IRS

A recent Court of Appeals casegarnered much attention due to the court’s outrage at being ignored. In that case,Baez-Sanchez originally applied for a specialized visa that required a waiver. The request first went to an immigration judge, then to the Board of Immigration Appeals, back to the immigration judge, back to the Board, then to the Court of Appeals.

In Part I, we looked at recent cases that have eroded the scope of Circular 230 and asked whether or not this was the right result. In this part, we will look at the fundamental question that was presented in each of the three cases, should the act of preparing a tax return be considered practice before the IRS?

In the past few years, there have been several challenges to the scope of Circular 230, and consequently, the Internal Revenue Service’s ability to regulate those that practice before it. As a consequence, what was a fairly sweeping scope of authority, has been whittled away a little at a time to now a pretty limited focus.

The title of this post is a phrase that appears a lot in court cases and quoted often by administrative agencies. It almost always precedes a negative result for the taxpayer in question and conveniently ignored when a positive outcome is required.