Tax News Roundup

Every Saturday, we'll take a look at the top tax stories in the news.

IRS Establishes e-Mail Box for Taxpayers to Report Phony e-Mails
The IRS has established a mailbox for reporting fake emails claiming to come from the IRS. These emails are from scammers who trick you into believing the email comes from the IRS and then try to get you to provide confidential financial information. PC Magazine got a hold of these scam emails, and have posted screen shots of what the emails look like. If you receive one of these fake emails, here's what to do. First, you'll want to display the full header information of the email. Second, you'll want to forward the email with all the header information to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration by sending the email to phishing@irs.gov.

Getting Tax Extension Easy, and Sometimes Very Smart
The Houston Chronicle highlights one of my very favorite tax strategies: filing an extension. The IRS will give you an extra six months to file your tax return. That means you don't have to rush to meet the April 17th deadline and you won't have to find a post office open late at night. Unfortunately, you cannot phone in your extension like last year. The IRS did away with their TeleFile system. So, next best thing: print out Form 4868, and mail it to the IRS. Oh, and include a payment for any taxes you think you will owe. That will help keep your penalties and interest to a minimum.

Say It With Cash
Kay Bell is not a fan of stock options. Options are often given to employees in high-tech companies as a way of building employee loyalty and rewarding employees for helping the company grow. Options are so complex, that even large companies sometimes cannot account for the options properly on an employees W2. In fact, I just finished working with a client where this happened, and boy was the tax bill a shocker. If you need help figuring out how to report stock options on your tax return, you should check out the extensive tax resources for investors over at Fairmark.com.

Firms with Tax Debt Still Win Federal Contracts
This new article certainly caught my eye. Companies with substantial tax problems are eligible to compete for and win contracts with the federal government. You would think that, at the least, the government would pay itself first and hold back a portion of the payments to pay down the company's tax debts. If you have tax debts, you should know that there are only five ways to get out of tax debt.