IRS / Former Employer Joy

[Coffee Warlord]

Un frickin' believable.

So I get a letter from the IRS yesterday, informing me I owe them $1,600 from my 2007 tax return. They say there was a 10-99 for $4,000 filed from my now previous employer that I did not report. I can say with 100% certainty I didn't receive either the money, or a 10-99 for it.

And now we factor in this previous employer. He's basically defunct, and the time period covering when that 10-99 was filed was during the Era of 5,000 Controllers, All Of Which Were Incompetant. So god knows what the hell they did. Got ahold of said employer last night and my accountant called them today. Long story short, he has no idea where any of the records for them would be. And has basically zero incentive to bother looking.

Yeah. This is going to be fun. IRS of course, won't give a rats ass. They want their money unless I can prove I don't owe it.

[spleen1015]

Sounds like this is going to be hard for you to prove. It might be worth it just to pay them and be done with it.

[lordscarlet]

Will the IRS provide you with a copy of the 1099?

[Coffee Warlord]

Doubt it, though maybe (dunno what good it'll be though). I'm going to call them tonight and see what they say.

REALLY hoping to get this handled without resorting to lawyers. But on principle, I'm not getting screwed out of 1,600 bucks.

[stevew]

Worked for some bitch-c*nt for like 5-6 months, supposedly under the table for cash.
Got a dreaded letter about 2 years later, I vaguely remember giving her my SSN, which was a major screw up on my part.

That was not easy to part with the money to fix that mistake.

[Coffee Warlord]

Heh. Hell, I'd take the 4,000 I supposedly got and pay the taxes on that in a heartbeat.

[lighthousekeeper]

Originally Posted by stevew

Worked for some bitch-c*nt for like 5-6 months, supposedly under the table for cash.
Got a dreaded letter about 2 years later, I vaguely remember giving her my SSN, which was a major screw up on my part.

That was not easy to part with the money to fix that mistake.

at least in this case the irs is doing it's job of getting people to pay who are trying to break the law.

[lordscarlet]

Originally Posted by Coffee Warlord

Doubt it, though maybe (dunno what good it'll be though). I'm going to call them tonight and see what they say.

REALLY hoping to get this handled without resorting to lawyers. But on principle, I'm not getting screwed out of 1,600 bucks.

My thought is that perhaps there is some sort of mistake and there is no such paper work.

[Alan T]

I've had to deal with the IRS 4 of the last 6 years. Here are my suggestions:

- Work out a payment plan of some kind with them now. Regardless if you owe the money or not, they are still counting interest for it being owed and that amount will just go up. If in the end you do end up having to pay it with no way around it, you'll at least save some money by getting it taken care of ahead of time. In my cases, I had the money that was in dispute paid in full (plus the interest I paid) back to me at the end of it, even in a case where there was $13,000.00 in dispute between the IRS and myself.

- I am surprised that your accountant hasn't offered up any suggestions regarding the ability to prove that you never received the bonus money that is being suggested. This case does sound like a bit more difficult to prove then what I was dealing with, but I still would think that if you can show your past paystubs, bank balances and prove there was no extra unaccounted for $4000.00 out of the blue, then that should be a start..

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by stevew

Worked for some bitch-c*nt for like 5-6 months, supposedly under the table for cash.

Boy, what kind of job were you doing working under her table for cash (and, yes, I mean that in both the innuendo-loaded and non-innuendo ways)

SI

[KWhit]

Originally Posted by stevew

Worked for some bitch-c*nt for like 5-6 months, supposedly under the table for cash.
Got a dreaded letter about 2 years later, I vaguely remember giving her my SSN, which was a major screw up on my part.

That was not easy to part with the money to fix that mistake.

I think the major screwup was trying to cheat the government and the taxpayers of this country in the first place.

But that's just me.

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by KWhit

I think the major screwup was trying to cheat the government and the taxpayers of this country in the first place.

But that's just me.

A friend of ours (my wife and I) was pointing out how angry her significant other gets every time they see that commercial for how to get out of owing money to the IRS. I mean, if it's a legit complaint like CW- that's one thing. But these "I owed the IRS $200K and I only paid $15K" people- yeah, that's money that we get to pay instead.

So, a hearty thanks, jackasses

SI

[Coffee Warlord]

Originally Posted by lordscarlet

My thought is that perhaps there is some sort of mistake and there is no such paper work.

Understand just how fucked up the accounting of that company was. We had 1 person responsible for all the financial/HR/etc things.

Now, after the lady who'd been there for 10+ years quit, we went through 5 new ones in the span of 1.5 years. The one that lasted the longest was fired after our owner discovered she'd basically not paid any bills...ever, and been just as lazy in regards to receivables. I have no doubts any such records I need would be damn near impossible to track down.

Originally Posted by Alan

- I am surprised that your accountant hasn't offered up any suggestions regarding the ability to prove that you never received the bonus money that is being suggested. This case does sound like a bit more difficult to prove then what I was dealing with, but I still would think that if you can show your past paystubs, bank balances and prove there was no extra unaccounted for $4000.00 out of the blue, then that should be a start..

Yeah, I'm moderately irritated at my accountant at this point as well. You'd think he'd be able to suggest more than "yep, you're screwed if they can't produce anything". I need to talk to the IRS and see what the deal is & what my options are. There's no way this is an uncommon occurance.

