Social Media:
https://www.facebook.com/ScarfoandCompanyCPAs/ https://twitter.com/scarfo_and_co https://www.linkedin.com/in/scarfo-and-company-a18a9a132 Blogs: https://scarfoandcompany.wordpress.com/ http://scarfo-and-company.tumblr.com/ http://scarfo-and-company.weebly.com/ Websites: http://www.scarfoandco-cpas.com/index.html http://scarfo-and-company-info.com/ http://scarfo-and-co.com/ http://scarfo-and-company-cpas.com/ http://scarfo-and-co-cpas.com/ http://scarfo-and-company.com/ More than two thirds of U.S. consumers are concerned about tax fraud and identity theft this year, according to a recent survey. Their fears are well-founded: More than one third reported having had their identity stolen in the past.
The burden of increased digitization of financial and general communication infrastructure is cybersecurity. While going paperless is faster, more efficient and more convenient for accountants, their clients, and everyone in between, security must remain a central consideration as firms go electronic. The IRS has issued several alerts about tax scams warning of a 400 percent surge in phishing and malware incidents this tax season, including a surge in W-2 phishing and TurboTax hacking attacks. Read Article: https://www.accountingtoday.com/news/tax-fraud-fears-on-the-rise-in-america Law360, New York (March 22, 2017, 7:11 PM EDT) -- A group of certified public accountants Wednesday urged Congress to reintroduce and pass a bill to fix drafting errors in recent tax legislation, saying failure to correct mistakes in a 2015 budget act place a burden on the Internal Revenue Service and taxpayers alike.
The American Institute of CPAs said in a letter to congressional leaders that errors in the drafting of the 2015 Bipartisan Budget Act threaten to complicate partnership audits and efforts by overseas taxpayers to renew their Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers if a bill to fix inadvertent changes to tax law made by the act is not reintroduced and signed into law. “Several of the provisions included in the ‘act’ are of unusually high importance since failure to enact them has an immediate negative impact on both the IRS and taxpayers. In particular, two provisions warrant immediate action,” the letter states. Read Entire Article: https://www.law360.com/articles/904888/cpa-group-urges-congress-to-fix-errors-in-tax-law What every small business owner should understand about their potential federal tax liability.3/29/2017
As a small business owner, you may assume the IRS isn’t concerned with your tax liability. However, this assumption couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, reports suggest that the IRS has increasingly targeted small businesses for audits in recent years.
While the government may not be interested in your business before it turns a profit, it’s important to pay attention to your tax responsibilities in the early stages of formation in order to maximize deductions and prevent liability issues moving forward. Read Article: http://quickbooks.intuit.com/r/taxes/new-small-business-5-things-to-know-about-federal-income-taxes/ Accountants agree: The top reason small business clients decide to flee for greener pastures is when services don’t match up with price.
“‘It costs too much’ is a commonly stated reason, but usually, when you get down to it, it’s the easiest excuse they can come up with,” said Sue Bosevich, vice president of support at Padgett Business Services. “Most often, clients leave because there is little correlation between the fee they're paying and the service offered — they simply don’t understand the value they're receiving. Bottom line, it has to be important to them and it's your responsibility to show them that.” Read Article: https://www.accountingtoday.com/opinion/the-no-1-reason-small-business-clients-leave The global business environment is riskier than in previous years, but many organizations are not devoting additional time or resources to risk management over the next 12 months, according to a new global survey.
Each of the top 10 risks’ perceived impact for 2017 grew compared with the previous year, according to respondents in a survey by consulting firm Protiviti and the North Carolina State University Enterprise Risk Management Initiative. The survey polled 735 board members and executives – 407 from the United States and 328 from other regions – on 30 risks facing their organizations. The top risks, and their rating on a 10-point scale of impact, are: A helpful article about how organizations can deter fraud and improve financial reporting.3/21/2017
The Anti-Fraud Collaboration, a coalition of the Center for Audit Quality, Financial Executives International, the Institute of Internal Auditors and the National Association of Corporate Directors, has released a new report on how organizations can deter fraud and improve financial reporting.
The report is based on two workshops the groups hosted last year. It makes several recommendations for improving accounting policies at companies:
Read Article: https://www.accountingtoday.com/news/groups-recommend-ways-to-fight-financial-fraud?feed=00000158-20c3-d6a2-adfb-70eb31330000 NEW ORLEANS -- The tiniest electronic gadgets have nothing on a new data-storage device. Each bit is encoded using the magnetic field of a single atom — making for extremely compact data storage, although researchers have stored only two bits of data so far.
“If you can make your bit smaller, you can store more information,” physicist Fabian Natterer of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland said March 16 at a meeting of the American Physical Society. Natterer and colleagues also reported the result in the March 9 Nature. Read Article: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/single-atom-magnets-store-bits-data Paying for private pre-K to 12 schooling or a college education is tough enough – but what if your child or student has to suddenly withdraw, costing you thousands of dollars in unused tuition funds?
One possible solution is tuition refund insurance. Tuition refund insurance, also known simply as tuition insurance, reduces or eliminates your losses in the event of a medical emergency or certain other setbacks resulting in early withdrawal from school. Read more: Should You Have Tuition Refund Insurance? | Investopedia http://www.investopedia.com/articles/pf/08/tuition-insurance.asp#ixzz4bqgckEQc The IRS established a tiered EITC Compliance Program to ensure preparers’ proper due diligence; the agency begun inspecting preparers who continue to have problems verifying clients’ eligibility for claiming the EITC.
“We look at the characteristics of returns claiming the EITC, the CTC and the AOTC completed by the same preparer and focus on questionable claims,” reads the IRS Web page “EITC & Other Refundable Credits.” The IRS has also alerted preparers who filed two or more tax year 2015 e-filed returns claiming the EITC without submitting a Form 8867, Paid Preparers’ EITC Checklist. The penalty is $505 per return. “The IRS has been scaring the industry for the last three years, beating tax professionals with a big stick,” said EA Kerry Freeman at Freeman Income Tax Service in Anthem, Ariz. Most preparers seem to turn mostly to one safeguard: “For the few taxpayers I help with these reporting responsibilities … documentation, documentation, documentation,” said John Dundon, an EA at Taxpayer Advocacy Services in Englewood, Colo. Read Article: https://www.accountingtoday.com/news/new-due-diligence-requirements-add-to-tax-season-burden |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
September 2017
Categories |