Awards & Recognition
Employers need to be careful how they treat their workers. If employers are misclassifying their workers as non-employees, they do not pay taxes. If one of those workers are let go, or terminated, and the worker files for unemployment benefits, the employer is now exposed to a worker classification audit by the EDD and possibly the IRS.
Employers sometimes misclassify their workers as independent contractors rather than employees. If an employer classifies their workers as independent contractors, usually the employer does not withhold any taxes from their workers’ pay. However, if a worker is classified as an employee, the employer has an obligation to pay one-half of their employee’s social security and one-half of their Medicare taxes. The employer also withholds an amount for federal income taxes, one-half of their employee’s social security and one-half of their Medicare taxes, state taxes from their employees paychecks and holds it in trust (on behalf of their employees) to submit to the taxing authorities. If an employer misclassifies their workers, the IRS and state can assess current and back taxes on the amount the employer should have paid for payroll taxes, and this amount can be significant.
Worker Classification or Employment Tax Audits
Misclassifying a worker is a mistake that is likely to haunt a business owner in the future. Designating an employee as an independent contractor or engaging in other illicit practices to save money will almost surely bring the IRS to your doorstep. Employment practices like paying partially by W2 and partially by 1099, paying workers under the table (especially where they claim unemployment benefits during Covid) or failing to issue a 1099 or a W2 on a worker resulting in the worker having no incentive to file will bring potential employment related criminal tax exposure.
Taking the following steps will help you when facing the possibility of a worker classification or employment tax audit from the IRS or from a State Taxing Authority.
Seek Legal Help
When you receive a State or Federal notice of an employment tax audit from the IRS or from a state taxing authority, it will typically contain information of the details of the audit, such as the scope and when it will take place. At this point, you should gather all relevant records that may be related to the audit and consider contacting a Tax Law Firm to represent you in the proceedings. The dually licensed California Tax Attorneys and CPAs at the Law Offices of David W. Klasing understand the gravity of a worker classification or employment tax audit. We will assist with preparing for the audit by examining your employment records to determine any errors / noncompliance that is very likely to become the focus of the State or Federal audit.
Respond to the IRS or State Taxing Authority
Communication is one of the most important factors when dealing with an audit. You want to meet any deadlines and requests for information that the auditor has requested. Failing to respond to letters or other types of communication from the auditor may give the impression that you are seeking to hide information or stall the investigation.
Organize Needed Paperwork
The records you will need to provide for the audit will depend on the scope of the audit. For example, if the auditor is questioning the classification of employees hired during a certain year, you want to ensure that you have the documentation requested. Also, note that the auditor may ask for employee 1099s within a span of three years. You should be prepared to provide the following records as well:
- Financial statements
- Bank records
- Income tax returns
- Credit card statements
- Copies of checks
- Travel logs for work
Cooperate with the Audit
It is also important to completely cooperate with the tax audit and to avoid impeding the auditor. There are various factors that the auditor will need to consider before making their determination, and it would be prudent to make it easy for them. For example, if the auditor wants to interview employees to discover their classification, disrupting this process may cause more trouble for you.
Work with our firm to get the legal representation needed for your worker classification audit.
Employment Tax Evasion
Employment tax evasion is a criminal tax offense that could cause life altering problems for a business owner or those deemed to be responsible parties. An employer must always be sure to both withhold and remit Federal and State employment taxes for their workers for state and federal income tax withholding, social security, and Medicare taxes etc.
Employment taxes must be remitted periodically throughout the course of the tax year as employer pays out the compensation. Missing one or more of these remittance payments will, at a minimum, result in tax penalties for a business owner. In some cases, an employer may enact a scheme to evade their employment tax responsibilities, which may carry civil and criminal penalties when discovered. Here is a list of common tax evasion schemes that are considered tax evasion:
Cash Payments to Employees
Paying employees in cash is one of the most prevalent ways to attempt to evade the employer’s duty to collect and remit employment taxes. While cash payments to employees are not in themselves Per Se illegal, they aide the employer with concealing the earnings of their employees. Employees will invariably work for less if they view their compensation as tax free. In turn, this pattern of paying employees will force the employer to present intentionally false data to the IRS to facilitate the fraud. This can very easily be charged as aiding and abetting the income tax evasion of the company’s employees & conspiracy. The employees can also be charged with income tax evasion. At a minimum responsible parties will be assessed the trust fund recovery penalty.
