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NINA OLSON:
Hello, my name is Nina Olson and I am the National
Taxpayer Advocate.

You have already received
training about working with the
Taxpayer Advocate Service but I wanted t have
a moment to speak with you all because you are
attending this training because you´ve been
assigned to collect potential tax debts
from taxpayers.

The IRS is required to assign these accounts
under the FAST Act, which is the acronym
for Fixing America´s Surface Transportation Act.

We can all wonder
what private debt collection is doing in a transportation act but that is how
Congress passes bills.

And so, when this important
law was enacted, it authorized you
as the employees of private collection agencies, to undertake
an enormous responsibility so its very important
that you understand that in addition to the law that authorizes you
to collect taxes on behalf of the Internal Revenue Service and the federal government, that there are also other
equally important laws that you all have
to consider as you go about performing your job.

So, as you probably know
by now there are many, many protections of taxpayers, what we would
call taxpayer rights that have been enacted and are scattered throughout the Internal
Revenue Code, namely the laws that
pertain to the tax system.

And you may know,
or may not know, that since 2007, I had advocated to Congress
that it adopt a Taxpayer Bill of Rights, a simple statement
so that taxpayers knew what right they had and were able to say wait, don´t I have the right
to an administrative appeal, because so many of these
rights were scattered throughout the code people
didn´t know them.

But a sort of list of 10 rights that sets out in
very common parlance language what your rights are would
really help taxpayers be able to avail themselves
of their rights.

If you don´t know
what your rights are, then you´ll never
ask about them and you´ll never avail yourself.

Well, in 2014, I was able to persuade the IRS to adopt the Taxpayer
Bill of Rights that I had recommended
and in 2015, about the same time the FAST Act was being enacted
by Congress, Congress actually amended
the Internal Revenue Code to require the Commissioner to ensure that IRS
employees are familiar with and act in accord with the Taxpayer
Bill of Rights.

The very rights that I had
recommended since 2007, the IRS and Congress
should adopt and enact.

Since you all are actually
acting as agents of the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Government,
these rights, these protections for taxpayers
also apply to you.

So, that´s what I want
to talk to you about today and according to both the law
and the contract that you´re operating under
that your employer has entered into with the IRS, you all as employees
have to be familiar with the Taxpayer Bill of Rights and you´re required to make sure
that these rights are respected.

Now I also want to say this because as we have a chat
about this, don´t just think about you
can think both about your job as private collection agency
employees but this information
is very important for you to have because you
all are taxpayers too and I´m sure there are members
of your family who are taxpayers, and you have
friends who are taxpayers, and you have colleagues
who are taxpayers and these rights apply to you, and your friends,
and your colleagues, and your family members as well.

And so, you´re getting
a really great training that just in a basic
conversation with a coworker or with a family member and you find out that
they´ve got a tax problem, you now know about the rights that they have as they go
about engaging with the IRS so this is actually good for you just as taxpayers as well
as employees.

So, just a brief discussion before I get into
the actual specific rights about how a case
might end up in the hands of a private collection agency because this is very
important to understand as you´re engaging
with taxpayers.

In many instances, the taxpayers may not have heard
from the IRS for quite some time.

It may be that the IRS sent lots and lots of letters to them but the IRS actually has an 11% undeliverable mail rate and that´s the mail
that´s returned to us by the Post Office.

There´s a whole bunch more mail
that just ends up because the forwarding
address has expired, that it just ends up
as I like to say on radiators in apartment buildings in New York
underneath the mailboxes and stuff like that
where we don´t know that the mail
hasn´t been delivered, we just know we sent something.

So, it´s entirely possible
that taxpayers haven´t received a whole series
of our notices and particularly
for lower income taxpayers that´s very true
because they move around a lot and also
because of the fact that we´ve been through
an economic downturn, a real serious crisis
economically a lot of people moved from one place to another looking for jobs,
or staying with family members, or staying with friends and they didn´t always update
their mailing addresses with the IRS
or even with the Post Office.

So, it may be that
you´re calling the and they have no idea that
there´s a tax debt that exists.

