(This post requested by JC.)
By law, the National Taxpayer Advocate must submit two reports to Congress each year.
National Taxpayer Advocate’s Objectives Report
The first report (Objectives Report), delivered each June, contains the goals and activities planned by the Taxpayer Advocate for the coming year.
National Taxpayer Advocate’s Reports to Congress
The second report (Annual Report), delivered at the end of December, includes: A summary of the 20 most serious problems encountered by taxpayers; recommendations for solving those problems; and other IRS efforts to improve customer service and reduce taxpayer burden.
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Volume I: FY 2016 Objectives Report to Congress
- PREFACE: National Taxpayer Advocate’s Introductory Remarks
- REVIEW OF THE 2015 FILING SEASON
- AREAS OF FOCUS
- The IRS Should Provide Victims of Identity Theft with a True Single Point of Contact to Help Them Resolve Their Account Problems and Obtain Their Refunds
- The IRS Agrees It Should Issue Refunds to Victims of Return Preparer Fraud, But It Has Been Slow to Develop Necessary Procedures
- The IRS’s Administration of the Affordable Care Act Has Gone Well Overall, But Some Glitches Have Arisen
- The IRS’s Implementation of FATCA Has in Some Cases Imposed Unnecessary Burdens and Failed to Protect the Rights of Affected Taxpayers
- IRS Procedures for Levies on Retirement Plan Assets Create Financial Harm and Undermine Taxpayer Rights
- As the IRS Migrates to More Self-Service Tools and Online Services, Low Income and Other Vulnerable Taxpayer Populations May Face Greater Compliance Challenges
- Additional Requirements for Appeals Access and Compressed Case Timelines Impair the Fundamental Rights of Taxpayers
- The IRS Approves Many Applications for Tax-Exempt Status Almost Automatically, Often Based on Insufficient Information
- International Local Taxpayer Advocates Would Provide Valuable Assistance to Taxpayers and Protect Their Rights
- TAS Continues to Work with the IRS to Implement the Taxpayer Bill of Rights into IRS Operations
- The IRS Must Have a Comprehensive Review Process for Guidance and Other Documents to Protect Taxpayer Rights, Improve Customer Service, and Operate More Efficiently
- EFFORTS TO IMPROVE TAS ADVOCACY AND SERVICE TO TAXPAYERS
- TAS RESEARCH INITIATIVES
- TAS TECHNOLOGY
- APPENDICES
“I wonder if people overestimate how tech savvy the young really are, and how much access to technology and the internet is still restricted. Owning technology is not the same as knowing how to use it effectively.”
You’re right. Truly-tech-savvy people are tech-leery, but there are a lot of sourcerers’ apprentices around. And it’s not just the young.
Facebook had (maybe still has) a restriction blocking use by people who declare their ages to be under 13. So a 9-year-old girl lied about her age. Her mother couldn’t understand how to administer a Facebook page, so the 9-year-old girl administered both her own page and her mother’s page.
Someone lied about the ages of some 11-year-old girls; they didn’t do it themselves. When I learned, I tried to correct their registrations. Facebook let me partly correct one but then blocked access to the account so I couldn’t finish correcting it. Facebook blocked access to another account before I even partly corrected it, and required me to guess the names of some “people”, for example this table was which person in the following list, or this frying pan was which person in the following list. Yahoo wouldn’t let me correct the birth years of any of them.
Then there’s someone who’s been programming for more than 40 years (same as me), has some social and political savvy (unlike me), has a good awareness of how computers can be hacked for identity theft (same as me), and needed surgery when his heart was damaged by stress from corrupt courts cooperating with abusers instead of the law (much like me). In a Skype discussion he mentioned that a court demanded his social security number when there was no valid reason and he didn’t want to provide it. And then a few months later, Skype announced to me that it was his birthday, that day, that month, and a birth year easily computable because Skype told me his age.
The National Taxpayer Advocate’s Annual Report to Congress for FY2016 was released today (28 Jun 2017). See https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/reports/2016-annual-report-to-congress/full-report
The whole thing runs close to a thousand pages, so here’s a precis of the Executive Summary items of most interest to Brockers, i.e. MSP (Most Serious Problem) #16 re FATCA, MSP18 re ITINs, and LR (Legislative Recommendation) #8 re International due dates.
The IRS:
– should adopt a service-based approach to international taxpayers instead of its enforcement-oriented regime that assumes that all international taxpayers should be suspected of fraudulent activity, mistrusts stakeholders, and dismisses useful comments and suggestions..
– should implement policies and procedures for Chapter 3 & 4 refund claims that mirror domestic taxpayers (e.g. stop freezing NRA student tax refunds)
– should adopt a same country exception that excludes from FATCA coverage financial accounts held in the country in which a U.S. taxpayer is a bona fide resident
– protect taxpayers from harsh application of the law allowing revocations and denials of passports …
– reduce burdens on FFIs by adopting collaborative administration that encourages FFIs correction of errors and guides FFIs towards reasonable, cost-effective compliance with FATCA.
– improve the processes for ITIN applications, deactivations, and renewals which unduly burden and harm taxpayers.