Pyramiding
A pyramiding scheme is when the employer withholds taxes from their employees’ checks and uses that money for any purpose (including paying other creditors) rather than remitting the withheld employment taxes to the pertinent State Taxing Authority(s) or the IRS. This scheme is usually unsustainable in the long term and consequently the company will typically be walked away from, and the pattern of employment tax evasion continues under the identity of a different or often newly formed entity / company. Repeating this pattern multiple times through multiple entities or companies is referred to as Pyramiding.
Misclassification of Employees
As previously mentioned, misclassification of employees as independent contractors is another common employment tax scheme that some employers may use to attempt to evade employment taxes. The penalty of this practice is simply not worth it for a taxpayer that values the long-term longevity of their business. The passage of AB5 in California for example has severely limited the proper use of independent contractors in California.
These are not the only employment schemes that could draw the eye of the IRS or another Federal or State Government Agency.
Our dually licensed California Tax Attorneys and CPAs have extensive experience working with clients that were facing audits or criminal tax investigations for employment tax related offenses. We know how to navigate worker classification audits and payroll tax audits or criminal investigations and are ready to act swiftly on your behalf to achieve damage control.
Who is an “Employer”?
Sometimes it’s not always clear whether you are the employer of other persons. Perhaps you view your workers as “independent contractors.” This classification is important since an employer is not required to withhold amounts from an independent contractor.
An employer may include individuals, partnerships, estates, trusts, corporations, and unincorporated organizations. Furthermore, even churches, and organizations that are exempt from income tax must withhold from employees. IRC § 3401(d); Reg. § 31.3401(d)-1.
Employer Duties
An employer is subject to a variety and variegated array of payroll and withholding requirements. They include the following:
- A duty to withhold a certain amount for income tax purposes from the wages paid to their employees;
- A duty to collect and pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on the worker’s compensation pursuant to the Federal Insurance Contribution Act (FICA);
- A duty to pay unemployment taxes on the employee’s wages pursuant to Federal Unemployment Tax Act (FUTA);
- A duty to comply with the workplace safety and labor laws, which includes worker’s compensation laws;
- A duty to provide certain fringe benefits, for example to make contributions to a pension or retirement plan, or health or life insurance, vacation pay, paid sick leave, and certain other duties.
The employer is responsible for this duty, even if it is delegated to a payroll firm. Reg. § 31.3403-1. However, even a non-employer may have a duty to withhold tax (e.g. lenders, or others who pay the employees their wages; and creditors who lend funds knowing that the loan will be used for payroll purposes). IRC § 3505(b).
An employer who must withhold income taxes from wages must make a quarterly return on Form 941. Withheld income tax must be paid into to a Federal Reserve bank within a certain period of time, and there are specific timing rules for that.
“Employee” vs. “Independent Contractor”
It is also sometimes not always clear whether your workers are “employees” or “independent contractors” (this is important as payroll tax fraud begins when a worker is misclassified).
The usual definition of whether an employer-employee relationship exists asks whether the “employer” has the right to control and direct the “employee,” including the details and the means that the services, even if the employer did not actually directly control the employee. Reg. § 31.3121(d)-1(c). In addition, the IRS also uses a 20-factor test. Rev. Rul. 87-41; 1987-1 CB 296. The complexity of this 20-factor test results in a grey area of the law, since it is not always clear which factor the IRS will weigh most heavily. Competent legal counsel will be able to advise you whether you are likely deemed an “employer” subject to payroll and withholding tax.
A worker may be classified as an “independent contractor” if certain tests are satisfied (e.g., judicial precedent, IRS rulings or technical advice, letter ruling, or a past audit). Legal counsel can advise you on this. A “skilled professional,” like a physician, attorney, CPA sometimes is classified as an independent contractor, sometimes as an employee. The number of employees and their length of the employment is immaterial; nor does it matter that the employee is not employed at the time the wages are paid; the duty remains. Reg. § 31.3401(d)-1(b).