It´s very interesting because particularly
for the low income, we did a survey one year where we found that 25%
of the taxpayers who were actually audited
for a program called the Earned Income Tax Credit that they were actually audited, we knew they were audited, that 25% of them didn´t know that the letter
we sent out to them saying you´re under audit
please respond, actually was telling them
they were under audit.

Now, some of that is maybe
because they didn´t have
a high literacy level, some of it is because maybe they
didn´t speak English very well, but some of it
is because the IRS doesn´t do a very good job
writing letters and making them explanatory
and clear.

So, there´s just all of that
has happened before this case even got to you and the reason why I´m talking about this
is because it may be, it may very well
be that this taxpayer doesn´t owe the debt at all, that you´re trying
to collect a debt that if a taxpayer can get
an audit reconsideration, that debt may go away
and you need to be aware that that may be a possibility
when you call them.

And the same time, the IRS
may not know that the reason why the taxpayer
hasn´t been paying is because they are experiencing
a financial hardship meaning that he/she
does not have the income to pay
the reasonable living expenses, the basic living expenses
that you need to survive.

We´ve long since
gotten rid of debtor prisons so we don´t ask people
to basically sell everything they have
in order to pay a tax debt.

And it may be that they were
once starting to pay but as I´ve noted,
we´ve had economic hardships, people have gotten
really behind, they´ve been unemployed
for a long period of time so their situation
may have changed.

You may be looking
at a very high tax liability but this person
may have been making money, quite a nice salary for a while but for the last three
or four years this person has been out of work
and is underemployed, is taking whatever job
he/she can but it´s just paying bills and you won´t know that
until you talk to the taxpayer.

So I think that´s very important
and then the other thing is the taxpayers
are just plain afraid.

They´re afraid of the IRS
and they will be afraid of you.

The IRS has awesome
collection powers, you only have a fraction
of those powers, the ability to put them in
a modest installment agreement, but people are very afraid
and what will happen to them so you need
to keep all of that in mind.

So having said that let´s chat about the Taxpayer
Bill of Rights.

Okay, the first right in the list of the Taxpayer
Bill of Rights, and I may bounce around
a little bit here but the first right,
the one that started it off and why I thought
this was the number one right that you started with when I was drafting
the Taxpayer Bill of Rights is the right to be informed and this is the official
IRS explanation.

It´s been worked out
between myself and the IRS.

Taxpayers have the right to know what they need to do
to comply with the tax laws.

They are entitled to clear
explanations of the law and IRS procedures
in all tax forms, instructions, publications, notices and correspondence.

They have the right
to be informed of IRS decisions
about their accounts and to receive clear
explanations of the outcomes.

Now, how does that
apply to you?

Well actually, everything I´m going to talk about
from this point on and all the other rights relate to this right to be informed because if people aren´t
told about their rights, if they aren´t told about
what´s going to happen to them, if the letter coming
to them explaining to them that their case
is going to go out to a private collection agency
isn´t clear, that´s going to influence
what happens when you contact the taxpayer.

And when you talk to taxpayer, if you don´t make clear
what you´re able to do for them and with them, and notice how I´m framing this, and how you can work with them to enable them to make payments and get into compliance and telling them
the opportunities that they have to avail
themselves of their rights, then you have actually not
followed the very first right which is the right
to be informed.

Now, I´m going to jump
from the first to the last, the alpha to the omega,
the A to the Z.

Namely, the last right
of the ten is the right to a fair and just tax system and this
is a very important one.

It has several components and I´m going to read
you the whole explanation and then I´m going to sort of
talk a little about the components.

The explanation is taxpayers
have the right to expect the tax system to consider facts
and circumstances that might affect
their underlying liabilities, their ability to pay, that goes to the work
that you´re doing, or the ability to
provide information timely.

Taxpayers have the right
to receive assistance from the Taxpayer
Advocate Service if they are experiencing
financial difficulty or if the IRS has not
resolved their tax issues properly and timely
through its normal channels.

So let me start off
and first talk about the Taxpayer Advocate Service.

