The IRS is set to send out letters in early 2018 to get financial information from certain U.S. people who has or had bank accounts in Swiss banks with delinquent filings and who signed waivers allowing the banks to hand over information to the IRS under FATCA (a Justice Department Program – DOJ). Under the waiver, the U.S. persons signed a certificate allowing their banks to participate in the DOJ program. However, the IRS claims that they “have not seen evidence of that being reflected in their filing” that certain U.S. persons are actually compliant.
The IRS announced on November 30, that the IRS letters will contain the name of the financial institution from the investigation and state that the IRS does have the information from those banks. Beyond bank names, the IRS officials did not confirm what would be in these letters to the individuals, but did say that the IR is in a hurry to get them out. The IRS is far from done with the information generated by the Swiss bank program and a broader crackdown on international compliance remains in full swing under FATCA.
It’s important to file the delinquent tax forms with the IRS as soon as possible and before you receive any of those IRS letters. There are currently amnesty programs to waive certain penalties and we have extensive experience with helping clients filing their returns under Streamlined programs (domestic or offshore) and OVDP (Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Programs). Under the Streamlined filing, the taxpayer is required to attach a reasonable cause statement to certify that the acts are unwilful. We have first hand experience dealing with the IRS agents on such statements. Please feel free to contact us now if you have any questions.
Here are some IRS information on the current Streamlined Domestic Offshore Procedure or Streamlined Foreign Offshore Procedure or Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Programs for delinquent filings.
