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ERC Rebellion: A CPA’s Toolkit for Dealing with Disregarded Advice
Question: I have several long-term clients I’ve advised they didn’t qualify for ERC under the requirements. I’ve discovered over time that all three were sold by an ERC mill and filed amended tax returns to claim credits. What are the risks they will be audited and what are my responsibilities in representing them? Should I release them as clients because they didn’t listen to me? Answer: You know, the Employee Retention Credit (ERC) might sound like a pretty sweet deal, especially if your business took a hit during the pandemic. It's a tax break designed to help you out. But don’t be fooled. It's not as simple as it sounds. You need to know the ins and outs before you jump in. Some new kids on the block, a bunch of specialist firms, are offering to help businesses claim this ERC. Unless you’ve been trapped in a cave (or under a pile of tax files) you’ve probably seen the mail, heard the commercials, clicked the ads. They make it seem so easy, don’t they? Just let us take care of everything and ignore the rules. This is music to the ears of employers – especially if we’ve already told them based on the rules, they don’t qualify. We want our clients to know they gotta be careful. These mills may promise you the moon and the stars, but the reality is, there's a pretty tight rule book on how and when you can claim the ERC. Misunderstanding these rules could mean you lose out on a potential $26,000 tax credit per employee. Worse, you could be tricked into claiming money you're not actually entitled to and end up with a nasty surprise later. And when you factor in the steep fees charged by these fly-by-nights, often up to 30% of promised refunds - there is a real risk of loss should these businesses lose their claims.
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CURRENT EDITION
A Court Just Bought Your Clients More Time on Clean Energy Tax Credits Here’s How to Use It
A federal district court just struck down an IRS rule that had been closing the door on a pretty compelling tax savings opportunity available to your clients today, the Section 48E Clean Electricity Investment Tax Credit. The ruling, handed down on June 6, 2026, reinstated a key pathway that allows investors to lock in credit eligibility for large-scale wind and solar projects a pathway the IRS had tried to eliminate just last year. The window is not wide open. July 4, 2026 is still the critical deadline, and the government will almost certainly appeal. But for advisors who act quickly, this ruling creates a genuine, time-sensitive planning opportunity. Here is what you need to understand, and what you should be doing right now.
Your Summer Tax Practice Playbook: Three Moves to Make Before Labor Day
Tax Day is finally in the rearview mirror, and if you’re like many practitioners—with the phones quieter, the inbox manageable, and the September extension wave feeling comfortably far away—the temptation right now is to coast. Resist that temptation. Summer is the only stretch of the calendar when both you and your best clients have the bandwidth to think strategically; furthermore, this summer, there is a deadline-driven opportunity. In this article, I’ll walk through three moves every practitioner should be making between now and Labor Day. The first move has a hard statutory deadline of July 10, 2026. The second move is about turning your highest-value client conversations into billable advisory engagements. And third is about tending to the practice itself because a tax practice, like a garden, doesn’t survive without care.
What Every Client Should Know About Partnership Distributions
Perhaps the most misunderstood aspect of partnership taxation relates to distributions. When a partnership distributes cash or property to its partners, the tax consequences can range from completely tax-free to significantly taxable, depending on how the distribution is structured and the partners’ tax basis in their partnership interests. In this article, we’ll explore the rules governing partnership distributions and how they impact partners’ tax situations. More importantly, we’ll look at strategies to structure distributions in the most tax-efficient manner possible – because the goal is not just to understand the rules but to use them advantageously.
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