Many married couples opt to make joint tax returns to qualify for certain tax breaks given to couples.  But making joint returns also means being jointly liable for any IRS actions against you.  Things get more complicated when a divorce ensues.  That's why the government enacted a new policy called the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption.  Under this policy, if you are a divorcee who is innocent of tax-related wrongdoing, you will not be penalized for the wrongs of your irresponsible ex-spouse.  However, there are some things that need to be done to obtain the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption.

The IRS has set a number of criteria that you must meet in order to be eligible for this exemption.  This new rule is open to anyone who has had to forfeit a tax refund because of the financial irresponsibility of their partner. This could have happened because of unpaid back taxes or it could be because of other unpaid debt, such as an unpaid student loan.  So if you have been the innocent victim of the financial irresponsibility of your ex-spouse and you are owed money by the IRS because of that, then you should apply for the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption.

Even if you do not qualify to have a tax file of your own, you can claim for the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption if the criteria reflect your situation.  The IRS understands that it was not your fault, therefore they are prepared to give you some breaks to help you out as you start a new life as a single person again.

You will find lots of questions asked of you to determine your eligibility when you apply but do not be put off by them.  It may be a bit complicated, but it is the easiest way to depict the qualifications for this tax break.  If you engage a professional to file your tax returns, discuss with them the possibility of your qualifying for the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption.  It could be the difference between a nice big refund and a huge tax debt.

This is a new policy implemented only this year, but may very well become a permanent fixture in the tax code if it is well received and benefits many people.  Although things can change quickly, if you feel that you qualify for the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption for next year and beyond, ask to see if it still exists.  To find out more about the Innocent Spouse IRS Exemption, discuss it with a tax attorney.  You could also contact the IRS through their toll free number or check up their website.

Darrin T. Mish is a veteran, nationally recognized tax attorney who has focused on providing IRS help to taxpayers for over a decade. He regularly travels the country training other attorneys, CPAs and enrolled agents on how to handle their toughest cases with the IRS. He is highly ranked among the top attorneys in the country, with an AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell and a perfect 10 on Avvo.com. Martindale-Hubbell has also honored him with a listing in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers. He is a member of the American Society of IRS Problem Solvers and the Tax Freedom Institute. With clients on every continent but Antarctica, he has what it takes to solve your IRS problems no matter where you live in the world. If you would like more information about his practice and how he can help you, please call his office at (813) 229-7100 or toll free at 1-888-GET-MISH.

Related Blogs

• Build Savings or Payoff Debt – Which Comes First? « OutOfYourRut.com
• Greece Debt Crisis: Sarkozy Says Europe Will Help Greece During …
• The Stanford Review » University Gains County Alcohol Ordinance …
• KHN Column: Popular but ineffective: Repealing insurers' antitrust …
• A Jeffersonian Response to Fiscal Irresponsibility « Garnering …
• Web Hits – Credit Culture: Incentivizing Greed and Irresponsibility
• A Culture Of Irresponsibility « Samuel at Gilgal
• Government Irresponsibility … « The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod …
• What is Irs Tax Fraud? | Finance
• Is The IRS Guilty of Violating Antitrust Laws? | Free Market Mojo
• Cracking The IRS Code – Time For The TRUTH – Part Two | xForce …
• Defaulted on your IRS installment agreement? Where do you turn now …
• It's time for the IRS to investigate money-laundering Tides …
• GayPatriot » How bad was that dance number at the Oscars?
• Algebraic Number Theory at Leiden « Ars Mathematica
• Insuring your policy | The Acorn
• Quote of the Day: Foreign policy edition | QandO
• Club Troppo » National information policy redux
• A Refund from Simon Monjack | PerezHilton.com
• Financial Sense: Rethink tax refund loans « Finance Business Articles

An IRS bank levy is like a nightmare come true because once you are slapped with one, you cease to have control over your own assets.  On the other hand, it also costs the IRS a lot of money and time as well.  The best way to deal with it is to avoid letting things get this far.  Here are some tips to help you pre-empt a bank levy.

The first step in avoiding a bank levy is for you to respond as quickly as possible when you realize you have an outstanding tax bill.  In almost every case, a bank levy is issued when a person refuses to communicate with the IRS.  Some taxpayers refuse to respond to the IRS because they feel they are unfairly given a large tax amount.  On the other hand, the IRS gets more unsympathetic towards you the more you ignore them.  So even if you do feel unjustly treated, it is better to pay what you owe and then fight the system, rather than have a stand-off with the IRS.

When responding to the IRS, propose a payment plan to clear your debt.  The IRS will usually agree to it provided the amount repaid is reasonable and your tax debt can be paid off within 12 months at most.  They wouldn't want you to carry forward your tax to the following year. In some circumstances, the IRS may offer you a longer payment plan, but generally speaking, they want to keep your tax debt current.

If you cannot even afford a payment plan, then consider applying for an Offer in Compromise.  This is a provision in the tax code that allows you to pay less than 100% of your tax debt as full settlement, under certain circumstances.  In truth, only a handful of people will be accepted for a compromise, so be realistic about your chances.  Yet you should still consider it as a viable option.