You´ve already had the training, you understand
that Congress created the Taxpayer Advocate Service
for several purposes but one of them
is to help taxpayers solve their problems
with the IRS.

Congress also specifically said that my authority as the National
Taxpayer Advocate reaches to the private
collection agencies and their employees.

Namely, I can order
private collection agency employees to do something,
not do something, stop doing something
you´re about to do.

That´s in the law.

That was changed
the first time we had private collection
agency legislation.

So, whenever a taxpayer
requests to work with TASK, under the right to have a fair and just tax system,
and under the contract, and under all sorts of rules including
the Internal Revenue code that established my office, you are required
to refer the case back to the Taxpayer
Advocate Service.

Just as importantly you,
just like IRS employees, are required to
identify situations in which it is appropriate to make referrals
of taxpayers to TASK even if the taxpayer
hasn´t specifically asked about it, okay?

They may not know
that TASK exists but the policy and procedures guide
sets out the conditions that require TASK referral, that require you all
to refer the cases to TASK.

And of course, an example
is where the taxpayer is saying if I enter in an
installment agreement, I can´t pay my medical expenses, I can´t do this,
or the IRS is also levying on me and this is creating
economic hardship so there it´s not anything
that you are doing it´s just that the taxpayer
has talked to you and said this is creating
economic harm to me and you are required then to refer
that taxpayer to TASK.

The procedures will be laid out in your policy
and procedure guide.

So what things might signal
to you that a taxpayer is experiencing
economic hardship or is about to suffer
economic harm?

Let me just give you
a few examples but these are just examples.

There are many other ways in which the taxpayer
will signal to you that there´s a problem.

The taxpayer may have been
recently laid off or is currently unemployed, the taxpayer´s only income
is Social Security, especially if
it´s disability income because that means somebody is
really living on limited means because folks who are
receiving disability can basically
only make $1,000 or a little bit
over $1,000 a month and then they lose
their disability.

The taxpayer has
experienced a life even that effects
his/her finances.

It could be a divorce, it could be that elderly parents
have moved into the house, it could be that there´s
a death of a spouse.

That means that there´s just
a whole bunch of upheaval there and economic instability and uncertainty.

The taxpayer has incurred
a large expense such as a large medical bill, had a surgery
for himself, herself, his children, his parents, it could be anybody really, his own spouse.

The taxpayer has recently
had his car stolen, has a break in
or very importantly we keep reading
about natural disasters, tornadoes, hurricanes, and sometimes
the effect of a tornado or a hurricane can last
for years, and years, and years.

Folks have
not completely recovered from Hurricane Katrina
or Hurricane Sandy and some of the tornadoes
have required massive rebuilding and so
it´s not in the news but if somebody says
something about that, that´s what you need
to be sensitive to.

And then lastly, although this is not
an all inclusive list, the taxpayer could have been
a victim of an unscrupulous tax return preparer where the preparer
basically absconded, altered the taxpayer´s
return without any knowledge and stole an inflated refund and now the taxpayer
has a tax debt that the preparer
actually created.

The IRS ha procedures
for fixing that.

You don´t have those procedures.

That´s something
that you want to get, that´s a hardship and that´s where you want
to get the taxpayer into the hands
of the Taxpayer Advocate Service so we can help that taxpayer
and straighten it out.

Now some of this also
goes to the right to privacy and so as I told you,
I´m bounding around but all of these rights
really are inter-related and again,
this laundry list of things, what you´re doing
is also exercising the right to be informed because you´re
informing the taxpayer about the taxpayer
advocate service and what they need to do
to get into our hands even as you´re furthering
the right to a fair and just tax system.

So again, the right to privacy.

Taxpayers have the right
to expect that any IRS inquiry, examination, or enforcement action
will comply with the law and be no more intrusive
than necessary, and will respect
all due process rights, including search
and seizure protections and a collection due process hearing where applicable.

Now, what´s important
about this right to privacy, it actually comes
from the fourth amendment which protected us from unreasonable
searches and seizures.

