Consider this a public service reminder 🙂
The IRS periodically sends sends out a Newswire by email that you can subscribe to, if you dare!
Today I received the following email notice – IR-2013-54. I have been searching the email to find a direct link to the message it contained. So far, all I have found are “broken links”, but I have not found a specific one with this information. (I did not engage in an exhaustive search, so if anyone else finds the link, please post it in comments, and I will update.)
Update: Direct IRS link as provided by MarkPinetree. Thanks
I decided to reproduce the email message here with emphasis which is mine. Some Brockers have already seen this, but for those that haven’t, this is the ‘W’ component of my CCW acquiescence – Comply, Complain and WARN. 🙂
You can send this to your friends who might think they want a U.S. Green card, or voluntarily want to join the US Tax, Form and Penalty Club. Appropriate heading might be: “Buyer Beware: Why You Might Want to Reconsider That Green Card or Citizenship Choice.”
Whether or not you decide to send this to U.S. Citizens (including dual citizens) residing abroad that are still doing “The Ostrich” with their heads in the sands about what the IRS is demanding is your decision to make. Please don’t consider me an IRS co-enabler here. LOL I am not advising what to do, I am just passing on the “demand notice”.
WASHINGTON – The Internal Revenue Service reminds U.S. citizens and resident aliens, including those with dual citizenship who have lived or worked abroad during all or part of 2012, that they may have a U.S. tax liability and a filing requirement in 2013.
The filing deadline is Monday, June 17, 2013, for U.S. citizens and resident aliens living overseas, or serving in the military outside the U.S. on the regular due date of their tax return. Eligible taxpayers get two additional days because the normal June 15 extended due date falls on Saturday this year. To use this automatic two-month extension, taxpayers must attach a statement to their return explaining which of these two situations applies. See U.S. Citizens and Resident Aliens Abroad for additional information additional information on extensions of time to file.
Nonresident aliens who received income from U.S. sources in 2012 also must determine whether they have a U.S. tax obligation. The filing deadline for nonresident aliens can be April 15 or June 17 depending on sources of income. See Taxation of Nonresident Aliens on IRS.gov.
Federal law requires U.S. citizens and resident aliens to report any worldwide income, including income from foreign trusts and foreign bank and securities accounts. In most cases, affected taxpayers need to fill out and attach Schedule B to their tax return. Certain taxpayers may also have to fill out and attach to their returnForm 8938, Statement of Foreign Financial Assets.
Part III of Schedule B asks about the existence of foreign accounts, such as bank and securities accounts, and usually requires U.S. citizens to report the country in which each account is located.
Generally, U.S. citizens, resident aliens and certain nonresident aliens must report specified foreign financial assets on Form 8938 if the aggregate value of those assets exceeds certain thresholds. Instructions for Form 8938 explain the thresholds for reporting, what constitutes a specified foreign financial asset, how to determine the total value of relevant assets, what assets are exempted and what information must be provided.
Separately, taxpayers with foreign accounts whose aggregate value exceeded $10,000 at any time during 2012 must file Treasury Department Form TD F 90-22.1. This is not a tax form and is due to the Treasury Department by June 30, 2013. For details, see Publication 4261: Do You Have a Foreign Financial Account? Though this form can be filed on paper, Treasury encourages taxpayers to file it electronically.
Taxpayers abroad can now use IRS Free File to prepare and electronically file their returns for free. This means both U.S. citizens and resident aliens living abroad with adjusted gross incomes (AGI) of $57,000 or less can use brand-name software to prepare their returns and then e-file them for free.
Taxpayers with an AGI greater than $57,000 who don’t qualify for Free File can still choose the accuracy, speed and convenience of electronic filing. Check out the e-file link on IRS.gov for details on using the Free File Fillable Forms or e-file by purchasing commercial software.
A limited number of companies provide software that can accommodate foreign addresses. To determine which will work best, get help choosing a software provider. Both e-file and Free File are available until Oct. 15, 2013, for anyone filing a 2012 return.
