Practice Management

Philadelphia’s H.R. Margolis Co. and Washington-area Becker & Co. PC announced that they will merge to form MargolisBecker.

Mayer Hoffman McCann had expanded its presence again in Maryland, with the acquisition of the 14-employee Riggleman Smyth Accounting Services LLC.Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, though Riggleman Smyth’s partners were admitted as shareholders in Mayer Hoffman.

Responding to criticism from Congress and taxpayer advocates, the Internal Revenue Service announced that for the upcoming tax-filing season, private sector partners in its Free File program will remove ancillary offerings -- such as refund anticipation loans -- made to taxpayers in the course of participating in the program.“We heard many legitimate concerns about the marketing of ancillary products during the last filing season,” said IRS Commissioner Mark Everson, in a statement. “This is a constructive step.”

The California Franchise Tax Board has voted unanimously to permanently offer a program allowing some low-income residents to file government-prepared tax returns, despite opposition from tax preparation software companies.

Accounting firm Cannon Wright Blount PLLC has purchased the Poulin Group PC, its second acquisition in less than four months.

The Internal Revenue Service has allocated nearly $1 billion of tax credits to nine planned clean coal projects.The Energy Policy Act of 2005 authorized the tax credits, and, working within a number of set parameters, the IRS consulted with the Department of Energy to allocate the credit to specific projects.

The Internal Revenue Service announced new guidelines for taxpayers to follow in order to substantiate donations to charities that were made via payroll deduction.

In a grab for its share of the exploding Web-based banking market, QuickBooks parent Intuit Inc. agreed to acquire online banking services provider Digital Insight Inc. for $1.35 billion via a combination of cash and debt.Under the terms of the deal, which is expected to close during the first quarter of 2007, Intuit will tender $39 in cash for each share of Calabasas, Calif.-based Digital Insight -- roughly 18 percent over the company’s closing share price of $33 prior to the announcement. Intuit will also assume about $1 billion in debt financing.

The Internal Revenue Service modified a $103 million contract for the management of paper tax returns in November, according to a published report.According to the Washington Post, the original plan to turn over the filing, storage and retrieval activities at seven IRS centers to a contractor Dec. 1 was altered so that, for now, the outsourcing will occur at just two centers. In a statement, the IRS said the conversion was scaled back "to ensure that a sufficient number of employees with the required training and security clearances are in place to manage the files during the upcoming filing season."

The U.S. Tax Court will continue its consideration of a requirement that would push the Internal Revenue Service commissioner to publicly file answers to all small tax cases.Chief Judge John Colvin first announced the proposed change in September, noting that small tax cases comprise about half of the court’s docket. He said that petitioners in those cases are increasingly being represented by low-income taxpayer clinics, and suggested that those parties, as well as the court itself, might benefit from improved pretrial communication between all the parties involved in settling some of those cases.