The founders of our country
thought that was very important because during the years before the Declaration
of Independence and we were colonies,
they were subject to all sorts
of searches and seizures without any cause whatsoever so they put that
in our Constitution.

The point about this is, this phrase
that collection action or any IRS action or inquiry will be no more
intrusive than necessary, that actually comes
from another statute relating to some collection
due process hearings that the IRS has to
give taxpayers the right to.

That´s very important in your
communication with taxpayers.

When you´re asking them
about their circumstances, when you´re trying to find out
how much they can afford to pay, you´re making
very intrusive inquiries and therefore your inquires should be no more intrusive than is necessary than for you
to get the information that you need in order
to be able to get them into some kind of
compliance arrangement or to determine if they have a hardship and they need to be sent to
the Taxpayer Advocate Service.

So, as an employee of
a private collection agency, you can offer taxpayers
installment agreements but if the amount
the taxpayer can pay will not fully pay
that liability within the maximum period
for the installment agreement that you can offer them, then you´re required
to inform the taxpayer that the IRS offers
other collection alternatives.

See, this is where
the inform comes in too but it´s also
the right to privacy.

So for example,
there are such things as offers and compromise.

There is such a stat where you can actually
settle the tax debt for your reasonable collection potential over
a period of years rather than the actual amount
of the debt itself.

There´s also currently
not collectible because you have
an economic hardship where you can´t take
into account your basic living expenses
and there are also things like partial pay
installment agreements.

Now, you don´t need to be
an expert about all this but you do need to recognize
that the taxpayer has the right to have their circumstances
be considered and that the collection action
that you put into them is no more intrusive
than necessary.

And the reason for that
is that if you put them in a collection
installment agreement where they really can´t keep up, then they´re going
to default on it and you wont get paid and that looks bad
for your company if you end up
with a whole bunch of defaulted
installment agreements.

It means you didn´t
listen to the taxpayer, you didn´t really ferret out what their facts
and circumstances were and you did
a collection action that was more intrusive
than was necessary.

All right, the right
to quality service.

This is one that people
laugh about a lot because our phone service
has been so poor at the IRS but believe it or not, taxpayers have the right
to receive prompt, courteous and professional
assistance in their dealings
with the IRS, to be spoken to in a way
they can clearly understand, to receive clear and easily understandable communication
from the IRS and to have a way
to file complaints about inadequate service.

For those people who can get
through to the IRS, they have polite and courteous service
for the most part and that´s important
for you too, that when you talk to taxpayers
you really do have to live up to this right
to quality service.

And also, be sensitive to whether the person
has language barriers, whether they can
really understand.

I know you all have
separate training, but I´ve spent my life representing taxpayers
both inside and outside the IRS and I worked very
much with taxpayers who came from other countries and very often
with low income taxpayers.

That was part of my job, representing low
income taxpayers at a low income taxpayer clinic, which we´ll talk about
a little bit later.

One of the things that I used
to do is get the taxpayer, once I said something,
once I was trying to say these are the steps
you need to take, I would get them
to repeat after me what they were supposed to do.

Repeat back to me.

Do you understand
what I´m saying?

They´ll all say yes and you
say well, can you rephrase?

Can you repeat to me
what we´ve agreed you´re going to do?

And that way, you can be sure
that they understand it and if not you´ve got to try it
in a different way.

You didn´t get
through to the taxpayer and that goes to
quality service.

So again you also have to, just as IRS employees the IRS has to have a way for taxpayers to file a complaint
about service where its been inadequate, you all have to inform taxpayers
of the process for filing a complaint if they feel they
have been mistreated.

This is true about IRS
employees too by the way, they have to do that.

If taxpayers don´t want
to work with a PCA for one reason or another, the PCA must immediately, the taxpayers must immediately
be given information on how to work with the IRS directly to resolve
their account.

And generally,
the taxpayer has to be told that they can say it orally but a simple letter to the PCA saying they want to work with
the IRS is all that´s required.

We´re not asking for a treatise, we´re not asking
for a formal letter, we´re not asking for a pleading.