The first kind of compromise is simply an inability to pay your debt because you hardly have enough for basic living expenses.  The reduced amount you are to pay depends on the IRS' assessment of your financial situation.  They will then adjust your tax bill to reflect what you can reasonably pay.  The second kind of offer has to do with possible errors on your tax forms that may have mistakenly increased your tax bill.  A third type of Offer in Compromise is where you can pay a lump sum payment that the IRS considers a reasonably high percentage of your total bill and consider your tax debt settled.

Needless to say, the IRS has stringent conditions set out for these Offers in Compromise; you are going to have to prove that you qualify.   One benefit, however, while processing an offer, any bank levy will immediately be lifted.

Darrin T. Mish is a veteran, nationally recognized tax attorney who has focused on providing IRS help to taxpayers for over a decade. He regularly travels the country training other attorneys, CPAs and enrolled agents on how to handle their toughest cases with the IRS. He is highly ranked among the top attorneys in the country, with an AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell and a perfect 10 on Avvo.com. Martindale-Hubbell has also honored him with a listing in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers. He is a member of the American Society of IRS Problem Solvers and the Tax Freedom Institute. With clients on every continent but Antarctica, he has what it takes to solve your IRS problems no matter where you live in the world. If you would like more information about his practice and how he can help you, please call his office at (813) 229-7100 or toll free at 1-888-GET-MISH.

A tax lien is a serious step taken by the IRS when all other attempts to collect taxes from you have failed.  If you have a tax lien enforced on your salary it can absolutely destroy your reputation and credit standing.  Here are a few things you can do to avoid such a thing.

Firstly, it is important to know that a tax lien is never issued without prior warning.  So as soon as you receive any correspondences from the IRS to that effect, you need to respond immediately by contacting the IRS and speaking to them about your tax situation.  If you ignore these mailings, you will not be shown any mercy by the IRS when it comes to putting a federal tax lien on your pay.  Then when you are in contact with the IRS, be sure you respond politely to them.  This will go a long way towards averting a tax lien.

If there were any years in which you did not file your tax returns, you should do so at once.  This could be because you felt you were not taxable or because you simply forgot.  In such a case, the IRS would almost certainly require you to file your back taxes.  To show you are serious about clearing your tax debt, you should make the filing.  Again, this simply shows that you are taking their requests seriously and you are doing everything you can short of paying off your balance.  This is another way you can avoid a tax lien.

You may have already been audited in which case you may have misrepresented your tax figures (most people have done so at one time or other).  If you want to avoid a federal tax lien, you need to start telling the truth.  You will not only exonerate yourself from the mistruths you have been telling, but you will be able to get the help you need and get back on the road to recovery.

The most important thing to do to avoid a tax lien is to make whatever payment you can, even if it is only $20 a month.  This shows your sincerity in trying to pay up your tax dues.  If you are being honest, they will see your entire financial picture in front of them and know that you can only afford so much per month.  It is only when you decline to pay anything at all do they tend to get nasty.

These are some of the simple but important things you can do to avoid a federal tax lien.

Darrin T. Mish is a veteran, nationally recognized tax attorney who has focused on providing IRS help to taxpayers for over a decade. He regularly travels the country training other attorneys, CPAs and enrolled agents on how to handle their toughest cases with the IRS. He is highly ranked among the top attorneys in the country, with an AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell and a perfect 10 on Avvo.com. Martindale-Hubbell has also honored him with a listing in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers. He is a member of the American Society of IRS Problem Solvers and the Tax Freedom Institute. With clients on every continent but Antarctica, he has what it takes to solve your IRS problems no matter where you live in the world. If you would like more information about his practice and how he can help you, please call his office at (813) 229-7100 or toll free at 1-888-GET-MISH.

Have you ever received a Statutory Notice of Deficiency from the IRS?  If you have never had the misfortune of receiving one, you might not even know what a Statutory Notice of Deficiency is. In simple terms, this document is basically a notice from the IRS that you owe them a certain amount of money in taxes and that you have a time period, usually 90 days in which to pay up. In most cases, these documents are sent in good faith by the IRS and are worded in a polite way. But ignore these notices at your peril.

Receiving a Statutory Notice of Deficiency is not the end of the world.  The notice itself is not a legal document and is used only as a last resort. The IRS will give you many opportunities to pay off your debt or to set up a payment plan that is fair to you based on your current financial situation.  A statutory notice of deficiency is the IRS' official way of informing you of an impending grave situation and it is up to you to act fast before things have a chance to get worse.

Here's an action plan for you should you receive a Statutory Notice of Deficiency. Your first action step should be to call the IRS and let them tell you what your options are.  They will discuss with you how you can pay off your tax debt.  It would be unlikely that you could pay it off entirely in one lump sum.  So your next best option would be to suggest a mutually agreeable payment plan with the IRS.  It is alright to agree on a payment plan even though you may not be able to keep to it entirely.  It would at least buy you some time during which other more drastic collection methods like a bank levy or wage garnishment would be suspended.

