IRS "Dirty Dozen" Tax Scam List Includes New Telephone Scams
Identity theft and telephone scams top this year's recently released IRS list of the "Dirty Dozen" fraudulent tax schemes. The annual list contains various common scams that taxpayers may be subjected to at any time of year, but many of them seem to reach a peak during tax filing season.
"These schemes jump every year at tax time," said IRS Commissioner John Koskinen in a prepared statement.
"Pervasive telephone scams", as the IRS puts it, represent a new entry onto the list. The IRS reports an increase in scams in which callers pretend to be from the IRS and try to steal taxpayers' money or identities.
In these scams, the callers may say the victim owes the IRS money or alternatively is entitled to a huge refund. Sometimes the callers threaten the victim with arrest or threaten that his or her driver's license will be revoked.
These callers can appear to be very genuine because they may be able to recite the last four digits of the victim's Social Security number or may imitate the IRS's toll-free number on caller ID to make it appear that the IRS is calling.
Some new telephone scams are even targeting recent immigrants, who are threatened with arrest or deportation if they do not pay up promptly.
The IRS has asked that taxpayers who think they are being targeted by phone scammers to contact the Service at 800-829-1040, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration at 800-366-4484, and the Federal Trade Commission using the FTC Complaint Assistant at FTC.gov.
The rest of the "Dirty Dozen" is similar to last year's list:
- Identity theft
- Phishing
- False promises of free money from inflated refunds
- Tax return preparer fraud
- Hiding income offshore
- Charitable organization impersonation
- False income, expenses, or exemptions
- Frivolous arguments
- Falsely claiming zero wages or using a false Form 1099
- Abusive tax structures
- Misuse of trusts
As with anything else, in the area of taxes, you should know that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. A healthy skepticism goes a long way to protecting yourself.
A final note – not long after completing and submitting this column, several local clients called to tell me about phone calls from someone calling himself Carl Stevens and identifying himself as with the IRS. Authorities confirmed these are scam calls and should not be viewed as legitimate.
Even our sleepy area is not immune from the scammers!