It can be two sentences, I don´t want to work with
the private collection agency, I want to work with the IRS
thank you very much, is enough to get them
into the hands of the IRS.

That is quality service.

You also have the obligation
to inform them of that, that´s the right to be informed.

Taxpayers who request
that their case be sent to TASK must be immediately
provided with information on how to contact TASK,
we´ve talked about that.

You may even, as we work on the technology
we´re working on this, you may even be able
to transfer the caller directly to the Taxpayer
Advocate Service so that we can then conduct an intake
on that taxpayer´s case, which would be
really easy for you but we´re working on that
technological challenge.

Delinquent returns.

Taxpayers may have a filing
requirement that it appears, and I put emphasis
on appearance, it appears that it
has not been met.

Now, the PCA policies and procedures guide
discusses situations in which the taxpayer says he/she has already filed
or that he/she does not have enough
information to file.

It´s also possible
that the taxpayer isn´t required to file but the IRS for some reason
thinks they do.

We have seen many cases where the IRS
is actually in error and that´s part
of the work that we do.

So don´t just blow it off if the taxpayer says
I´m not required to file.

They may be right, and that´s something
where you either need to get the taxpayer back to IRS or you need to get the taxpayer into the hands
of the Taxpayer Advocate Service so a determination can be made.

Your policy and procedures
guide will outline that but remember that there
are three possibilities.

And remember that
sometimes people, when they don´t file it´s not because they haven´t wanted
to comply with the law.

Some life altering event,
and I´ll share a personal story, my father who is now
deceased had a heart attack and he paid his tax actually but he did not file
his return so the IRS had no idea about his expenses.

He had more gross income than what the taxes looked
like it would cover and it was maybe five years before he actually was able
to get back on his feet and get caught up on
all of his financial activities and be able to file
with the IRS.

And unfortunately, by the time
he filed with the IRS he was actually eligible
for a refund and he lost his refund because
too much time had gone by.

But don´t assume that
somebody is a bad actor just because they haven´t
filed and again, going back to how many
times people move around, don´t assume that
because the IRS has sent all these letters
out that the taxpayer is trying to actively avoid.

They may have moved long since and they haven´t gotten
any of these letters.

Part of what you need to do
to deliver quality service is to find out what´s really
going on with the taxpayer.

Okay, now we have the right
to pay no more than the correct amount of tax and that´s a very simple one
and I think we can all appreciate that one.

Taxpayers have the right
to pay only the amount of tax legally due and to have the IRS apply
all tax payments properly.

Now, a little piece of that is that there are provisions
under the law, some of these rights
that have been scattered throughout the
Internal Revenue Code I talked about earlier, there is an ability
to get penalty and interest abatement and a lot of times the bulk of the tax bill is penalties.

Well, let´s just take my father
for a minute.

Let´s say he was incapacitated because of a heart attack and he couldn´t make
his payments for many years because he wasn´t
really earning a lot and the penalties
for late payment and for non-filing are accruing, and accruing,
and accruing but there is something
called reasonable cause.

Medical hardship
and medical disability is actually a reason to abate the failure
to pay penalty and the failure to file penalty.

And actually, sometimes
you can get that penalty, if that penalty can be abated it might mean
that the dollar amount, the taxpayer can´t pay it
all in the amount of time that you´ve got for entering
into an installment agreement but if the penalty
can get abated, then it might come back
within your jurisdiction so that the dollar amount is within the installment agreement
authority that you have.

But you don´t have the ability
to abate the penalty, that has to go back to the IRS and you need
to inform the taxpayer how to go about requesting
a penalty abatement and then you have a new amount
that you´re now looking at and maybe that´s
a resolvable tax debt even with a payment in full because the tax liability itself
may be so low.

And once you get rid
of the penalty, you get rid of some
of the interest too because interest accrues
on penalties.

Actually, interest accrues
on IRS debt and penalties daily, not like your mortgage
once a month or your credit
card once a month, but daily so interest
is accruing on interest, is accruing on penalties, is accruing on the tax daily and that´s why you get
such big tax bills when they started out
being so low.

