration system more customer-oriented, but it's already contending with a growing chorus of people who want to see major changes in the agency, if not outright dismantlement.

RSM McGladrey and Axiom Solutions have signed an agreement to offer research and development tax credit services to companies.

There are a lot of very good research tools on the market. But what's available for the small practitioner who needs less than high-powered products?

The Internal Revenue Service said it would begin sending out more than 130 million economic stimulus payments in weekly installments starting May 2, with the distribution schedule based on the last two digits of the recipient's Social Security number.

The Senate has confirmed Douglas H. Shulman as the new commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service.

Sage Software has updated its Sage FAS software with a service update to reflect the economic stimulus package recently enacted by Congress.

There are a lot of very good research tools on the market. But what's available for the small practitioner who needs less than high-powered products?

The ink hadn’t dried on the new economic stimulus bill before federal tax authorities began receiving complaints about vicious new tax rebate scams targeting taxpayers and their accountants.The new flurry of fraudulent activity is directed at taxpayers expecting to receive the rebates of up to $1,200 per couple that Congress voted to send out after the close of this year’s tax filing season.

By the time this column appears, CPAs everywhere are going to be tackling stacks of paperwork for income taxes. This will be true whether they are up to their necks in client returns, or struggling in an audit to reconcile book and tax income in Schedule M.With those pains in mind, it only makes sense that accountants would prefer GAAP accounting for income taxes to be relatively simple.

The Government Accountability Office has issued a report on the Internal Revenue Service's performance so far this filing season, including a prediction that the IRS will lose hundreds of millions of dollars responding to calls about tax rebates.