I had an accident client come in to sign a release. After we had taken care of our legal business, we began to chat about taxes. He asked me if I put my name on the tax returns that I file, and I told him that I did. He told me that there is another tax preparer that he knows of who does not. He does not trust this preparer. He said he will come to see me when he has his documents are ready.
I told him that he was correct not to trust a tax preparer who does not put his name on the return. First of all, paid preparers are required by law to put their names on the returns that they prepare. I reminded him that he would give a tax preparer his name, address, date of birth and social security number. If he wants direct deposit, then he is going to give the tax preparer his bank account number. Since he is going to tell the tax preparer how much interest he earned, the preparer can estimate how much is in the account. As such, he is giving a person who is violating the law all the information that person needs to become the taxpayer and steal his identity.
What is more, there is probably a reason why the tax preparer is not signing his name. It is not because he is proud of his work on the return. Of the people who come to me who hired a tax preparer and now have problems, three quarters also have unsigned returns. This is because the preparers who are not signing the returns either do not know what they are doing (and know that they do not know what they are doing) or they are playing games, which is a euphemism for committing tax fraud. Of course, the Internal Revenue Service has no way of linking the tax preparer to the improper tax return. The tax preparer’s name is not on it. However, the taxpayer’s name is. When the Internal Revenue Service catches the problem, they are not only looking for the money that should have been paid in the first place, but at a minimum, they are looking for interest and penalty as well.
The solution to this problem is very simple. Be certain to use a tax preparer that is reputable. Someone who is not putting his name on the return is, by definition, not reputable. I have been practicing law for twenty-seven years, and have spent those twenty-seven years building a reputation. With every tax return I file, I am putting that reputation on the line, just the same as with every other case that we do in this office. You can be confident that I am filing a good return.