Okay now, the right to challenge the IRS´ position and be heard.

This is actually
my favorite right and when we did focus groups
with people around the country when we were testing
the language, this was the one that
most people said to us I didn´t know I could do that and so this is something that would be
very helpful for you to talk to your friends
and family and colleagues about, to let them know that they have
the right to challenge.

If the IRS is saying
you owe this, they may be wrong and you have
the right to the IRS to listen to you and be heard
and here is the description.

Taxpayers have the right
to raise objections and provide
additional documentation in response to formal IRS
actions or proposed actions, to expect that the IRS will consider their
timely objections and documentation
promptly and fairly, and to receive a response if the IRS does not agree
with their position.

Now, that is
basically a statement of due process, that the IRS is
proposing an action or is saying something to you, you have the right to be told
what that action is, that´s the right to be informed
and you have the right to object to that action
and raise considerations and have them
be considered.

And what´s so important
about this right is it says you have the right
not only to challenge it, but also be heard
and saying be heard means that not only do
you have a right but the IRS has an obligation.

The IRS has an obligation
to listen as do you as the representatives
of the IRS.

You have the obligation
to listen to what the taxpayer is saying and listen
very carefully.

Taxpayer may not be
completely articulate.

They may not know what
information you need to have.

That´s where you inform them but you also need
to listen to the taxpayer and consider where
things need to be sent.

And so, although you don´t
have the authority to adjust the taxpayer´s
account, taxpayers
may be saying to you I don´t owe this liability and if they´re saying that it
is actually very likely that that may be the case.

Again, remember what I said
in the beginning of this, that we have an 11% recorded undeliverable mail rate so they may never have
gotten the notice that assessed the tax
in the first place or that taxpayers
move around a lot so they may never
have gotten it.

And there are tools
that the taxpayer can ask to clear up that matter so if the taxpayer is saying
I don´t believe I owe it, you don´t have the authority
to adjust the tax but that´s something
where you would send it back tot he IRS per the policies and procedures guide
in the sense of telling the taxpayer how they can go
about challenging, challenging the liability
of the IRS position and if they say I´ve done that before then you can get them
to the Taxpayer Advocate Service because that´s where there´s
been a systemic breakdown.

TASK not only
works with economic harm but we work with systemic burden where the taxpayers tried to go through
the normal procedures and the normal procedures
haven´t worked so just by listening, you can provide service
to the taxpayer, quality service which taxpayers
have the right to.

Okay, now the right
to appeal a decision, an IRS decision
to an independent forum.

Now again, there are going
to be instances even after you´re handling a case where the taxpayer
may get a levy action and where that is,
is sometimes in some of the automated
levy situations that we do.

And when that happens taxpayers
have appeal rights with respect
to that levy and so as a private
collection agency employee, you can remind taxpayers
to review that levy notice they receive which contains instructions
on how to appeal.

And there are times
where the taxpayer will have even additional rights for appeal
and your policy and procedures guide
will go through some of them, that´s what all of this
training has been for you.

But taxpayers have
the right to a fair and impartial administrative appeal of most
IRS decisions.

That´s what
the language says.

They also have the right
to take their cases to court and it may be that
by some weird circumstances, you may have a taxpayer
who could find a way to get to court
through a refund forum and that will stop
your activity on the case.

Okay now, the right to finality.

This is one that
a lot of people have some confusion about but the point is that taxpayers
have the right to know the maximum amount
of time they have to challenge
the IRS´ position as well as the maximum amount
of time the IRS has to audit
a particular tax year or to collect
on a particular tax.

Taxpayers have the right to know when the IRS
has finished an audit.

Now, I know that
there´s not a lot about finality on audit
but again, that might be that the taxpayer is saying I don´t believe
I owe this and they may still have time
to challenge this debt.

As well, they have time
to challenge the collection of it.

They may say that the collection
statute expiration date has already expired.

Now, the IRS will
give you that date for the account it assigns and that period
is usually 10 years after the assessment of tax but the taxpayer may have agreed to extend
that period of time or there may be other events that have caused it
to be extended.

