Gail in Virginia

Not sure I have this straight: Your client is receiving child support, but is not the custodial parent? That doesn't make sense unless it is disguised alimony. But if he is the recipient,then he doesn't pay taxes on child support, and ex cannot deduct the payments. I agree with Cathy's points, but she is reading that your client is paying the child support I think. I usually have clients paying child support who want me to treat it as alimony. Your situation is a new one on me.

I think the non-conforming part of this is not reporting income that was reported on a 1099, and the reasonable basis is that because it was a rental of less than 14 days it is not reportable income. Unfortunately, Mr. Pencil has not been seen on the forum for quite some time and cannot explain his answer personally since the question did not arise until much later.

Thanks for the information about the fully informed jury association, Catherine. That was interesting and informative!

Ouch!

Have you checked your ATX's site to see if the return has been accepted? I am assuming that you are using ATX. Every now and then I had a problem with a return being accepted but the ack never coming through to my computer. In ATX 2012, under the E-file Manager tab, under Support, under Customer Service Utilities, is an option to Synchronize E-File Info with EFC. You might try running that. Good luck!

It amazes me how often employers who hire high school and college students advise them to claim Single and 0 for the w-4 instead of exempt, or instead of suggesting that they take the form to their parent(s). I hate having to file a tax return for a kid that only has to file to get back $10 or $15 that was withheld from his or her first job. It was a big enough shock to them to lose all that money to social security withholding.

I am glad my "friends" don't post pictures of how I look at seminars on fb!

Could he be deported to the moon? Without a vacuum suit? Or maybe forced to work at prison wages until everyone gets paid back for at least the money he stole from them (I don't think he can restore their peace of mind.) Anymore, sending him to another country doesn't mean he can't do this again, it just means that it will be harder to arrest him if he does.

Actually, I got a call Tuesday on my cell phone. While I was attending the IRS Tax Forum at National Harbor. I laughed. But it really isn't funny - people fall for this every day, which is why they keep doing it.

Maybe we could get congress to do away with filing status - everyone files their own return based on their own income with no dependent exemptions or special tax rates according to filing status. If you own assets such as rental property or stocks/bank accounts jointly, you must each report 1/2 of the income. Then it won't matter whether you are married or to whom. Never happen.

I just looked at the website for your church's ASP volunteers. Wow. You guys sound so organized and I love all of the training before you go in using tools, and actually having a practice work day where you build wheelchair ramps. I don't know if this is ASP required, or something that your church does, but I think it is a great idea. Our church just usually sends a list of what to bring with you and goes, with no training for anyone until they are on site. I hope that you won't mind if I share that web page with some of our leaders - I think it is a great practice to follow!

Nice in theory, Pacun, but my husband and I have not been on the same insurance plan in years. So if we were minded to lie about our marital status, the insurance would not be what tripped us up.

I looked at the link that you provided, and I really could not find anything about itemizing deductions in that link. After chasing through some other links, I did find a power point presentation from the UN about paying US taxes that, on slide 44, tells employees that they make all efforts to minimize their tax to qualify for reimbursement, including using the larger of standard or itemized deduction. See http://www.un.org/Depts/oppba/accounts/tax/forms/us_tax_reimbursement_procedures_at_unhq.pdf

I agree with MDEA - it is usually married people telling me they are single I have a problem with but I don't know how to get someone to prove a negative. If we originally had them as married, I could ask to see their divorce papers but we had one gentleman that I did his return for 10 years filing him as single, his previous preparer had filed him as single on the return that I saw when we started with him, and then he came in and asked me to notarized some paperwork for another state because he was getting divorced. To me that is a much bigger problem.

I am curious - why do they have to itemize? I don't have any UN employees as clients, and I am not likely to, but I did not think anyone (other than MFS spouse of someone who itemizes) was required to itemize. I can see it might be advantageous.... but why required?

Thanks for sharing that link. It was fun reading some of the arguments that people were making both for and against the SCOTUS ruling.

Is anyone attending the IRS Tax Forum in National Harbor? I plan to attend.

If he has a desk, he needs a chair. How much more than a normal office chair is this going to cost? It looks to me like he might be able to at least depreciate the part of the cost that relates to having an office chair for his desk. If the massage part of it increases the cost/fmv appreciably, then that part would have to go on schedule A as a medical if prescribed by a doctor. Of course, everything depends on how you look at it but I believe that I could defend that position on audit.

Tom, I read it the same way BUT it sounds like she had $638K in income, and even after taxes had $250K left to build a house. Now maybe you don't think $638,000 sounds like a lot of income but it does to me. Now had she not taken it as a distribution and paid the taxes on it, and it was sitting there waiting for her retirement, I don't think it would have been income and caused a problem with ACA eligibility.

Catherine, I have not signed up yet but unless something changes I expect that I will be attending. I hope to see you there!

From the Virginia Department of Taxation website: Corporations that have elected S status for federal purposes are automatically treated as S corporations for Virginia purposes, and must file their returns on Form 502 by the 15th day of the fourth month following the close of their taxable year. All other corporations file on Form 500. The Virginia Form 500 must be filed by the 15th day of the fourth month following the close of the taxable year, except for nonprofit organizations, which file by the 15th day of the sixth month following the close of their taxable year.So unlike New York, once you have elected S status for federal purposes, you are automatically treated as a pass-through entity for state purposes as well.

The instructions for the POA (form 2848) have the phone numbers for faxing the form to the CAF unit. I usually wait about a week before trying to access the transcript to give them time to record the information. Sometimes I have gotten it faster and sometimes it has taken longer.

Another option might be available if you plan to attend one of the IRS tax forums. They will have a case resolution program there where you can talk to someone from TAS face to face. If you don't resolve this before then, and you plan to attend the forum, that might be an option.

My laptop currently is a Windows 7 Toshiba. If my wrist happens to touch the touchpad while I am typing, the cursor can do strange and wonderful things. This is not an operating system issue as much as it is a touchpad issue.

Virginia had that requirement last year.