Month: June 2015

Yesterday the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Ersparniskasse Schaffhausen AG (EKS) has agreed to cooperate in order to avoid criminal and civil fines and penalties. What does this mean for EKS? EKS, like Swiss banks before them who have entered into a DOJ Swiss Bank Non – …

Thanks to all the recent commotion about offshore financial accounts and banks being forced to provide evidence against their account holders, one thing is becoming painstakingly clear to the taxpaying public – the IRS is out for blood. The IRS’s new – found focus on foreign and …

When the Holy See joins your side, you know you that there’s higher powers at work. On June 10th, it was announced that the Vatican City and the United States had finalized their intergovernmental agreement (read: tax treaty). The deal is official – – – the Vatican bank will now report …

It exists. Ladies and gentleman, whether you want to believe it or not, there is an IRS Taxpayer Bill of Rights. I am completely, 100%, not messing with you. Pulled straight from the trenches of IRS.gov, here it is. It’s definitely a thing on a website. Mmhmm, it sure is.

The Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program can feel overwhelming to understand. Let’s tackle some of the more common questions we receive about the program, such as: What does being on the Foreign Financial Institutions or Facilitators list mean? and The 50% penalty sounds unreasonable. What other…

If you’ve submitted an Offer in Compromise, you know how much time and effort is put into the process; rejection can be devastating. Here are some reasons why your Offer in Compromise was rejected, and what you might be able to do to fix it. 1. Your Offer in Compromise was rejected because you…

If you’re a US taxpayer, whether domestic and abroad, you may have more tax compliance obligations than you know; make sure you understand your FATCA filing requirements to avoid any unnecessary fees or penalties. What is FATCA? The US government passed the Foreign Account Tax Compliance …

Every day, at least one US person with business overseas will learn of some horrible US government form they are in non-compliance with. Whether it is a 1040 they didn’t report worldwide income on, an FBAR form for foreign bank accounts (or foreign life insurance or pensions), or for an …

Form 8938 (Statement of Specified Foreign Financial Assets) is used to report specified foreign financial assets. It is filed by taxpayers with specific types and amounts of foreign financial assets or foreign accounts. It can be confusing to know exactly what you need to …