Taxes are on the agenda in Washington Congress is back in session following its August recess, and taxes are on the fall agenda. A variety of energy tax provisions. Either outright repeal of the alternative minimum tax or a temporary fix to keep the tax from affecting an estimated 23 million taxpayers in 2007. Extension of the tax cuts created in 2001, 2002, and 2003 tax legislation. More
In the case of some fringe benefits that are offered to or given to employees, certain benefits can be excluded from an employee’s income because the expenses would normally be deductible on an individual’s personal income tax return. A moving or relocation expense is one such benefit. What moving expenses are deductible? How should moving expenses be reported? More
For homeowners who are seriously delinquent on their mortgages and hoping for relief, the Internal Revenue Service has bad news: If your lender agrees to modify your loan and forgive any of your debt, you could owe federal income tax on the amount forgiven.Think of it as the tax code's "kick 'em while they're down" rule. The Mortgage Cancellation Tax Relief Act of 2007 (H.R. Robert E. More
This year, the deadline for filing Form 1040 is Tuesday, April 17. The additional time is because the 15th falls on a Sunday and the 16th is a legal holiday in the District of Columbia. Miss the deadline and you could get nicked for a sizable, nondeductible penalty. The maximum penalty is 25 percent of the balance due. More
Many refund delays, time-consuming correspondence and audits are triggered by taxpayer carelessness. Here are some IRS reminders about items to check in advance of filing your return, along with some steps to take afterward. START WITH THE BASICSCheck the package of forms and schedules that came from the IRS. First read the instructions to make sure you have all the ones you need. More
There are three types of tax that you will be responsible for when you start your eBay business. They are 1) sales and use tax, 2) payroll tax and 3) income tax.Sales and use tax - Just about every state, and many cities and other local authorities, imposes a sales tax on items sold. Each state has different rules, so it's important to find out the rules in your state and city. More
Telephone tax refund – This is a one-time refund and many taxpayers are not aware of its existence. Married couples, with no children, can receive a $40 refund. Those with one child can claim $50 & those with two, $60. If you kept your phone bills for the last three years and the telephone excise tax on your invoices exceeds these credits, you can apply the actual amount. More
New figures reveal that RALs drained about $960 million in loan fees, plus over $100 million in other fees, from the wallets of nearly 9.6 million American taxpayers in 2005.“Taxpayers can save themselves over a billion dollars by just saying ‘no’ to quick tax refund loans,” says NCLC staff attorney Chi Chi Wu. For that year alone, about 1 in 13 tax returns involved a RAL. More
Taxpayers are due a onetime federal excise tax refund credit of $30 to $60 – or possibly even more – on their 2006 federal returns, according to the Internal Revenue Service. The refund is intended to compensate people who have been charged an excise tax on their phone bills. But when they went to flat-fee phone services, they continued to levy the tax. United Feature Syndicate More
It is estimated that low income families spent nearly $1 billion last year for refund anticipation loans. As tax season approaches, I wanted to warn you “saving savvy” taxpayers that no matter how strapped for cash you may be, it doesn’t pay to borrow your own money. These are avoidable tax-time expenses. RALs are high cost bank loans secured by the taxpayer’s expected refund. More
