All of us here at Lincoln Tax Professionals want to congratulate Matt for completing and receiving his Certified Financial Planner™ designation at the end of 2021. It was a long, arduous journey for him and we're very proud of him for completing it. So the next time you see his name with a CFP® at the end be sure to give him an "atta boy tiger!"
The IRS officially opened up the 2021 tax filing season on January 24, 2022 but has already made statements to congress, and the public, that they expect this season to be just as complicated and aggravating as the last two years. Just what we all wanted to hear, right?
Matt and Ryan made the decision last summer that we'd like to have all clients provide us with a signed Power of Attorney Form 2848. We saw the writing on the wall and knew this upcoming tax season was going to provide a whole host of challenges and to make life easier on our clients and our staff, it made sense for us to have all possible resources we need to complete your return available to us during tax time.
Starting in the summer of 2022, the IRS will require all taxpayers who use the IRS website for things like access to the Child Tax Credit Update Portal, getting their tax transcript, or viewing their payment history to create an account with the third party identity verification company ID.me.
As we're sure you're aware, the past year and a half living under a global pandemic has been unbelievably challenging for everyone. It has been exceptionally difficult for us as preparers navigating complex new tax laws and provisions, incorporated in the middle of tax season no less. One of the biggest challenges we've had during this time is dealing with an already under-funded, technologically deprived, and short-staffed IRS. Issues that would, in non-pandemic years, take us a few days to resolve now take weeks or even months.
As part of the American Rescue Plan Act that was signed into law in March, the IRS is required to assist taxpayers with children by making periodic, and non-taxable, advance payments from July through December of 2021. These payments will be equal to half of what the IRS estimates eligible taxpayers will receive in child tax credit when they file their 2021 return next year in 2022.
