Did you know we have a Taxpayer Bill of Rights?

 You might have heard about the “Taxpayer Bill of Rights” recently released by the IRS. What’s that all about? The current IRS Commissioner, John Koskinen, and the National Taxpayer Advocate, Nina Olson, announced the Taxpayer Bill of Rights at a news conference in Washington, D.C., in June 2014. The new Taxpayer Bill of Rights is intended to better communicate to taxpayers their existing statutory and administrative protections. Like the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights, there are 10 broad provisions in the Taxpayer Bill of Rights.  They are:

1. The Right to Be Informed
2. The Right to Quality Service
3. The Right to Pay No More than the Correct Amount of Tax
4. The right to Challenge the IRS’s Position and Be Heard
5. The Right to Appeal an IRS Decision in an Independent Forum
6. The Right to Finality
7. The Right to Privacy
8. The Right to Confidentiality
9. The Right to Retain Representation
10. The Right to a Fair and Just Tax System

The IRS acknowledged that as an institution, it needed to do a better job of communicating to taxpayers the rights that do exist for taxpayers and that the IRS respects those rights and has a responsibility to treat taxpayers fairly.