The public forums provide an opportunity for the National Taxpayer Advocate to hear from taxpayers through panel discussions with congressional and community representatives and comments from the audience. In addition to written statements submitted by panel members, each forum has been transcribed to make sure there is a written record of all discussions on taxpayer needs and preferences when dealing with the IRS. The National Taxpayer Advocate will use these recorded conversations to further the discussion of the IRS future state vision and to ensure that U.S. taxpayers have a voice in the process. Transcripts are listed by city and date below:

Washington, DC (May 17, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson
• Full Transcript

Baltimore, MD (May 13, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Senator Ben Cardin, United States Senate, Maryland
• Full Transcript

Red Oak, IA (May 5, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Senator Charles Grassley, United States Senate, Iowa
• Full Transcript

Harrisburg, PA (April 8, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Senator Bob Casey, United States Senate, Pennsylvania
• Full Transcript

Hendersonville, NC (April 4, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Rep. Mark Meadows, Member of Congress, 11th Congressional District, North Carolina
• Full Transcript

Bronx, NY (March 18, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Rep. Jose E. Serrano, Member of Congress, 15th Congressional District, New York
• Full Transcript

Chicago, IL (March 9, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson and Rep. Peter Roskam, Member of Congress, 6^th Congressional District, Illinois
• Full Transcript

Washington, DC (February 23, 2016)

• Hosted by: National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson
• Full Transcript

Did you get a notice you thought was from the IRS? Make sure it is a real one before paying.

 The IRS has issued a warning to taxpayers and tax professionals about a new scam related to the Affordable Care Act.  

The warning encourages people to be on the alert against fake emails purporting to contain an IRS tax bill related to the Affordable Care Act. Reports from around the country tell of scammers sending fraudulent version of IRS CP2000 notices for tax year 2015. Generally, the scam involves an email that includes the fake CP2000 notice as an attachment.

Don’t be fooled into making a payment. The IRS provides details on how to spot a fake notice and report scams in this press release. If you are not sure what is real or what is fake, always investigate first before taking action.

One good resource for the latest scam awareness news is IRS’s Tax Scams/Consumer Alerts page.

Please be assured this issue has been reported to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration for investigation.

If you have a vaild notice and need further assistance, our Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS) website has many resources to help you when you:

•    get a notice from the IRS,
•    respond to a legitimate audit,
•    need to secure a payment arrangement, or
•    need to know what to do about identity theft, and many more tax related topics.

As always, TAS is here to protect your rights as a taxpayer and help you with tax problems you can’t resolve on your own. We are your voice at the IRS. If you are not familiar with the Taxapyer Advocate Service, see who we are and how we can help.

This past filing season saw some people owing money at tax time that they didn’t expect. Why? Because they didn’t provide an accurate income estimate to the Marketplace when enrolling for health insurance or they forgot to report changes to the Marketplace immediately. Don’t let that be you next year!

Here are three ways to help lessen your chances of owing money at tax time, if you chose to have advance payments of the Premium Tax Credit paid to your insurer.

1) Make sure you include ALL your income in your estimate.

Remember that it’s more than just your paycheck that needs to be included. Pay special attention to these items:

• Unemployment compensation
• All household members’ income (not just yours)
• Additional types of income, including interest income, capital gains, cash support, and alimony.
• Most withdrawals and distributions from traditional IRAs and 401ks. (See IRS Publication 590-B Distributions from Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs) for more information.)

Some unexpected balances were due to a lump sum payment received or withdrawn during the year that was not included in the initial income estimate. Lump sum payments can be issued through retirement account distributions, Social Security or disability payments and awards from law suits. These amounts are reported to you on a IRS Form 1099.

Healthcare.gov’s “Get Answers” has many articles to help you estimate your income more accurately.

• How to estimate your income for the Marketplace
• Who’s included in your household
• What’s included in income

2) Consider having a lower amount of the estimated Premium Tax Credit paid directly to the insurer where possible.

When possible, opt to have less than 100% of the calculated credit used as advance payments. If you are eligible for a larger credit, you will receive the difference when you file your tax return. So if you can afford to take less, even a little bit, doing this will give you at least some cushion of safety should the unexpected happen or you miscalculated your income.