On the other hand,
IRS systems sometimes improperly
extend the debt.

We have had several cases where the IRS has actually
taken collection action that was actually unlawful because the collection
statute expiration date had already done and gone and those actions
had to be reversed.

Collection CSED´s are very
complicated to calculate and therefore you should
give the taxpayer, if they feel it
erroneously calculated, you should get the taxpayer
to call the IRS.

You should also
give them information about the Taxpayer
Advocate Service.

Again, to verify this CSED, the taxpayer should
contact the IRS, should ask for a transcript, they can now go online
and get a transcript if they create
an online account because that will show
certain actions and then it may
be that the IRS has actually miscalculated
the tax, the CSED.

And so, that´s very important.

All right now, we´ve already covered
the right to privacy so now we´re going to come
to the right to confidentiality and this is very
important and taxpayers may have some
concerns about this because now not only is
their tax information in the hands of the IRS, but it´s also in the hands
of agents of the IRS, namely the private
collection agencies and I know
from talking to taxpayers that they´re very concerned
about the confidentiality and the protection
of their tax information because that is so importantly,
particularly in this day of identity theft.

This is the description,
taxpayers have the right to expect that any information they provide to the IRS will not be disclosed unless authorized
by the taxpayer or by law.

Taxpayers have the right
to expect the IRS to investigate and take appropriate action against its employees, return preparers and others
which would include contractors, who wrongfully use or disclose
taxpayer return information.

Now, I know that you have
had a lot of training about those very rights, those statutory rights.

Those are in the law, all the confidentiality rules, and it´s also in your agreement.

And you know that you
are required to authenticate
the taxpayer´s identity but taxpayer information
can be discussed only after the taxpayer´s
identity has been authenticated so that you don´t become a vehicle of identity
theft yourself and the need to protect
taxpayer data is critical, is absolutely critical.

If the IRS is perceived, and private collection agencies are perceived as to contributing to identity theft
or leaking taxpayer data, that will put an end
to this program and it will also result
in some pretty heavy sanctions for whomever did that.

And certainly,
I don´t need to tell you in this day of identity theft, and some of you may have been
victims of identity theft, if a taxpayer says that they are
a victim of identity theft and they don´t believe
that they owe this tax, then you need to tell them
how to get back into the hands of the IRS to get themselves worked
by the Identity Theft Unit and have the liability
eliminated because it could be a liability that arose as a result
of an identity theft return.

It´s not even
the return of the taxpayer and the taxpayer
may not owe any money and so that´s just
another example where you´re doing
the authentication and then your listening right, your listening will really
help the taxpayer and help you.

They will perceive
you as helpful.

Okay, now this is
very important one, taxpayers have the right
to retain representation.

Taxpayers have the right
to retain an authorized representative of their choice
to represent them in their dealings
with the IRS and by extension, you all.

So if a taxpayer says
I have a lawyer or I want my lawyer
to talk to you, then you´re going
to have to cease and desist
talking to the taxpayer and you´re going to have
to talk to the representative.

Now, the only people
that you can talk to really are attorneys, certified public accountants,
and enrolled agents.

No one else under the rules
of our programs are authorized to speak
on behalf of the taxpayer unless of course
the taxpayer is a minor and you may have some instances where the taxpayer
is incapacitated and there is a Power
of Attorney, a family member or someone who has been
appointed and stands in the shoes of the taxpayer.

Those are complicated cases and you will have
procedures to work out but if the taxpayer says
they want representation you´re required to work
with that representative.

More importantly, there´s
a second half of this provision.

Taxpayers have
the right to be told that if they cannot afford
to hire a representative, they may be eligible
for assistance from a Low
Income Taxpayer Clinic.

Now, I mentioned that before, that I personally had founded
one of the very first Low Income Taxpayer Clinics
in the country and the very first
that was organized as an independent nonprofit
that recruited attorneys, CPA´s and enrolled agents to represent low
income taxpayers free of charge.

If you have any acquaintances
or family members who are low income and have a tax problem,
you should go on the IRS.gov website and look up Low
Income Taxpayer Clinics.