– should be required by law to give foreign taxpayers more time than domestic taxpayers to challenge IRS summary assessments
In previous years the majority of TAS recommendations have not been acted on by the IRS, so I don’t expect much if any changes resulting from the 2016 one.
“In previous years the majority of TAS recommendations have not been acted on by the IRS,”
Only the majority? Which means some have been acted on. Oh no, I can just imagine this one:
“- should adopt a same country exception that excludes from FATCA coverage financial accounts held in the country in which a U.S. taxpayer is a bona fide resident”
And then they’ll think they accomplished something useful.
All roads…
The NTA’s job is to try to make CBT work. She not an advocate for those who support RBT/TBT.
As part of the 2018 FY Objectives released today by TAS (https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/2018ObjectivesReport), there’s the annual set of responses by the IRS to issues raised in the previous Annual Report (released in January) – see Volume 2 (https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/Media/Default/Documents/2018-JRC/JRC18_Volume1_AOF_02.pdf). Particularly infuriating is their response on page 122 to TAS’s suggestions regarding FATCA and international compliance. Not only do they believe that anyone with an foreign account is a tax evader, but they’re claiming credit for CRS! While I understand that TAS and the IRS must enforce CBT (until Congress changes the law), there’s no recognition that most expats owe little, if any, US tax due to a combination of FEIE and FTC.
@Karen, it also shows that shamefully, the IRS also refused to allow the TAS to release stats re the OVD/I/P and Streamlined programs (TAS obtained via FOIA) as well as the FBAR report. The OVDI/P and Streamlined stats were redacted in whole – the chart is a solid black box.
See starting page 43 https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/Media/Default/Documents/2018-JRC/JRC18_Volume1_AOF_03.pdf
Ex.
“…..The IRS Does Not Release Summary Statistics
The IRS’s release of certain statistics, such as the average or median tax, interest, and penalties paid inside and outside an OVDP could help assure taxpayers they are not being unfairly singled out and the programs are being administered in a rational manner. Both TAS and the Government Accountability Office have computed and publicly reported such statistics in the past. 24
However, LB&I recently stated
that TAS should not publish an update.25
LB&I computes OVDP results using a different methodology,
which TAS has obtained and redacted (at LB&I’s request) in the Appendix below. LB&I explained: Statistics with details beyond those publicly released in press releases by the Commissioner
(most recently in IR-2016-137) may impair tax administration and are exempt from release under FOIA. LB&I’s response to FOIA request #
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from
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limited the information provided under the request to high level statistics. TAS should not release statistics more granular than those provided by the Commissioner in press releases.
We disagree. “May impair tax administration” is not the legal standard for withholding information under FOIA. 26
Even if it were, the IRS has provided no basis to support its conclusion that releasing this data may impair tax administration. Moreover, if the IRS could prevent the National Taxpayer Advocate from publishing data more granular than data provided by the IRS Commissioner in press
releases, her reports would be much less effective in highlighting problems, such as those caused by the IRS’s initial one-size-fits all approach to the OVDPs. In addition to penalties assessed inside OVDP-related programs, the Treasury Department also compiles
a summary of the penalties assessed outside the OVDPs against those who failed to file a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts
(FBAR) for reports to Congress. 27
However, the IRS has not disclosed this summary to the public, notwithstanding repeated requests by TAS. 28
After years of working with the IRS to release these reports, the IRS recently stated for the first time to TAS that “Treasury is the owner of the annual FBAR report and thereby controls the release of that report.”29
The IRS’s lack of transparency about how taxpayers fare inside and outside the OVDPs makes it more difficult for anyone to recognize when the result in a particular case is outside the norm. Moreover, this lack of transparency makes it impossible for impartial and independent observers to assess the effectiveness of the OVDPs ………”…..
See also TAS criticisms of FATCA;
https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/Media/Default/Documents/2018-JRC/JRC18_Volume2.pdf
@badger – these IRS responses – and their non-responses to repeated TAS criticism – just highlights their contempt for taxpayers, especially those living outside the US.
I’ve compiled an incomplete list of relevant TAS recommendations (and associated discussion) over at https://wiki.fixthetaxtreaty.org/doku/doku.php?id=wiki:contents:us_tax:cbt#taxpayer_advocate_reports
It’s amazing to see how many times FATCA and OVDP have been criticized by TAS and ignored by the IRS.
@Karen, thanks for the compilation, I’ll go over to Fix the Tax Treaty to check it out.
And re; “…It’s amazing to see how many times FATCA and OVDP have been criticized by TAS and ignored by the IRS.”
So much for ‘transparency’ and paying no more tax than ‘owed’ and ‘educating’ taxpayers and ‘equity’. If the IRS has nothing to hide in their administration of the OVDI/P and Streamlined programs, then why the games and stonewalling – and deliberately keeping relevant information from the TAS as well as those they claim everywhere in the world as taxpayers?
I don’t believe that creature will ever change. It justs thinks up new ways to abuse people. And I pity resident US taxpayers too. Ever growing complexity, arrogance and aggression, with ever shrinking assistance and resources for those who are actually trying to comply in good faith. Plus erroneous computer generated notices and withholdings in error – and now voracious private debt collectors.