Tax practice

The U.S. House of Representatives voted to hold a former Internal Revenue Service official in contempt of Congress yesterday for refusing to answer questions about her role in scrutinizing Tea Party groups.

Internal Revenue Service Commissioner John Koskinen testified before the House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee on Wednesday about the 2014 tax filing season and other matters, including problems with administering the Earned Income Tax Credit and oversight of tax preparers.

There are a number of due dates that don’t apply to all taxpayers, but are easily missed when they do apply and will subject the taxpayer to harsh penalties if they overlook them.

Switzerland and Singapore agreed to automatically share bank data across borders as governments around the world seek to crack down on tax evasion.

The House Ways and Means Committee may have broken the law when it publicly disclosed confidential taxpayer information in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder.

Nearly two-thirds of corporate tax leaders are skeptical about the two-year timeline set by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development for curbing multinational tax avoidance, according to a new survey by KPMG.

Credit Suisse Group AG is close to resolving a U.S. tax-evasion probe with an agreement that might include a penalty of more than $1 billion, after creating a separate entity last year to house the businesses involved.

Brager Tax Law Group is sponsoring a contest with the goal of educating tax professionals and taxpayers about the complicated rules surrounding foreign bank account reports.

The Internal Revenue Service’s Office of Professional Responsibility has disbarred a former Massachusetts CPA and attorney for falsely claiming to be a CPA on power of attorney forms that he submitted to the IRS even after his CPA license had been revoked.

Randall Hogan chairs the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Sandy Cutler ran the Greater Cleveland Partnership. Tony Petrello donated $5 million to the Texas Children’s Hospital.

The Internal Revenue Service said it would regard 2014 and 2015 as a transition period for purposes of IRS enforcement and administration of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FATCA, for banks that have made a good-faith effort to comply.

In a decision at odds with five other circuit courts, the Tenth Circuit quashed IRS summonses that were issued after the 23-day notice requirement of Section 7609(a)(1) of the Tax Code. As a result, the issue could be ripe for Supreme Court review.

Eighty-one percent of U.S. CEOs believe the current international tax system needs to be reformed, according to a new survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers,

Some of our favorite recent tax fraud cases.

The IRS is accepting applications through June 13 for its Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council.

Thomson Reuters has launched a bimonthly newsletter for tax and accounting professionals.

Despite delays in expected tax reform, companies are engaging, modeling and planning in order to manage uncertainty, according to survey findings released at Ernst & Young LLP’s Ninth Annual Domestic Tax Conference in New York.

Recent highlights from some of our favorite tax bloggers.

Should you assume that your favorites will be retroactively revived?

A roundup of recent tax news.