My father (whom is legally blind) has not filed income taxes in 8 years!?

Question

We (my siblings and I) recently discovered that my father has not filed his income tax return in nearly 8 years. He sold a piece of property that year and so it was not so cut and dry and he just has not been able to see to do it and has been reluctant to ask for help in doing it.

My sister has collected all the information he has however their are a few years which he did not have his W2's .

Do you know what the best method to resolve this for him would be...he may have money coming to him...or he may owe..we don't know.

How do we go about getting a W2 for him...the company he worked for no longer has them on file as it has been too long ago.

Should we hire an accountant to resolve this or maybe a tax attorney. He is worried to pieces about it and apparently has been worried for some time now and has not told anyone as he did not want to burden us with it.

Any help you can give on what steps we should take to resolve this with the best outcome would be appreciated!

Answer 1

I'd contact a CPA and have him or her take care of these. Unless he has a very high income, you shouldn't need a tax attorney. Your dad shouldn't be in a panic over it - he's not going to jail or something like that. It might cost him a little money, or might not, but this isn't disaster.

If he has money coming to him, he can still get it for tax years back to 2003 (the deadline to file for that is 4/15/07). Refunds for years farther back than 2003 are lost.

If he owes for any of those years when he didn't file if he was required to, he'll have to pay the taxes, plus interest and probably penalties. But with a little luck, if most of his income those years was on W-2's, he wouldn't owe much if anything.

If he didn't file but never heard from the IRS about not filing, there's a reasonable chance he doesn't owe anything for those years. Even if he does, it's probably not a lot as long as he had proper withholding during those years.

If you or one of your siblings are pretty knowledgable about doing taxes, you can download forms for old years at irs.gov, go to forms and publications, then to prior years. Each year needs to be filed on the proper forms for that year, using the instructions for that year. For the missing W-2's, you can call the IRS and they can provide them. You can't efile for a prior year, you'll have to mail them in.

Good luck.

Answer 2

Just call the Internal Revenue Service at 1-800-829-1040 and ask them to sent you a transcript of his w2 information. After you receive the information, review the information and determine if the amount he made would either get him a refund or will make him owe. Be sure to include in your figures his eligible dependents which will determine whether he has a refund or not. If it is determined that he would have a refund, you may file for it if it has not been over three years. Any refund after the three year period is forfeited. However, if your father had owed any money, you can be sure the IRS would have reminded him of it by some kind of correspondence. So don't go out and spend a lot of money on a tax attorney for what appears to be just an oversite of filing for a tax refund. Get your fathers refund for the past three years by collecting his W2 information and taking them to your nearest tax office preferably H and R Block where you will get the most assistance for the least amount of money.......

Answer 3

Get a lawyer or CPA. Do not do this on your own. You will have to file returns for each year missed and pay penalties and interest, if any taxes were due.

The company should have a file somewhere that has his W-2 on it. All that information was sent to the IRS and they are supposed to keep a copy. The IRS at the least should have the W-2 info on file too.

This is why you need a CPA or lawyer to do this. It will cost a little bit, but it will be so worth it to have it all taken care of.

Answer 4

I'd find a competent tax attorney, and quickly. Not filing your taxes is a jailable offense. A good attorney can help you get the pieces back in order, and work with the IRS to help get him right with them again.

I think it may be too late to collect some old refunds, but not too late for the IRS to demand money from those same periods (it's not even in both directions, this is the IRS we're talking about).

But with any luck, the attorney should be able to get the job done and minimize any negative impact from the IRS. A CPA might also be good actually to ask questions to first, and see if he advises getting an attorney too. I strongly advise you do not attempt to manage this on your own though.