Last Friday, the American Bar Association (ABA) sent a letter to the IRS expressing opposition to a new proposal requiring taxpayers to disclose “uncertain tax positions” to the IRS. You can find a snippet of the letter below courtesy of the Tax Professor, or download a PDF of the full letter at ABAnet.org.
The ABA Tax Section on Friday sent this letter to the IRS expressing its opposition to the proposals to require taxpayers to disclose uncertain tax positions to the IRS:
On behalf of the ABA, I write to express our concerns regarding the proposals contained in IRS Announcement 2010-9, 2010-7 I.R.B. 408, Announcement 2010-17, 2010-13 I.R.B. 515, and Announcement 2010-30, 2010-19 I.R.B. 668 (collectively, the Announcements). The Announcements would require disclosure of uncertain tax positions through the required filing of Schedule UTP by certain business taxpayers...
We are concerned that the disclosure proposals set forth in the Announcements, requiring identification of specific uncertain tax positions and elaboration of the taxpayer’s views and assessments of those positions, will undermine the protections afforded by the attorney-client privilege and attorney work product doctrine, as well as the related § 7525 tax practitioner’s privilege. ...
[T]he ABA urges the Service to withdraw the disclosure proposals in the Announcements and instead rely on existing methods of obtaining information.
