Law Office of Camron Hoorfar, PC

For most individual taxpayers the tax filing and payment deadline is Monday, April 18, 2022. Those who need more time to file can request an extension to file. Taxpayers must request an extension to file by April 18, or they may face a failure to file penalty. This extension gives them until October 17 to file their tax return. An extension to file is not an extension to pay.

Most taxpayers must pay taxes by April 18 to avoid penalties and interest on the amount owed after that date. Taxpayers in Maine and Massachusetts have until April 19 to pay to file their returns due to the Patriots’ Day holiday in those states.

How to request an extension to file—To get an extension to file, the IRS urges taxpayers to do one of the following:

• File Form 4868 through their tax professional, tax software or by using IRS Free File on IRS.gov. Individual taxpayers, regardless of income, can use Free File to electronically request an automatic tax-filing extension.
• Submit an electronic payment with Direct Pay, Electronic Federal Tax Payment System or by debit, credit card or digital wallet and select Form 4868 or extension as the payment type. Taxpayers don’t need to file Form 4868 when making an electronic payment and indicating it’s for an extension. The IRS will automatically count it as an extension.

Some taxpayers may have extra time to file their tax returns and pay any taxes due. This includes some disaster victims, taxpayers living overseas, including members of the military, and eligible support personnel serving in combat zones.

Need tax help? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule an appointment.

A unit of Deutsche Bank AG agreed to pay a $2 million penalty to an industry-backed regulator over allegations it failed to ensure that its customers received the best prices for securities orders. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. said that from January 2014 through May 2019, the firm owned an alternative trading system known as SuperX. During that time the firm routed customer orders through SuperX before sending them to any other exchange. Customers could opt out of the strategy. “The firm failed to consider alternate routing arrangements even though, according to the firm’s own ranking model, other dark pools consistently ranked higher than SuperX for execution quality,” the settlement states.

The brokerage, which didn’t admit or deny the allegations, failed to change the arrangement despite knowing it resulted in delays and lower order fill rates, the regulator said. The firm was accused of violating the so-called best execution rule, which requires brokers to find the most favorable terms for their customers. Companies must also periodically review the quality of their trade execution by looking at factors such as speed, order size and transactions costs. The firm also failed to disclose to investors material information about its trading systems, the regulator said. Deutsche Bank closed SuperX in September as part of its exit from U.S. equity sales and trading, according to Finra.

Interested in speaking with an attorney? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a consultation.

Rent is any amount paid for the use of property that a small business doesn’t own. Typically, rent can be deducted as a business expense when the rent is for property the taxpayer uses for the business.

Here are some things small business owners should keep in mind when it comes to deducting rental expenses:

Lease or purchase

• Sometimes a business must determine whether its payments are for rent or for the purchase of the property, because different tax rules may apply.
• Businesses must first determine whether an agreement is a lease or a conditional sales contract.
• Payments made under a conditional sales contract aren’t deductible as rent expense.

Unreasonable rent
Businesses can’t take a rental deduction for unreasonable rents paid. Rent is unreasonable for deduction when it is higher than market value or a professional appraisal.

• Usually, unreasonable rent becomes a problem when business owners and the lessors are related.
• Rent paid to a related person is reasonable if it’s the same amount a business owner would pay to a stranger for use of the same property.

Office in the home
A business owner’s workplace can be in their home if they have a home office that qualifies as their principal place of business.

• Business owners who rent their home and have a home office as their principal place of business may also qualify for a deduction.
• IRS Publication 587, Business Use of Your Home, Including Use by Daycare Providers, has more details about this deduction.

Rent paid in advance
Rent paid for a business is usually deductible in the year it is paid.

• If a business pays rent in advance, it can deduct only the amount that applies to the use of the rented property during the tax year. The business can deduct the rest of the payment over the period to which it applies.
• Business owners can review Publication 535, Business Expenses, for detailed examples on rent paid in advance.

Canceling a lease
A business can usually deduct the costs paid to cancel a business lease.

More information:
Publication 334, Tax Guide for Small Business
Publication 544, Sales and Other Dispositions of Assets
Publication 583, Starting a Business and Keeping Records

Need tax help? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a consultation.

The Internal Revenue Service is set to launch a full-court press this month in an attempt to tackle its massive backlog of tax returns. The goal in the next 30 days is to extend the first of 5,000 job offers and add high-tech customer support tools throughout its operations, officials said. The tax collector will deploy a second “surge team” to sort through its accumulation of 24 million returns and correspondence, reassigning 700 employees at its processing centers in Utah, Missouri and Texas.

It will hire more contractors to staff phone lines and complete clerical work. In recent days, it expanded customer callback functions to 70 percent of its phone lines, a move that has already saved taxpayers 1 million hours of hold time. The moves, disclosed by a senior Treasury official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about it publicly, represent the agency’s most aggressive plan to dig out from the massive backlog, the result of lagging operations due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In need of tax assistance? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a consultation.

The elements of class B felony assault in the first degree include an attempt to cause serious bodily harm, which a fact-finder could infer from a video of appellant hitting and kicking victim about 30 times. Plain error review of an officer’s opinion on the potential results of such an attack denied.  

Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District – SD37121

Learn more: STATE OF MISSOURI, Respondent vs. CORNELIUS PERKINS, Appellant  

If you are interested in speaking with an attorney, call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a consultation.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released a report highlighting the complicated and burdensome nature of the medical billing system in the U.S., according to a CFPB press release. The report reveals that the U.S. healthcare system is supported by a billing, payments, collections, and credit reporting infrastructure where mistakes are common, and where patients often have difficulty getting these errors corrected or resolved. “When it comes to medical bills, Americans are often caught in a doom loop between their medical provider and insurance company,” said CFPB Director Rohit Chopra. “Our credit reporting system is too often used as a tool to coerce and extort patients into paying medical bills they may not even owe.” This recent report details how medical bills are often incurred through unexpected and emergency events, are subject to opaque pricing, and involve complicated insurance or charity care coverage and pricing rules.

In emergency situations, patients might not even sign a billing agreement until after receiving treatment. In other instances, patients, including those with chronic illnesses or who are injured or ill, may desperately feel that the need for medical care forces them into accepting any costs for treatment. The report describes challenges and sources of confusion when a person’s medical bills go into collection or are placed on a credit report. Bills may be sent to collectors by doctors, hospitals, parent companies, or groups representing a service provider, so there may be multiple charges for the same visit. The total billed amount can easily snowball into something completely unrecognizable.

Struggling with medical debt? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a free consultation to discuss your options.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is moving to thwart illegal repossessions in the heated auto market. A compliance bulletin issued today reveals conduct observed during CFPB examinations and enforcement actions, including the illegal seizure of cars, sloppy record keeping, unreliable balance statements, and ransom for personal property, according to a CFPB press release. “With today’s high car prices, auto lenders and investors might be tempted to seize vehicles for resale in the hot used car market,” said CFPB Director Rohit Chopra. “No American ever wants to wake up to see their car stolen. Auto loan servicers need to ensure that every repossession is lawful.” Due to the global chip shortage, the average list price for new and used vehicles has spiked, creating a strong demand. The CFPB is concerned that these market conditions might create incentives for risky auto repossession practices, since repossessed automobiles can command higher prices when resold. The CFPB also expects that both the total amount of debt and the average loan size will continue to increase. Even when inventory shortages abate, larger car loans will put pressure on household budgets for much of the next decade.

Struggling financially? Call our office at 816-524-4949 or click here to schedule a consultation.