Administrative Procedure Act and International Penalties: Timing Issues, Strategies for Challenging FBAR Penalties

This CLE/CPE course will provide tax counsel and advisers with a thorough and practical guide to strategies for administrative challenges and defenses against international penalty assessments under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). The panel will contrast the penalty structures between FBAR and other foreign-related information filings and focus on remedies available under the APA for challenging FBAR penalties.

The Internal Revenue Code contains countless reporting requirements regarding foreign information filing obligations. The failure to timely or correctly file foreign information returns with the IRS can result in the assessment of penalties ranging from $10,000 to several million dollars annually. As a result of the IRS’s overzealous approach in assessing foreign information return penalties, taxpayers have begun challenging international penalties in a number of courts based on various legal theories.

Recently, some of these challenges have been based on the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”). In certain cases, the APA may provide judicial review of an IRS assessment of a penalty associated with a foreign information return. An APA action is separate from other technical grounds used to challenge assessments of international penalties. Tax counsel must be aware of potential APA arguments in strategizing a defense against international penalties.

Listen as our experienced panel provides thorough and practical guidance on administrative claims potentially available to taxpayers facing an international penalty assessment.