schirallicpa

Thanks for letting us know. I appreciate learning what others are doing since I'm pretty much on my own island here in western ny

I have 4 of them this year!

I have a couple clients that are messing around with hobby-kind-of-stuff, that they content are businesses that they are expecting to make it profitable someday. And I say "yeah right" privately, but I am wondering if someone has a form letter that I could steal.

what are you doing? putting it in a csv format?

haven't had that error all year until the last week or so. wondered if we needed an update.

I have not used this form before. this year I have a client who lost his records and I was looking thru forms and disclosures to see if there was something to say that we are using some estimates on the return. Now - the thing is - this is not a high dollar client, and heck - i bet half the time I get estimates anyway. But, the question is, how often does anyone use the 8275, and is it supposed to be used just for positions taken, not just some run-of-the-mill estimates made on an individual return. Just one thing after another this year.

I just hate the home office deduction worksheet in ATX now. A few years ago it was quite straightforward, but now its cumbersome.

I want a slow week........

thank you for making sense of it.

I'd rather deal with the IRS than anyone from NYS tax and finance. Just sayin....

I have never posted so many questions on this forum. Remind me to make another donation! Client receives SSA-1099 with 120000 of benefits, much of which is for 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015. During all of those years she was married and filed MFJ. Divorced final in 2016. Now filing HOH. During all of those previous years her X received SS benefits. My client received SS benefits in 2015 only. Looking at the lump sum worksheet. First line - enter the total amount form box 5 of all your forms ssa1099 for earlier year plus the lump sum for the earlier year. ok - I assume I am only putting my client's ss benefit, not her now estranged spouses benefit.(?) But - line 3 - enter AGI. Well - if I'm only counting her SS benefit, then why am I putting their AGI. Then move to line 7 - enter taxable benefits reported on your return for the earlier year. Ugh - do I figure just the amount that would have been reported for my client's portion of SS benefits, or do I put their combined taxable benefit. Do I need to go thru lump sum worksheet for each previous year - for the husbands taxable benefits. I guess my question is - do i try to separate hers from his as we look back, or do I take their combined each year. I beginning to believe there should not be joint tax returns, that we each should just file individually.......

a few years ago i had a situation where a mom would always claim a child, when the child lived with the dad. Then we would just attach a signed statement, state who's return the child was on, and that's it. it would fly and the dad would get his rightful refund. but that was in the low-tech days.

It's kind of a mess up family. My client has taken in her nieces because her sister has some mental issues. When she went to collect her info this Fed, she could not find the youngest girls SS card, and had to go thru the trouble of getting another one for her. Finally she got it Thursday and brought it in so we could get her return e-filed. On Friday the efile rejected because that SS # had been used on someone else's return. My client thinks she knows who (another relative) and thinks he had stolen the SS card to begin with and that's why she could not find it in February. So now the question is, how do we pursue this?

new client. All the good ones come in late in the season. Filing old returns. Has not filed 13 - 16. Self employed "project manager" whatever the heck that is. Has residence in NY, has farm in NY, and since 2014 has wife in NY. However, in 2011 he accepted contract work in North Carolina. Was supposed to be an 6-8 month gig. Then they hired him again, another 6-8 months, and again, and again. So supposedly he never knew if he could plan on being down there for long term, or if after each contract ended he was done. He went home to NY once or twice a month to tend to personal stuff. He does not have a home office. The company he was contracted with was only in NC, not in NY at all. He rented a small house in NC. He actually did a really good job at keeping track of expenses right down to stamps bought, and burger king whoopers. He did this thru mid 2015 and then took a regular job in NY. Of course, he's asking me if he can just take per diem for all this, since it would be a lot more than his house rent and whoopers. I'm a little nervous about where is tax home is. Can I take per diem for lodging? Can we take per diem for food? And can I take the travel back and forth from NY to NC? How much can I charge for this one?

We send our children to school to learn terrific geometry problems, and solve horrific stats problems. We make sure they take sciences that they are not interested in, fill their calendar with Spanish classes they will never use, and make sure they have at least 2 "arts" to graduate, or something dumb like that. But no one teaches a child about basic cooking skills, how to keep a checkbook, what interest on credit cards looks like, the implications of student loans, and especially income tax and how to fill out a W4. It is a huge problem in our schools, and we continue to ignore basic stuff in lieu of math - that personally I cannot figure out why they need it these days after they learn the basics! We have computers! I've done a few amends myself. Grumble mumble...grumble mumble.....It's been a very long week.

Thank you Gail, jasdlm, I think that is where I was leaning. Certainly no one is trying to cook any books. I just had not come across this situation before, and since it is a large amount of money, the matching issue swatted me in the face. Yes - I will post again if I hear of a notice - however, I do not know the contributor and I suspect he would be the recipient, not my client the non-profit.

Nonprofit received very large contribution in early 2017. But the contributor had written the check on Dec 31, to take the deduction. When the NP wrote him a very nice letter thanking him for the contribution, they dated the contribution for the 31st to support his taking the 2016 deduction. But - they did not know it was coming, and their books record the money as 2017 income. Not a problem, until I get to the schedule B. If I put him on Sch B with that large contribution, his amount alone will exceed the total revenue for 2016. So that sticks out like a sore thumb. But if I put the lesser amount that was received in 2016 will there be possibility of mismatch later on if his return gets pulled? Can I just put the lower amount, and then put an explanation on schedule O? Or should I include the income on the 2016 990 as an in-transit receivable - even though it was an unknown.......I don't like that idea......

but I posted the convoy rubberduck song

Rubberduck! (You did see my earlier trucker question.......)

The camera is spanning down the street trying to capture the feel for the area, the young men hanging around doing nothing, the run down buildings, while the reporter is talking of the huge problem they are having in this particular area with drugs. I thought it was kinda funny when the Jackson-Hewitt office was right there in the mist of it all. "come here and we'll send your refund right to your supplier". No - of course it didn't really say that, but jeepers creepers don't the politicians ever catch on to the the whole EIC scam? Remarkably the drug problem increases in the spring. Gee-golly. Federally subsidized drug use.

My client qualifies for a moving expense as he had to move from PA to NY to accept a new job. The 3903 info automatically fills in on the pa forms. I'm thinking that he should not get a benefit in pa since he moved out of pa. But my expertise is limited on PA. Any experts out there????

Rubberduck.

As I recall, the over-the-road trucker can take meals per diem @ 80% but cannot take the lodging per diem - that is only actual expense. Does that sound right?

i didn't think there should be any prior period adjustment. So I will have client fix that and we will record properly. Thanks for the responses. Sometimes you just get tired of thinking I think...........