Tax strategies

Nobody wants to be the bearer of bad news, but small business owners should be aware that the Internal Revenue Service is stepping up its examinations of companies' retirement plans this year, hoping to catch those that are cheating their workers or the government, or both, as well as to ensure that the plans meet federal regulations.Traditional pensions, 401(k) plans and profit-sharing plans are all on the agenda.

The ranking minority member of the Senate Finance Committee threatened to place a "hold" on President Bush's nomination for the top Treasury tax official, unless the department agrees to provide a comprehensive plan to close the tax gap by the end of September.

A federal judge has ruled that the Internal Revenue Service went too far in retroactively banning the "Son of Boss" tax shelter.

Some federal tax breaks for energy efficient hybrids will start shrinking this fall.

Avalara, a provider of Web-based sales tax compliance services for small-and-midsized businesses, announced that it has seen dramatic growth for the first half of 2006.

In response to a bill that would ban Internet poker, the nonprofit Poker Players Alliance has released a study making a case for the online games to be legalized and taxed by the federal government.

A federal judge in Greenville, S.C., has permanently barred Heather Alexander Ferguson from promoting an alleged tax-fraud scheme.

Thomson Tax & Accounting, part of The Thomson Corp., announced the upcoming release of its InSource WorkFlow Manager solution.

The Congressional Research Service, which provides nonpartisan public policy research, has released its review of the presidential advisory panel on tax reform's two major proposals.

The failure to get a revamped computer program online to screen for fraudulent 2006 tax returns will cost the federal government between $200 million and $300 million, the Internal Revenue Service has estimated.

A federal court has barred a Jackson Hewitt franchise from preparing federal income tax returns claiming an improper federal income tax exemption for casino proceeds paid to Native Americans.

The Internal Revenue Service has ruled that employer incentives encouraging their employees to purchase environmentally friendly hybrid cars, are considered taxable compensation.

The Senate Finance Committee pushed hard for answers from a tax policy nominee on when the Treasury Department will supply recommendations on an overhaul of the tax system, and how best to meaningfully improve the nation's tax compliance.

National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson has delivered a report to Congress outlining the priority issues her office will tackle in the coming fiscal year.

The government got a big victory in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, winning a reversal of a 2004 decision in a case legal experts say will go a long way in defining what constitutes an illegal tax shelter by reestablishing the economic substance test.

Prosecutors are looking into Deutsche Bank's role in providing a lesser-known questionably tax shelter sold through a Silicon Valley firm, according to published reports.

Three weeks into the clean-up effort following the massive flooding at its Washington headquarters, the Internal Revenue Service said that the office -- which houses some 2,700 workers -- won't reopen until early 2007.

During his administration's mid-year congressional review, President Bush said that high tax revenues were responsible for helping the government reduce the budget deficit faster than originally anticipated.

Whether accounting firms and tax practitioners should be allowed to seek patent protection for the tax advice they offer is a question being raised on Capitol Hill in response to a recent upsurge in patent applications by the developers of new tax reduction strategies.

While practitioners are still scrambling to make sense out of the recent tax reconciliation legislation, significant changes in tax legislation are already in effect for 2006 - changes that may have a huge impact on the tax pro's 2007 tax filing season. And since it's an election year, tax pros will have to keep a close watch on any additional legislation that makes it into law impacting 2007 filings.How the practitioner community prepares for those changes now will make a big difference in the success of that filing season, which is really just a few months away.