On my end, I can indeed prove there were no deposits in that amount, but I doubt that'll fly as my only proof.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Coffee Warlord

Yeah, I'm moderately irritated at my accountant at this point as well. You'd think he'd be able to suggest more than "yep, you're screwed if they can't produce anything". I need to talk to the IRS and see what the deal is & what my options are. There's no way this is an uncommon occurance.

On my end, I can indeed prove there were no deposits in that amount, but I doubt that'll fly as my only proof.

I know everyone likes to make the IRS out to be the bad guys because no one ever likes paying money away to people in a way that they likely won't see much return on it. My experience though is the people who you call at the IRS for help on these issues aren't complete jerks about it and often will either give recommendations on what they need to help you prove it is not owed, and/or even send you the forms needed if applicable.

The only time they seem to be jerks is when you actually are at fault for something and they want their money Of course there will always be exceptions, but for the most part i have always found the IRS employees very helpful, especially since I do not understand tax code at all, and keep making mistakes when reporting various investment returns every year.

[Coffee Warlord]

I'm holding out hope that's the case. I'm going to call when I get home tonight and hopefully get some insight from 'em.

[lordscarlet]

From my wife, the tax accountant:

i would first ask that the IRS provide a copy of the 1099 (which they should be able to do).

then just pay it - i agree that it would be pretty hard to prove that he didn't earn the money. but also write a letter a letter requesting the IRS abate any penalties (they will not abate interest). it's basically a "i'm really sorry, i didn't know" letter. say that he never received the 1099 from his employer and was thus not aware that he had to report it on his tax return. he could also throw in some fancy language saying that the employer was going through a period of change at the time and even now cannot produce a copy of the 1099. if his accountant is decent, he'll know what to say.

[RainMaker]

Wouldn't the burden of proof here be on the business? Don't they have to provide some proof they actually paid you?

[lordscarlet]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Wouldn't the burden of proof here be on the business? Don't they have to provide some proof they actually paid you?

I believe the 1099 is proof? Unless you're asking for a cancelled check or something.

[lordscarlet]

dola: It does seem like they shouldn't be able to just randomly file something that there's no way to prove it didn't happen, but this is certainly not my area of knowledge.

[CU Tiger]

hmmmm that could certainly help my tax base...Ill just send a few extra 1099 to all my employees.....


Horseshit the people saying just pay it....Id throw a suit on the former company before Id pay it....

hell Id pay a lawyer 10,000 before Id pay 50 I dont owe...

[stevew]

Originally Posted by KWhit

I think the major screwup was trying to cheat the government and the taxpayers of this country in the first place.

But that's just me.

Maybe so. I think I made 240 dollars per week.

Obviously not one of my finer judgement calls.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by lordscarlet

I believe the 1099 is proof? Unless you're asking for a cancelled check or something.

I can print out a bunch of fake 1099's all day if the government doesn't require me to prove I paid these people.

[Coffee Warlord]

Originally Posted by lordscarlet

dola: It does seem like they shouldn't be able to just randomly file something that there's no way to prove it didn't happen, but this is certainly not my area of knowledge.

Yeah, that's what kills me. If there were no recourse, any company could just randomly screw over anyone whose SSN they had.

[Coffee Warlord]

IRS was, in fact, helpful.

Lady I talked to said he would not need to actually dig out and find (if he could even find it) a copy of the original 10-99. A letter from him stating that the amounts are, in fact, incorrect, is sufficient to reverse this.

And she happily stated if I can't get that, we'll go from there.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Coffee Warlord

IRS was, in fact, helpful.

Lady I talked to said he would not need to actually dig out and find (if he could even find it) a copy of the original 10-99. A letter from him stating that the amounts are, in fact, incorrect, is sufficient to reverse this.

And she happily stated if I can't get that, we'll go from there.

Glad to hear that! Good luck on the next steps. Like I said, I have found more often then not the IRS employees have been very cordial and helpful. Glad that you found the same!

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by Coffee Warlord

IRS was, in fact, helpful.

Lady I talked to said he would not need to actually dig out and find (if he could even find it) a copy of the original 10-99. A letter from him stating that the amounts are, in fact, incorrect, is sufficient to reverse this.

And she happily stated if I can't get that, we'll go from there.

Good to hear a good story about the "hated" IRS.

Actually, pretty much all of their IT people I interacted with were good folks. We went onsite to work on their pc's as they have a huge processing center in KC and someone had to go down there once or twice a week, fixing things. It was rarely a trip we dreaded. Their security was a bit crazy but we've had to deal with worse and I suppose I'm not sad that they have good security.

Actually, that's true of most of the government agencies we worked with. They were far better and more reasonable customers to work with than most

SI

[Coffee Warlord]

Latest update, old employer called me, and seemed quite amenable to getting me the needed letter. We shall see, but hopefully this can be cleared up with a minimum of fuss.

[Drake]

To go at this slightly ass-backwards from the usual trend:

When I got divorced in 1992 or 1993, I completely spaced adjusting my witholding to the level of a single dude again and ended up with a substantial tax bill that I couldn't pay.

The IRS folks I worked with to resolve that were awesome, professional, kind and even understanding.

Some of those big government agency schmucks aren't so bad.