Wednesday, June 1, 2016

IRS Released New Publication "Federal Tax Return Preparers: What You Need to Know"

The IRS released Publication 4938, Federal Tax Return Preparers: What You Need to Know. In it, the IRS discusses their new Annual Filing Season Program (AFSP) status, which replaces the RTRP status that was thrown out after Loving.


The AFSP program allows unenrolled practitioners to take CPE during the year in order to get limited representation rights for their clients. Becoming an AFSP also allows unenrolled practitioners to have their name in a searchable IRS database of all return preparers. Attorneys, CPAs, and EAs will have their names automatically entered into the database without need to report CPE to the IRS.


This is basically a compromise between the IRS and the unenrolled preparers after Loving. Now, unenrolled preparers will not need to pay a fee for a license and they can choose not to do CPE while still being able to prepare tax returns.


Relevant Citations:
IRS Publication 4938

No comments:

Post a Comment