At this point, you may be eligible for an offer of compromise.  An Offer in Compromise is where you are allowed to make a part payment of your tax debt and that is received as full settlement.  However, only a small percentage of people qualify for such a compromise.  The IRS will likely determine exactly how much you are capable of paying over the next few months and ask for that amount.  If you are eligible for an Offer in Compromise, you should accept the amount of payment required by the IRS without trying to negotiate for a bigger discount. Whatever the repayment amount set by the IRS in your Offer of Compromise is already a much reduced amount that most people would not tbe granted.  The IRS wants to get as much as they can but they don't want to ruin your life, so you would do well to go along with the offer.

Darrin T. Mish is a veteran, nationally recognized tax attorney who has focused on providing IRS help to taxpayers for over a decade. He regularly travels the country training other attorneys, CPAs and enrolled agents on how to handle their toughest cases with the IRS. He is highly ranked among the top attorneys in the country, with an AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell and a perfect 10 on Avvo.com. Martindale-Hubbell has also honored him with a listing in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers. He is a member of the American Society of IRS Problem Solvers and the Tax Freedom Institute. With clients on every continent but Antarctica, he has what it takes to solve your IRS problems no matter where you live in the world. If you would like more information about his practice and how he can help you, please call his office at (813) 229-7100 or toll free at 1-888-GET-MISH.

Related Blogs

• Is it okay to use a little amount of steroids as a stepping stool …
• McConnell: Obama Failed To Mention The Amount Of New Spending …
• Expand Your primary Dollars Amount | Investing Blog
• Last Minute Travel Deals: Save a Tremendous Amount of Money …
• ASU Bookstores working to boost amount of textbooks for rent | ASU …
• Unsecured Loans Online: Get the Desired Loan Amount at Ease …
• kolkataObserver » Chandrayaan finds significant amount of water on …
• What is the maximum amount (pounds) of fat that can be removed …
• Compromise at Central Falls High « Joanne Jacobs
• Wonk Room » Will A Compromise On The Individual Mandate Encourage …
• Need advice on a compromise agreement? « Matthew Arnold & Baldwin …
• Genesis 12 – Crisis to Compromise, Compromise to Christ « Family …
• » Bonding bill compromise inches slightly closer
• Testosterone Part Xii – Testosterone Deficiency and Obesity …
• Canadian News, Immigration, Military, Music and More. – 'Epidemic …
• Healthy health » Blog Archive » Vitamin D deficiency
• Fat malabsorption vitamin d deficiency « Mariah Schulz's home page
• Alexa Krueger's site » Vitamin d deficiency and parathyroid
• Christopher Krause's journal » Vitamin d deficiency and tension …
• download B12 b12 deficiency vitamin mp3 | Losogor.msk.ru music

Major tax problems of large tax amounts usually stem from 2 causes.  It is either the taxpayer has fraudulently filed his returns or he has not been paying enough taxes over the years.  If you have recently been saddled with a giant tax bill, here are a few places you can look for assistance with IRS debt.

In most cases, the first place to go to for assistance in IRS matters is the IRS office itself.  The Internal Revenue Service has a reputation for being inflexible and even downright rude when it comes to dealing directly with people.  Actually, the taxpayers are just as culpable in that they often yell and behave rudely to the IRS personnel (when it comes to money, it is easy to get hot under the collar).  But if you treat your IRS agent with the respect he or she deserves and are prompt in responding to all IRS correspondences and contacts with you, the IRS will be more than willing to help you find a payment plan, or even a compromise, that will result in both sides being happy.

If you want an alternative to going to see the IRS, you can talk to an accountant instead.  They do a lot more than just simple tax preparation. A good accountant knows the tax laws very thoroughly and can advise you on exceptions and exemptions you may be entitled to that can reduce or even eliminate your tax debt if that is possible.  The worst situation here is that they will tell you that you don't have any other options other than to settle your tax debt.

If your accountant can't help, maybe a lawyer can. If you are positive that this tax debt is unreasonable or even unfair, then this is the next logical step. The earlier you approach a lawyer the better.  You should not wait until the letters from the IRS gets nasty.  The quicker you act and begin litigation, the stronger your case will be.

If you are really not able to settle your tax debt, you may need a bankruptcy lawyer.  However, there are strict rules on what kind of tax debt you can write off and how. If your debt is due to you lying on your taxes, you can forget about getting any leniency.  If you are trying to write off a recent tax bill that is less than 3 years old, you won't be able to do that either.

These are some places to obtain assistance with your IRS debt.

Darrin T. Mish is a veteran, nationally recognized tax attorney who has focused on providing IRS help to taxpayers for over a decade. He regularly travels the country training other attorneys, CPAs and enrolled agents on how to handle their toughest cases with the IRS. He is highly ranked among the top attorneys in the country, with an AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell and a perfect 10 on Avvo.com. Martindale-Hubbell has also honored him with a listing in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers. He is a member of the American Society of IRS Problem Solvers and the Tax Freedom Institute. With clients on every continent but Antarctica, he has what it takes to solve your IRS problems no matter where you live in the world. If you would like more information about his practice and how he can help you, please call his office at (813) 229-7100 or toll free at 1-888-GET-MISH.

Related Blogs