You can look at the taxpayeradvocateservice.
irs.gov and find the names and addresses of the Low
Income Taxpayer Clinics and point out to your friends,
and colleagues, and family members
where they are so they can get the assistance that they need but that´s true
for the very taxpayers that you´re talking to.

If you hear someone flustered,
concerned, you can tell them you can go to the Taxpayer
Advocate Service website and look up the Low Income Taxpayer Clinic
in your state because we basically
have one for each state.

They sometimes change
from one year to other because we make grants
to give them to help these programs
represent these taxpayers but really helps
and that´s something that taxpayers
have the right to and you have the obligation
to inform them of these things.

So last we come back to where
we pretty much started which is the right to a fair and just tax system.

So what that really means
as we started out was, you have to take
into account all of the facts and circumstance that might affect
their underlying liabilities and their ability to pay.

And that´s very important
because again, there may be other debts
that are overriding.

The taxpayer may have debts
that have priority over the IRS.

They may be under a court
order about divorce.

Their circumstances
as I noted before, they may be caring
for a sick cause.

Under the circumstances there may be,
as I discussed before, reasonable cause
penalty abatement which is mentioned in the policy
and procedures guide.

So you all are prohibited
from threatening or taking any collection action.

You can´t
threaten to take a lien, or a levy, or a seizure.

That´s not in your authority and you are prohibited
from doing that.

Taxpayers assigned to the PCA´s
may already however, have liens filed against them and they may say
I can´t make payments, it´s harming my ability
to pay you.

This lien is drying up
all my access to credit, it´s making it
more expensive for me to rent an apartment,
to get insurance, to do all sort of things.

An IRS tax lien
on the credit report is a death-knell.

It´s worse than bankruptcy
and so one of the tools that the IRS has,
one of those laws that are a statutory
protection of taxpayers is that the IRS
can withdraw a lien which will eliminate it
from the credit report an that would enable
the taxpayer to be able to earn
income or borrow money and be able to pay you.

So if a taxpayer says there´s this IRS lien
on my account and it´s just wreaking havoc
with my finances, you can´t withdraw that lien but you can tell the taxpayer how to get in touch with the IRS or that might be an instance where you would refer
the taxpayer to the Taxpayer Advocate Service so we can work with the IRS
and get the lien withdrawn.

So, the last thing I want to say to you is this little point.

You are representing
the federal government here.

Your interaction with taxpayers
may be the first time in a really long time anybody has talked to this taxpayer
about their tax debt.

You may be the first human being
that they have talked to because everything the IRS did was automated
and letters and stuff like that so your interaction with the taxpayer will influence how they perceive
the government and the IRS.

So, how you react and relate
to that taxpayer, and how helpful you are, and how you comply with
all of these 10 rights that taxpayers have, will determine whether
the taxpayer thinks that you and by
extension the IRS, and by extension the federal
government is helpful.

Does it listen to
the taxpayer´s concerns, or is it impatient, or is it coercive,
or is it a bully?

So you have in your hands,
in your hands, how the taxpayer is going
to view the government.

It´s very rare to have
that kind of influence and every phone call and every interaction you make is an opportunity to interact with that taxpayer,
to educate that taxpayer, to help them feel more
confident that the IRS and the government
respects their rights and that you respect
their rights.

And so, I´ll close with this, if you were a taxpayer
and you had a tax liability, and your account
were in the hands of a private collection agency, how would you like
to be handled?

How would you like people
to talk to you?

And if you think, I would
never have that circumstance, I will just say to you
I have been in tax practice since 1975, and I have seen people
who never thought that they would have
a tax liability and they ended up with one.

I gave you the example
of my father.

I can give you so many examples.

You could be in those shoes, or a family member could be
in those shoes or a colleague or a member
of your church, synagogue, mosque or anybody, or a member
of your softball team.

Anybody could be
on those shoes and so how would you want them treated?

And when you think about that,
that´s what you should do.

Thank you very much, good luck.

I appreciate what you´re doing.

Have a good day.