3) Report all income and life changes to the Marketplace immediately.

Don’t wait to report changes. The longer you wait to report changes to the Marketplace the larger the difference between the advance payments and the final allowable credit will be. Changes can also affect your insurance coverage.

Don’t know which changes to report? Healthcare.gov has information on which changes should be reported. Or see IRS Publication 5152, Report changes to the Marketplace as they happen (also available in Spanish).

Another handy tool is our Premium Tax Credit Change Estimator. The Premium Tax Credit Change Estimator can help you estimate how much your premium tax credit will change if your income or family size changes during the year. It won’t report those changes to the Marketplace, you must do that yourself, but it will give you a better idea of how those life changes affect the total amount of your premium tax credit.

Of course you never know what’s going to happen in the coming year. That’s why it’s so important to update your Marketplace information all year round whenever you have income or household changes that could affect your coverageand your taxes.

If you should you find yourself owing money to the IRS at tax time, but can’t afford to pay it all at once, there are options. See I can’t pay my taxes for more information.

With both the IRS and the Healthcare Marketplace sending healthcare notices out each year, you might be confused. We hope the information below will help you sort out why you received this message and what you need to do to respond.

IRS Healthcare Related Notices

Premium Tax Credit Letter 12C
This letter is sent if healthcare coverage related documents, like the Form 1095A, Health Insurance Marketplace Statement, shows that advance payments of the premium tax credit were elected at enrollment, but those amounts were not reported on your federal tax return or were reported incorrectly.

To resolve: Please visit IRS.gov’ s Understanding Your Letter 0012C page, then either reply in writing explaining any error with the information reported or complete and submit the required forms, such as Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit.

Other general letters
These request that you file your 2014 or 2015 federal tax return with Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit, as soon as possible to protect your eligibility for assistance with paying for you or your family’s Marketplace health insurance coverage for the following calendar year, because records show that you claimed advance payments of the Premium Tax Credit when you enrolled in your insurance policy.

To resolve: If you agree with the information in the letter, file your tax return with Form 8962 as soon as possible, even if you don’t normally have to file. Use the Form 1095-A that you received from your Marketplace to complete Form 8962. If you need a copy of your Form 1095-A, log in to your HealthCare.gov or state Marketplace account or call your Marketplace call center.

Letter 5600C
This letter sent to let you know that it appears that you may have reported owing too much Health Care Shared Responsibility Payment (SRP) on your 2014 income tax return. See Understanding Your Letter 5600C. Please be aware that a new version of this letter will start being sent shortly for 2015 tax returns, but the resolution actions are the same.

To resolve: Please review the situation to see if you agree with the information in the letter. Check to see if you might be eligible for an exemption that you weren’t aware of. If you need to change the amount claimed on the return, file a Form 1040X, Amended U.S. Individual Income Tax Return. Attach Form 8965, Health Coverage Exemptions, if you qualify.

Note: The IRS, as of this article’s publication date, has not begun issuing letters or notices with regard to an employer’s status or liability under the employer shared responsibility provisions.

Marketplace Notices

Periodic Data Matching Notices 
These are sent to certain taxpayers if someone in their tax household is enrolled in both a Marketplace health plan with advance payments of the premium tax credit and Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program. In general, no one should be enrolled in both types of plans, so corrections to one or both of those plans may need to be made.

To resolve: Please go to HealthCare.gov, or call the Marketplace Call Center at 1-800-318-2596 and follow the instructions in the letter. 

Failure to Reconcile Warning Notices 
These are sent to certain taxpayers if anyone in their tax household attested on their 2016 Health Insurance Marketplace application that they filed a tax year 2014 federal tax return with Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit, and reconciled their 2014 advance payments of the premium tax credit (APTC), but who appear to have not yet filed. The law requires everyone who claimed advanced PTC at the time of enrollment must file a tax return. If one isn’t filed timely, you may be denied the option to get those advanced payment when you enroll for a future year.

To resolve: Use the Get Transcript process if you need to provide information to the Marketplace. Please file an amended return with the IRS, if APTC was not reported on the original return. If no return was filed, please file an original return using Form 1095-A data from the Marketplace with the IRS.

