Americans abroad — frustrated by the uncertainty of what FATCA will do to their financial lives, and facing repeated delays of the IRS’ promises to bring some clarity through proposed regulations — are increasingly turning to the politicians of the places where they live in an effort to get some answers. In the past week several government officials at the national or supranational level have brought up the issue of FATCA, in response to concerns expressed by constituents — both dual citizens who elected them, and banks and other institutions for whom FATCA amounts to yet another extra-territorial unfunded mandate by the US. A number of scholars have also released draft papers about FATCA and FBAR. Here’s the roundup for the past week or so. If you see any more, leave them in the comments:
Tag Archives: OVDI
FBAR penalties for "reasonable cause". The Unknown unknowns.
This is a response to @Mona that I did over on another discussion thread. Petros has suggested I make a post out of it as a stand alone, which I am doing with some amendments to my previous rushed comments.
Mona said to Roger… ” I still think that they should allow for reasonable cause. I do see what you’re saying though, especially with the possible fbar penalties. But outside of the ovdi and ovdp programmes, do you know of anyone who genuinely hadn’t known about fbar and pleaded reasonable cause still being hit with draconian fines? There don’t seem to be any cases specifically mentioned on any of these blogs.”
Here is my response:
The OVDP Drudgery for Minnows
Just Me offers advice to newbies to the subject of FBAR compliance and OVDP considerations. To join or not to join. That is the question. This is a must read post.
A link to his Case Study of Communication with the IRS through the entire 851 day process is here.
OVDI futility, Sally's free but what about the others (Updated)
Just Me sent me the following OVDI story from Jack Townsend’s blog:
Anonymous said…
I moved outside the US as a poor student, never having had enough money necessitating acquaintance with Schedule B.
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We can't trust the IRS – But can we trust the accountants and lawyers?
The post is a comment responding to the blog post – IRS issues Fact Sheet For U.S. or dual citizens residing outside of the U.S., to which Petros commented :
They [the IRS] can’t be trusted when they talk about reasonable cause, because they don’t really indicate what reasonable cause is.
