Lee B

It's always interesting, how many clients think they are saving money by avoiding Accountants and Attorneys and their exorbitant fees.

Actually it was a Ponzi Scheme, very similar to what Bernie Madoff did for many years.

Tax shelter fraud scheme leads to 16 years in prison "Two tax attorneys from St. Louis and an insurance agent from North Carolina will spend a combined 16 years in prison for running a fraudulent tax shelter resulting in a tax loss of more than $22 million. Michael Elliott Kohn, Catherine Elizabeth Chollet, and David Shane Simmons created and promoted the “Gain Elimination Plan,” a scheme that helped clients hide income and inflate business expenses. From 2011 to 2022, the group fabricated transactions using fake royalties and management fees. On paper, they funneled these fees into limited partnerships owned by charities, but in reality, the transactions were used to evade taxes. To further the scheme, they required clients to buy life insurance policies linked to their hidden income. The death benefit for the policy was directly tied to the anticipated profitability of the clients’ businesses and how much of the clients’ taxable income was intended to be sheltered. Simmons, the insurance agent, earned more than $2.3 million in commissions by selling these policies and shared profits with Kohn and Chollet. Kohn and Chollet received more than $1 million from Simmons. Simmons also filed false personal tax returns, underreporting his income and inflating expenses, which caused an additional $480,000 in tax losses. The court sentenced the three as follows: Michael Elliott Kohn: seven years Catherine Elizabeth Chollet: four years David Shane Simmons: five years The court also ordered them to serve three years of supervised release and pay more than $22.5 million in restitution." I am always amazed how gullible the victims are? I had a client about 10 years ago who invested $300,000 in a pyramid scheme that guaranteed a 12 % return. Most of the victims were here in the Pacific Northwest. The pyramid scheme was forced into a bankruptcy liquidation and my client ultimately recovered about $200,00.

In the past several years I have had three business clients who had fraudulent checks which cleared their checking accounts. I found them when I did my monthly checking account reconciliation. In two cases the banks reimbursed my clients. In the third case the bank refused to help my client. However the amounts were only 2 or 3 thousand dollars.

This application of this ruling was limited to the plaintiffs in this case.

Two renewals ago I waited until the last day and didn't receive my card until late April. I have never had to include copies of my CPE credit hours. They should have that on file cross referenced to your PTIN.

It's a preliminary injunction which is temporary.

Excerpt from the legal firm KUTAKROCK: "Note that the court’s injunction is nationwide and is not limited to the plaintiffs in the case. By contrast, on March 1, 2024, the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Alabama entered an order declaring the CTA unconstitutional and permanently enjoining the government from enforcing the CTA against only the named plaintiffs in that case1. "

Bloomberg Law: "We note this is a preliminary injunction, and we urge reporting companies to pay attention for additional updates and proceedings in this and other cases which could modify or change this order." Good, I can put this on the back burner

"Drake Software has been dedicated to protecting your and your clients’ data by automatically enabling MFA for preparers since Drake Tax 2021 and for all web-based applications thereafter (Drake Software single sign-on (SSO) accounts, including the Drake User Manager, Support site, Drake Portals (firms), Drake Zero, and Web1040). If tax professionals have other sufficient means of security that meet or exceed IRS MFA requirements, they may choose to disable MFA; however, those who disable MFA without adequate safeguards in place are in direct violation of FTC 16 CFR 314.4(c)(5). For this reason, Drake Software strongly recommends enabling MFA on all Drake Software" According to this excerpt from a Drake Knowledgebase article dated November 4, 2024, Drake will still allow preparers to opt out of MFA.

Interesting, there a number of users posting on the Drake Board that they aren't able to do that?

Interesting, according to the Drake Community Board, Drake requires you to reload an authenticator app every year after you download the the nest years software ?

All Google apps update automatically multiple times a year.

There is a number of various MFAs that qualify, but we are limited by what our tax software allows.

Enter "closing a corporation" in the search box. Be sure to include the quotation marks.

Yeah, I have noticed that on the OSCPA Discussion Board that some members are using Perplexity AI to answer other members questions.

If you want to dive into the details, there was a discussion about this topic started by schirallicpa on March 14th.

The exception to this would be when you accrue post liquidation expenses, for example legal and accounting fees.

Just took a webinar on BOI Reporting. Ownership is just one of the qualifiers. Someone or some group of people have substantial control and decision making authority.

I'm set up as an S Corporation so I have to file.

"Recently, a FinCEN representative acknowledged that only about 20% of the millions of businesses that need to report have filed. " With everyone waiting to file, their website may get overwhelmed and crash. Calling their help line may end up being an exercise in frustration. I guess I better file before Thanksgiving

You're the only one who knows the answer to this question

I have money in a savings account that is currently earning 4.0 %

"D.13. Who is the beneficial owner of a homeowners association? A homeowners association (HOA) that meets the reporting company definition and does not qualify for any exemptions must report its beneficial owner(s). A beneficial owner is any individual who, directly or indirectly, exercises substantial control over a reporting company, or owns or controls at least 25 percent of the ownership interests of a reporting company. There may be instances in which no individuals own or control at least 25 percent of the ownership interests of an HOA that is a reporting company. However, FinCEN expects that at least one individual exercises substantial control over each reporting company. Individuals who meet one of the following criteria are considered to exercise substantial control over the HOA: • the individual is a senior officer; • the individual has authority to appoint or remove certain officers or a majority of directors of the HOA; • the individual is an important decision-maker; or • the individual has any other form of substantial control over the HOA. [Issued April 18, 2024] " Be careful. under this FAQ any other senior officer would be a beneficial owner . For example: A Treasurer or Secretary.

Unless the deceased taxpayer had no assets at the time of death, isn't whoever was the fiduciary for his estate responsible for paying any taxes due before any distributions are made to the beneficiaries?