Tax professionals in a local tax practice (CPAs,
accountants, enrolled agents, attorneys) have an inherent
“conflict of interest” for aggressive representation of any one
client because they do not want to antagonize the local IRS
revenue officer or examiner in a way that will have a negative
impact on their other clients. The IRS will take advantage of
the timid local practitioner who finds it necessary to generate
a positive image for the balance of his client base.
We specialize in dealing with IRS controversies, problems and
issues of every kind throughout the United States . We have
active cases pending throughout the United States . Having
worked within the IRS at a high executive level, we understand
the most effective ways to deal with the IRS to advocate a
reasonable solution to resolve your IRS problems.
CPAs, accountants, bookkeepers, enrolled agents, and attorneys
without a tax specialty may not have the time, experience,
education, insight or technical skill to deal with the technical
analysis, legal research, identification of issues,
interpretative creativity and insight, negotiating skills,
knowledge of the IRS , or technical writing ability necessary to
effectively prevent avoidable tax overpayments. The person who
prepares your tax return may only have six weeks of training,
and that training may be limited to how to put numbers into an
IRS income tax return. Your bookkeeper is not a tax expert. Your
CPA prepares tax returns for approximately three months out of
the year and spends the balance of the time preparing books,
records, and financial statements. Most, if not all enrolled
agents are not tax lawyers. Attorneys may have a general or a
specialized practice that does not include tax issues and
problems. Nevertheless, accountants, CPAs, bookkeepers, enrolled
agents, and non-tax attorneys will usually agree to represent
you if you approach them with a tax issue even if they do not
have the training or experience to handle difficult, complex, or
creative tax issues. The IRS can be expected to take advantage
of those representatives who are not specialists in the tax law
and who do not deal with the IRS on a full-time basis.
A tax attorney can do something an accountant cannot do. An
experienced tax attorney can thoroughly research a tax statute
and master it. He will know its legislative history. He will be
familiar with the Treasury regulations and IRS rulings on that
statute. He will penetrate the many court decisions involved in
the litigation of the tax statute. He will have read tax
articles and books that deal with the tax statute. It is
improbable that your accountant has the training or experience
that would permit him to penetrate the complexity of the tax law
on a particular tax issue. It is also not likely that the
accountant can take the time out of a busy accounting practice,
working with numbers and preparing financial statements, to
master the vast array of difficult tax law that bears on a tax
statute.
Even worse is the fact that the mind-set of an accountant is to
see "black and white" rather than the "gray" because they are
trained to be precise with numbers. Tax law is drenched with
ambiguity where there is mostly no answer that is right or
wrong. Tax lawyers are trained to seek and find the ambiguity in
the law (i.e., the "gray"). Tax law ambiguity can be used as a
"sword" to attack and IRS position and also as a "shield" to
protect the taxpayer.
However, not all tax attorneys are equal just as, for example;
professional golfers have difference levels of skill and
ability. Tax attorneys have different levels of creativity,
insight and skill.
The most important attribute of a good tax attorney is to be
"creative" with the tax law. This creativity may arise in many
ways. A creative tax attorney will use interpretative skill to
find support of a taxpayer position. A creative tax attorney
will find a gap in a statute or a regulation (a "tax loophole")
that permits favorable tax treatment in situations not covered
by the statute under consideration. A creative tax attorney will
be able to identify inconsistencies by the IRS in its published
positions or private ruling letters. A creative tax attorney
will use interpretative skills to spin facts, case law,
regulations in favor of the taxpayer. Creativity is unlimited in
its potential to interpret and apply the law or the ability to
develop that knowledge through research skills.
Any attorney is a better representative than a non-attorney
because “taxes” is based on law written by the Conges and
non-attorneys are not trained to research and interpret tax law.
As between two attorneys, a specialist in taxes is a better
choice as the result of superior training and experience. As
between to tax attorneys who both specialize in IRS problems and
controversies, a firm that has IRS experience, as we do, have
better insight to the inner workings of the IRS . Knowledge of
the administrative processes of the IRS is a distinct advantage
in choosing your representative.
In explaining what a tax lawyer does that other representatives
cannot do, it is helpful to understand what is meant by a legal
issue. Legal issues are developed from expert creative
analytical, interpretative, and technical research skills.
Technical research includes: determining Congressional intent
from the legislative history of the tax law; a search and
analysis of the provisions of the applicable provisions of the
Internal Revenue Code, Treasury tax regulations, IRS revenue
rulings, private letter rulings and procedures and the IRS
administrative procedures and guidelines..
The fact that tax law is complex and arcane is well known. This
complexity is he reason a qualified tax attorney is in a
superior position to protect a taxpayer from overpaying a tax
liability - provided that attorney has strong creative,
analytical and interpretative skills. Interpretative and
analytical skills involve the sophisticated ability to read tax
legislation, regulations, cases and other authority to identify
subtle distinctions, ambiguity or supportive facts, issues, and
argument.
Presented by Alvin Brown and Associates, tax
attorney, formerly with the Office of the Chief Counsel of the IRS.
Call us for all IRS tax issues, problems and emergencies.
Protect yourself from IRS intimidation, errors, and penalties.
www.irstaxattorney.com
-
ab@irstaxattorney.com -
(888) 712-7690 - (703)
425-1400
