Practice and client management

Employers say the Affordable Care Act is driving the costs of their medical plans higher, according to a new survey by accounting firm Cherry Bekaert’s benefits consulting unit.

Thomson Reuters has released a special report for tax professionals on how to respond to Internal Revenue Service examinations.

Professional services organizations confronted declining revenues and other challenges last year, according to a new report.

At one point we had a client that was going out of business and they asked us to negotiate a final settlement with the IRS where the two partners could walk away broke but without being in debt to the IRS for unpaid withholding taxes.

Congress is planning a hearing next week on the integrity of the Affordable Care Act’s Premium Tax Credit program as the Internal Revenue Service is cautioning taxpayers to make sure they are receiving the appropriate level of tax credits to help them pay for health insurance.

Some of our favorite recent tax fraud cases.

Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who blew the whistle on the secret surveillance activities being carried out by the federal government, is warning accountants and other professionals to be concerned about the privacy of their communications.

The tax reform proposal put forward by House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp earlier this year attempts, like other proposals before it, to broaden the base and lower the rates.

Highlights of some of our favorite tax-related blogs from the past week.

Barclays Plc and Deutsche Bank AG face scrutiny over their sale of products to a hedge-fund manager that allowed it to skirt borrowing limits and avoid taxes, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

The U.S. Justice Department is investigating the loss of more than two years of e-mails from an Internal Revenue Service employee at the center of a controversy over how the agency handled Tea Party groups.

Washington is buzzing this summer about inversions, and the chatter has nothing to do with the weather.

The Internal Revenue Service has issued final regulations to provide guidance on the allocation and apportionment of interest expense by corporations that own a 10 percent or greater interest in a partnership, along with the allocation and apportionment of interest expense using the fair market value method.

Thomson Reuters has released the 2014-2015 edition of its Tax Planning Guide, which accountants and tax professionals can distribute to their clients and prospects.

U.S. Wealth Management president and CEO John Napolitano discusses how accountants should take charge of the various advisors that their clients deal with and coach them, in an interview with Accounting Today editor-in-chief Dan Hood.

House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., and Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee chairman Charles Boustany, Jr., R-La., have written a letter to the advocacy group Democracy 21 asking it to provide all communications with the former director of the Internal Revenue Service’s Exempt Organizations unit, Lois Lerner, including emails.

National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson has released her mid-year report to Congress, in which she urges the Internal Revenue Service to issue refunds to victims of tax preparer fraud and expand the IRS’s recently announced voluntary tax preparer education program to include competency testing.

A group of senators has introduced a bipartisan bill governing sales taxes on online purchases and Internet access after previous legislation failed to make progress in the House.

The U.S. House of Representatives voted to cut the Internal Revenue Service’s budget by $1.14 billion in another blow to the tax agency.

The Internal Revenue Service has issued final regulations on truncated taxpayer identification numbers, or TTINs, to safeguard against identity theft.