The IRS Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program - OVDP

Описание: The Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program allows you to disclose your unfiled FBARs, unreported foreign income and unfiled information returns, and the IRS won't proceed against you criminally. This is the get out of jail free card. It's a real benefit for individuals who didn't file FBARs and didn't include foreign interest dividend and capital gains on their U.S. income tax returns.

However, the IRS will assess a penalty equal to 27.5% of the highest balance in your unreported foreign bank accounts and the value of your undisclosed foreign financial assets. The IRS will not investigate whether your actions were willful in nature or where the original principal amount was unreported.

To qualify, the disclosure must be timely in that the disclosure must be made prior to an IRS audit or criminal and tax investigation. And prior to the receipt by the government of information from a third-party such as a foreign bank, the voluntary disclosure does not apply to individuals with illegal source income such as from money laundering, prostitution or drugs.

OVDP requires a 27.5% penalty; however, the penalty is significantly higher if the foreign financial institutions where you bank are at specific banks that the U.S. Department of Justice is now criminally investigating. This includes: UBS, Credit Suisse, Wegelin Bank, Liechtenstein, Zurcher Kantonalbank, Swiss Partners Investment Network, First Caribbean International Bank, Stanford International Bank, HSBC, Bank of Butterfield. If you have any funds at any of these accounts, you'll pay a 50% OVDP penalty, not 27.5%. We will prepare a complete submission to the IRS CID including filing eight years admitted income tax returns, unfiled FBARs and work papers to compute the lowest penalty possible.

We go to great lengths to assure that funds transferred from one account to the other are not double accounted for. We will also assure that the proceeds from the sale of foreign real property that are deposited in a foreign bank account are not double accounted for as well. We'll do anything necessary in order to assure that you pay the lowest amount allowed by law.

Six to nine months later, the IRS will conduct a mini-audit. They will review the foreign bank account statements, recompute the capital gains and losses under the Passive Foreign Investment Company rules, and confirm the penalty amount. This tax law firm will assure we have all the supporting documentation, work papers, and evidence in order to obtain the lowest penalty available by law.

The U.S. Department of Justice also has a Voluntary Disclosure Program. However, the DOJ's Voluntary Disclosure Program gives you no legal rights and is an exercise of prosecutorial discretion. This is not nearly as beneficial for tax matters; however, it does include federal crimes other than just tax crimes.

This tax law firm will analyze what is best in your particular situation. Please call me at: 858-481-4844 to talk about your tax case. Our conversation is protected by the Attorney-Client Privilege. It will never be disclosed to the IRS. I look forward to hearing from you.