Beware of Tax Scams this Halloween!

A CP 2000 notice issued by the IRS usually indicates that the IRS received information from a third party, such as an employer, which does not match what was reported on your tax return. An example of this is the W-2 form that the IRS receives has a different amount than the taxpayer entered on line 7 wages of the taxpayer’s Form 1040. The CP 2000 notice will instruct the taxpayer how to respond, depending on whether the taxpayer agrees that additional tax is due or disagrees with the proposed change. As with all legitimate tax notices and correspondence from the IRS, the CP 2000 would be received through the mail from the U.S. Postal Service.

There has been a recent scam that used fake CP 2000 notices. The fake CP 2000 notices have been used to scam taxpayers for unpaid taxes related to coverage under the Affordable Care Act for the 2014 tax year.  There have been numerous reports of taxpayers receiving fraudulent CP 2000 notices through email with a bill attached.  A few distinguishing factors of the fraudulent notice:

1. Appears to be issued from an Austin, Texas address.
2. The payment voucher lists the letter number as 105C.
3. A payment request for a check made out to “I.R.S.” to an “Austin Processing Center” at a P.O. Box address.
4. A payment link is included in the email.

Tax professionals and taxpayers alike are able to go to the IRS webpage to see an image of a real CP 2000 notice. You should never respond to an unsolicited email from the IRS.  If you receive this scam email, you should forward it to [email protected] and then delete it from your email account. 

Please contact us with questions and visit the Our Thoughts On blog for more tax related articles.