Check Your PTIN for Suspicious Activity

The IRS released a new security awareness tip today for practitioners. Most practitioners can go on the IRS PTIN renewal site and check how many returns have been filed under their PTIN. This is really important for practitioners to be doing and not enough people do it.


For example, if you normally prepare 80 Form 1040s each year and when you check your PTIN status it shows 500 PTINs, there is suspicious activity on the account. This has been happening very frequently.


With tax fraud becoming harder to get away with, one way criminals are finding a way around IRS roadblocks is by stealing PTINs.


If you do have issues, you can file Form 14157 with the IRS and they can help get the matter cleared.


All you need to do:
Visit http://www.irs.gov/ptin and log into your PTIN account.

1. From the Main Menu, find “Additional Activities.”
2. Under Additional Activities, select “View Returns Filed Per PTIN.”
3. A chart labeled Returns Per PTIN should appear.
4. A count of individual income tax returns filed and processed in the current year will be displayed.

Relevant Cites:

Form 14157

IRS Security Awareness Tax Tip 2016-11