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Can she afford the tax bill? Does she still have an income? If she can't work and is living off savings, you may be able to get her into currently uncollectible due to severe financial hardship. If she can pay the tax bill, have her pay that but not the penalty, but you need to request the abatement right away. Communication with the IRS is key. Tom Longview, TX

I would get a POA now. The IRS will need it in order to talk to you. I'm sorry for your client and you.

Any depreciation gets recaptured and taxed in year 1 so that could be a problem when the resulting tax is greater than the first year proceeds. Don't think it makes any difference whether the corporation is accrual or cash The corporation can terminate and distribute the installment sales contract to the stockholders. This is a test of my memory. Did I pass or fail

This website maintained by an ex IRS employee should answer your questions: https://www.irsmind.com/irs-penalties-and-penalty-relief/

"The California Public Employees’ Retirement System reported Wednesday that hackers stole the names, social security numbers, birth dates and other confidential information of roughly 769,000 retirees and beneficiaries, taking advantage of a vulnerability in a contracted vendor’s cybersecurity system.' Apparently CalPERS was also hacked 3 weeks ago and just announced it today? Not good optics.

I believe the C Corp will be ineligible for installment reporting if the corp is on an accrual basis. So - the corp will take the hit, and then the owner/stockholder will take the hit. (no - not my regular client. Another tax preparer is asking for input as to how to handle.) Does the corp have to stay open to continue to collect the payments? Can the payment agreement be transferred? Or does this trigger another event somehow......?

"Timothy J Lundquist of Minnesota pleaded guilty to willfully failing to account for and pay over employment taxes for his automobile transmission business. Lundquist was responsible for filing quarterly employment tax returns, as well as collecting and paying over to the IRS payroll taxes withheld from employees’ wages. For at least the last quarter of 2013 through 2018, Lundquist did not pay withholdings to the IRS or file required employment tax returns. In total, he caused a tax loss to the IRS of more than $1.2 million. IRS Criminal Investigation is investigating the case. Lundquist faces a statutory maximum of five years in prison. He also faces a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties." I am astounded that he got away with this for 5 years!

Take this with a grain of salt since I don't deal with these kind of clients: When you have the returns prepared, pay the tax and interest ( not the penalty) via direct debit or Direct Pay. Then file the penalty abatement request. Remember the POA will take 5 to 7 weeks to be processed. Don't know if it would be possible with this client, but in the past I have dealt with the POA processing delay by making phone calls together with my client in my office.

First Republic has been taken over by JPMorganChase. Your client should have received communications about that along with contact information.

Likely true. But, the current hardware security, including bitlocker and similar, when used, is darn good enough for normal use.

Yeah, the worksheets take some getting used to. I have been with Drake since the 2017 Tax Year and 2 or 3 times a year I have to call support because I can't find something. Their diagnostic messages can be annoyingly detailed. However, I can honestly say I have never had an efile fail once I cleared all the diagnostic messages!

If we applied SS tax to ALL income, we could lower the rate. A lower SS tax rate would benefit low earners and small business immensely.