2016 Employer Notice 
This notice is being issued to 300,000 employers, regardless of size, to inform the employers that an employee has enrolled in Marketplace coverage with financial assistance and that he or she claimed they: didn’t receive an offer of health care coverage from your company; did have an offer of health coverage, but it wasn’t affordable or didn’t provide minimum value; or were in a waiting period and
unable to enroll in the offered employer health care coverage.

To resolve: Employers should visit the Healthcare.gov Employer Appeals page and file an appeal, with a copy of your notice, to the Marketplace if you believe there’s been a mistake regarding the employee’s eligibility or if you believe your employee was incorrectly determined eligible for their health plan because you offered the employee affordable, minimum value health coverage.

Employers can check IRS.gov’ s Affordable Care Act Tax Provisions for Employers for more information about the employer shared responsibility provisions and how to determine if you are considered and ALE or not. You can also use our Employer Shared Responsibility Provision Estimator to help you determine the company’s status.

Since both agencies administer different parts of the Affordable Care Act laws, you may get a notice from both agencies with regard to the same topic, but looking for slightly different information for different reasons. We encourage you to read through any notice or letter first and identify the agency that actually sent the letter. If you need help figuring out how to respond, check the agency website first for further guidance, then if needed; contact that agency directly for further assistance.

Agency Information

For IRS: visit IRS.gov/aca or call 1-800-829-1040.

Healthcare Marketplace: Please visit HealthCare.gov to see your online account, visit The Health Insurance Marketplace page for state contact information or call 1-800-318-2596.

More Information

If your IRS notice or letter is not listed above, please visit Understanding Your IRS Notice or Letter for more listings and information on what to do. Basic information may help you understand more about the Form 1095-A, Health Insurance Marketplace Statement, and how to fix issues related to that form.

Taxpayers and businesses can use these before filing their federal tax returns.

Tax filing season will be here before you know it. As you plan and prepare your information over the next few months, don’t forget TAS has four online Affordable Care Act (ACA) estimators that can help you.

These four easy-to-use tools are designed to help taxpayers estimate ACA credits and payments. They can be used for individual taxpayers and businesses when preparing to file federal tax returns and for planning purposes throughout the year.

Individual Shared Responsibility Payment Estimator

This tool estimates any payment due for not having minimum essential medical insurance coverage for part or all of the year where no exemption is applicable. It can also help guide you to see if you may qualify for an exemption from this requirement.

If you need healthcare insurance coverage for 2017, enrollment opens November 1, 2016. Go to Healthcare.gov or to find your Marketplace Contact Information on IRS.gov, then contact that specific agency. Before enrolling, we suggest that you read this important article: Premium Tax Credit: 3 ways to reduce the chance of owing taxes.

 
Premium Credit – Change Estimator

This tool helps estimate premium tax credit changes throughout the year if your income or family size changes. It can estimate any increase or decrease in the final credit allowable before you file, which can help you predict if you might owe money or be getting some money back. Remember, you should always report any change in circumstance directly to your Marketplace as soon as possible.

If you did elect to get this credit in advance when you enrolled in your 2016 health insurance plan, you must file an IRS Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit (PTC), with your tax return. Failure to file this form can cause delays with the processing of your federal tax return.

 
Small Business Health Care Tax Credit Estimator

This tool estimates if certain small businesses might be eligible for the Small Business Health Care Tax Credit and for approximately how much. It can be used to see if you are eligible for a credit in a prior tax year, so you can file an amended tax return to claim it.

Employer Shared Responsibility Provision Estimator

Employers can use this to determine:

• The number of your full-time employees, including full-time equivalent employees (FTEs);
• Whether you might be an applicable large employer; and
• If you are an applicable large employer (ALE), an estimate of the maximum amount of the potential liability for the employer shared responsibility payment that could apply to you based on the number of FTEs that you report if you fail to offer coverage to your full-time employees.

All four tools can be found on the Taxpayer Toolkit, by just entering “aca estimators” in the search bar or clicking on the “Get Help” tab above and scrolling down the page to find links to each tool. There are also links from IRS.gov’s Affordable Care Act Estimator Tools page.

To learn more about any of the ACA provisions, visit our Affordable Care Act (ACA) page or the IRS’s Affordable Care Act page.