Any U.S. taxpayer here or abroad with tax questions can use the online IRS Tax Mapto get answers. An International Tax Topic Index page was added recently. The IRS Tax Map assembles or groups IRS forms, publications and web pages by subject and provides users with a single entry point to find tax information.
@Chris… Like Romney, you have to assume that she had competent CPA and tax lawyer advice to be compliant with FBAR and now FATCA reporting. But good question and surprised it is not asked in the hearings, seeing how important it has been for our IRS offshore jihad and penalty revenue collection.
Her competent CPA and lawyers forgot $80 million of income. Hopefully for her, this was local income only – otherwise, she’s good for OVDI 🙂
“Pritzker was not asked about an amendment she made to her financial disclosure reform earlier this week after initially underreporting her income by nearly $80 million”.
@Chris
Only $80 million? Oh, just a clerical error!
“………… after initially underreporting her income by nearly $80 million.
Her attorney, who filed the amendment with the Office of Government Ethics, blamed the omission on a “clerical error.”…………….
Right. And we have to sweat over a dollar in our local account if our total aggregate exceeds the FBAR threshold on any single day in a year? And a tiny local chequing and savings account held within walking distance of my residence in Canada might have been subject to a 50% penalty if it was deemed a willful omission?
But a buddy of Obama and the Democrats can even be considered for a government post like that?
I can’t put down here what I really want to say about this. Where is all the hypocritical BS about ‘offshore accounts’ and ‘foreign trusts’ etc. now?
Canadian duals with disabilities are taxed on meagre RDSPs by the IRS, but US government cronies can forget to report tens of thousands, or millions, and that is okay? The Treasury Secretary Geithner can underpay tax that is owed, and misreport income, but still trumpet that we’re the cause of the ‘tax gap’?
What scale of tax misbehaviour would it take to get some of those US homelanders with money and political connections actually treated the way that the IRS and Treasury treats all of us living legal lives outside the US – who have already paid our home government revenue agencies in full.
Exactly how egregious would US homelander offences have to be for those politically connected in order to actually face some kind of serious repercussions.?
‘Canadian grandmas’ spent legal Canadian funds to file US tax returns and FBARs in order to prove that they owed nothing, but US homelanders and Obama cronies ‘forget’ to report?
@Badger
Speaking of hypocrisy have you seen this site?
http://ushypocrisy.com/
You are forgetting the principle here:
The law does not apply to Obama Democrats. She has been a huge fundraiser for him. Obama would say:
“To be perfectly clear, failing to report 80 million in income is a mistake commonly made. It should not stand in the way of her appointment!”
@ all — EM is not me.
Em, please see Petros comment: http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/expat_tax/comment-page-30/#comment-355537.
@ calgary411
I saw it and thank you for being on top of this.
Help! I thought my FUBAR went thru on the Fincen site. Did this last year because I filed 2 days b4 deadline and saves the cost of sending registered. This year it seems they only accept the PDF in older versions ( they list on the site I think 9.0 and 10.02). Those versions don’t seem to be available anymore. Tried to send secured email from the site and it tells me I may not have the latest Adobe version. What? Has anyone else filed online? All this for my 19 days if citizenship in 2012. Ugh….
Canuck Doc filed electronically, nobledreamer.
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/consulate2/comment-page-7/#comment-331179
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@nobledreamer
Ugh indeed! I noticed that too. I can’t remember exactly what I did, but i think I just downloaded the “latest version” and it all went fine. Hopefully that will work for you, unless, of course you have a Mac….
@Calgary & Canuck Doc
Thanks. The problem was an issue with Java. As soon as I dealt with that, it went through immediately.
But still, the information on the FinCen site is wrong. I wonder if others have given up in frustration.
I filed my FBAR using return receipt confirmation this year, but they never bothered sending the receipt back. I know it arrived because I tracked it on the USPS website. I found that odd. But I am not going to send it again 🙂