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Joke of the Day: "Taxpayer Advocate"

BobKamman
Level 15

I’m still on the Taxpayer Advocate’s Do-Not-Call list. I rarely ask my local office for help, because I know how useless they are except in the easiest cases. Still, I am always surprised when I don’t even get a “Forget About It” response to a Form 911. I made them look bad a few times, but that was years ago. Nevertheless, the grudge remains.

Someone stole my client’s identity and filed a return using his name and SSN claiming $50,000 in fuel tax credits. He’s a retired letter carrier, works part time, well into his 70s and a widower. As honest as the day is long. Correspondence audit in September told him they were disallowing the claim. No details, and no reference to the actual 2022 return he had filed on time and paid a couple thousand tax. You always have to watch out for those September letters because they’re under pressure to close cases before the end of the fiscal year.

Of course we responded. Of course it didn’t help. Come December, they need to close cases by the end of the calendar year. So the Notice of Deficiency arrives, with no indication they had looked at our response.

The easiest way to solve this problem is to pay the $60 Tax Court filing fee and let some GS-12 in Appeals hand the case over to a GS-13 in Chief Counsel. That’s what these people do, clean up messes created by a GS-4 at the Service Center trying to make quota. But to collect an award of attorney fees, I have to show we exhausted administrative remedies. So, try the Taxpayer Advocate, right?

Form 911 was filed on December 12. No response, so the Tax Court petition was filed tonight. Have to keep in practice, you can do the whole thing online now. It will probably take a year to settle as a “no change.”

What's funny is that Congress enacted a statute, back when it was interested in reforming IRS, that required Notices of Deficiency to provide a description and location of the Taxpayer Advocate.  But as we all know, the TA never gets involved once a case has gone that far.  Although, there's no law against it.  

1 Comment 1
BobKamman
Level 15

To follow up, this is what happens these days when you file a Form 911:

December 11 -- mailed to local TA.  Did not yet have the Form 2848 but faxed that to central processing the next day.  Figured if TA wanted it also, they would call.  

January 10 -- date of letter to client in response from Kansas City SC TA, asking for Form 2848.  Letter is postmarked January 15.  (Previous correspondence has come from Fresno SC and Austin SC; this is the first appearance of Kansas City.)

I have faxed the Form 2848 to the number on the latest letter, along with a request for the account transcript.  Not that I expect a response.  Tax Court petition was filed January 13, so I'll make the same request of the IRS lawyer who has to file an answer by March 14.  Chief Counsel doesn't require a Form 2848 since I signed the petition.