Penalty Abatement

            If you fail to file your returns on time or if you file them but do not pay any taxes owed, you will be subject to penalties allowed by federal law.   You will also have to pay penalties if you are required to make quarterly estimated payments and do not do so.  This is just a small sample of the dozens of penalties that the IRS can demand from you if you do not comply with the tax law.

            Luckily, most statutes that address penalties also provide for some relief from the penalty when the taxpayer can demonstrate that he or she did his best to comply with the tax law, but for a reasonable cause could not do so.  What constitutes reasonable cause would fill a book.  Tax lawyers and tax court judges grapple with this concept regularly.  What is reasonable cause to one is unreasonable to another.

            We stay current on recent case law and tax court decisions addressing this important issue.  In many cases, a court decision will hold that someone with similar facts to yours was entitled to have their penalties wiped out.   Since penalties constitute such a large component of your tax liability, it is important to know whether it would be possible to eliminate them.  Many tax relief firms give the impression that removing penalties is as simple as a stroke of the pen.  It is not.  We do not guarantee that we can get penalties removed and you should take a second look at anyone who does.