Tax practice

Micro Focus, a company that provides software for modernizing enterprise applications, has been awarded a contract by the Internal Revenue Service.

As 2010 winds to a close, tax and accounting information and software provider CCH, a Wolters Kluwer business, has released a short list of four tax-planning moves for companies to make the most of current federal tax laws.

Congressman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., faces censure from his colleagues in the House for ethical violations involving taxes, unreported income and other matters.

The Government Accountability Office has produced a report looking at the tax compliance benefits and costs of 1099-MISC information reporting, which has been expanded under the health care reform bill.

House Republicans blocked a three-month extension of unemployment benefits, which are set to expire on Nov. 30.

The IRS Advisory Council has released a report criticizing the IRS’s revised schedule for reporting uncertain tax positions and its plans to regulate non-signing tax preparers.

The Internal Revenue Service is looking to return $164.6 million in undelivered refund checks.

Democratic lawmakers in the House have introduced legislation to extend unemployment benefits for three months until the end of February.

The meeting on the Bush tax cuts between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders that was scheduled for Thursday has been postponed until Nov. 30 at the request of Republican congressional leaders, who cited “scheduling conflicts.”

Senate Finance Committee ranking member Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, has asked the Government Accountability Office to analyze who benefits from the federal Build America Bonds program, and the proportion of tax dollars that go to Wall Street banks for fees rather than for the infrastructure projects themselves.

The American Institute of CPAs has written to Congress urging lawmakers to repeal the controversial new 1099 information reporting requirements in the health care reform bill.

Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Doug Shulman said Tuesday the IRS has withdrawn its “John Doe” summonses against the Swiss bank UBS.

Charles Rangel, the former chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, abruptly departed a House ethics panel hearing on Monday, claiming that he could not afford to pay for legal counsel.

The Internal Revenue Service failed to ensure that only eligible taxpayers received education credit tax relief that was only supposed to be available to taxpayers in Midwestern disaster areas, according to a new government report.

In June we discussed the proposed Schedule UTP and instructions for reporting uncertain tax positions. The Internal Revenue Service received a number of comments on those proposals and, on Sept. 24, 2010, issued a final Schedule UTP and related materials for the 2010 year in Announcements 2010-75 and 2010-76. The final version makes a number of significant changes to the requirements in response to the input received.

IRS MAY PROBE FORGIVEN MORTGAGE DEBT

Washington, D.C. - The IRS plans to take a closer look at businesses that fail to file tax returns, and identify more of them.

The unfinished business awaiting Congress during the lame duck session this month includes the expiring 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, the normal extender items, the estate tax, and, many tax professionals believe, a ban on tax strategy patents.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said Friday he would introduce legislation to repeal the controversial requirements for businesses to file forms that would report payments made for goods and certain services to the IRS.

Here’s some good news for those who haven’t renewed their Preparer Tax Identification Number by the end of the year. The process to renew it will be the same beginning in January as it is now, and it takes only about 15 minutes to do online.