FBAR and FATCA: FYI

First, thank you Alan for keeping us apprised of useful info like this... you are a great "feature" of this newsgroup!

Second, as a relative newcomer to the world of professional tax preparation (only seven tax seasons under my belt so far), I must say that this strikes me as the epitome of tax law obfuscation and needless complication. Instead of one requirement, there are now two, mostly-but-not-quite-overlapping, reporting requirements, which require a 28-row tabular comparison from Forbes to capture the subtle differences between them.

What's worse, these requirements by themselves do not directly lead to any changes in the tax calculation.

I have dealt with three clients this year who had to go on extension specifically due to this new requirement and trying to interpret it correctly. Question: in an audit, will a document written in German be considered evidence of adequate due diligence? Or must we hire a German translator to certify what information the document contains?

Ridiculous.

>

Oh.... then you'll just love this....

There actually is no privacy clause in the Constitution. The Supreme Court has recognized a general privacy right based on the over-all tone of the Constitution. But there is no privacy right per se.

___ Stu

The

says that "the Court ruled thata right to privacy under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment ...".

Yes, wikipedia articles are always very persuasive when trying to convince a judge.

To quote from Roe v. Wade,

"The Constitution does not explicitly mention any right of privacy. In a line of decisions, however, going back perhaps as far as Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford, 141 U. S. 250, 251 (1891), the Court has recognized that a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain areas or zones of privacy, does exist under the Constitution."

___ Stu

In a follow-up article, Forbes published an article on how the FBAR/FATCA rules change the statute of limitations.

Mark, you're right, it's gotten absurd.

As to the translation issue: I can't say what they'll do re this new form, but recently they've been auditing overseas filers like crazy, when those overseas filers have claimed the additional child tax credit. And they have been asking for certified translations of any document not in English.

David Rosenbaum.

FYI Bloomberg BNA has published "Form 8938 and the Exception for Foreign Social Security Plans".