Jan Allen speaks on a national IRS FBAR panel tomorrow at 12:30 pm pacific time, 3:30 pm eastern. The topic of the expert panel discussion is “Willfulness and the IRS Disclosure Programs. Are you Compliant?”
The program will answer the questions of US taxpayers and foreign nationals who live and work in the United States who have bank and investment accounts outside of the US. For many years, the US Congress and the IRS were convinced US taxpayers were shielding income and assets from the IRS using offshore accounts and multiple corporate shell strategies. Congress worked with the US Department of the Treasury and the IRS to develop the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act or FATCA. FATCA forces sovereign nations and foreign banks and investment houses to comply with US demands or face exclusion from access to US Markets.
Foreign Bank Account Reports or FBARs have been in existence since the 1970s. US taxpayers are required to report all offshore bank accounts, financial institution accounts, holdings, assets and real estate on the FBAR each year if the aggregated total of these assets or accounts exceeds $10,000 at any point in time in a calendar year, even if only for a day. The penalties for failure to comply with FBAR reporting have increased substantially since then.
In 2009 the IRS created the Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program or OVDP which was designed to provide a vehicle for US taxpayers to come into compliance with FBAR reporting requirements and relieving the taxpayer of exposure to criminal charges if they paid a 20% penalty. The penalty has subsequently been raised to 27.5% and in 2014 the IRS created the Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedures which provided an alternative for those taxpayers whose failure to comply was based on non-willful conduct.
When Jan Allen speaks on a national IRS FBAR panel tomorrow you are invited to join the event. Pricing and information for the program are below:
Click here for more information or to register for the event.
Download Allen Barron’s Guide to IRS FBAR Reporting Requirements Here:
Allen Barron Offshore Reporting Requirements and the Impact of FATCA