Simplified greatly, if you hire a worker and set all the rules, the workers will be deemed “employees.” But if the workers “call the shots,” then the workers are “independent contractors.”
Solution for Misclassification of Workers as “Independent Contractors” (IRC § 530 Relief)
Suppose you have classified a worker as an independent contractor when, really, he is an employee — and, accordingly, you did not withhold the required payroll taxes. Once the IRS discovers this, they will exact a liability.
However, there is good news. An employer may escape liability for past and future employment taxes (FICA, FUTA, and federal withholdings) by qualifying for “IRC § 530 relief.” This relief is available if three conditions are satisfied:
- The employer has filed all federal tax returns (“reporting consistency”);
- The employer has treated all similarly situated workers as independent contractors (“substantive consistency”); and
- The employer has a reasonable basis for not treating the worker in question as an employee (“safe harbor”).
This last condition’s “reasonable basis” must generally be based on case law, IRS rulings, technical advice, or private letter rulings. Legal counsel will be able to advise you whether your worker classification should be defended against the IRS, or whether to strike a compromise with the IRS on the matter (under the IRS’s so-called “Classification Settlement Program” or CSP).
What is a “Wage” According to the IRS?
Like the definition of “employer”, “employee”, the definition of “wage” is not always straightforward. This is important to an employer because only payments that are deemed “wages” for income tax purposes are subject to withholding.
A “wage” is pay to an employee for services. IRC § 3401(a). This term is very broad, and includes salary, fees, a bonus, award, commission, vacation pay, retirement pay, among others. In fact, the IRS’s approach is to look at the substance of an economic transaction, and to ignore its form. Old Colony Trust Co. v. Commissioner, 279 U.S. 716 (1929)(employee must include in gross income the amount a third party paid on his income taxes, even though it is classified as an employee fringe benefit).
Some distributions of funds to an employee are more complex. For example, is employee commission subject to withholding? Are employer contributions to an IRA subject to withholding? Below market loans to an employee? Pension distributions? Overtime pay? May a shareholder (owner) of a closely-held corporation avoid employment tax by characterizing wages as a royalty or a rent? These are the sorts of questions your attorney can answer for you.
Employer Penalties
Employers may be liable for civil and criminal penalties for: (1) failing to collect (withhold) and pay tax, (2) failing to file a return, (3) failing to deposit the withheld amount, (4) failing to file correct a false returns, (5) fraudulently withholding information from the IRS. We consider the details of these.
(1) Failure to Collect (Withhold) and Pay Tax
Generally, an employer required to withhold tax is liable for that tax, plus interest, even if she has not actually collected and paid the tax from the employee. IRC § 3403; Reg. § 31.3403-1. The responsible person may even be held personally liable, meaning that the tax may be paid by collecting from the person’s personal assets—his house, car, other business, and the like. In practice, what this means that that the IRS may seek to close your business and liquidate its assets, and then go after the your personal possessions to satisfy your tax obligation.
Furthermore, this personal obligation may not be escaped by declaring bankruptcy, as a discharge in personal bankruptcy will generally not shield one from tax liability. United States v. Sotelo, 436 U.S. 268 (1978) (holding that a IRC § 6672 liability was a “tax” for bankruptcy purposes).
(2) Failure to File
Many people are surprised to learn how serious the government is about its filing requirements. Generally, when an employer fails to file a return, she may receive a penalty of up to five percent of the total unpaid tax for that month, plus an additional five percent for each subsequent month. And, if the employer acted “willfully” in failing to file a return, to supply required information, or to keep proper records, a fine of $25,000 may be imposed ($100,000 for corporations). IRC § 7203. Further, if the employer is found to willfully evade taxes, he is guilty of a felony, and may be fined up to $100,000 ($500,000 for corporations), and imprisoned for up to five years. IRC § 7201.
(3) Failure to Deposit
A failure to make a timely deposit of the withheld tax amount in an authorized deposit may result in a penalty, with the penalty amount increasing by the tardiness of the payment. IRC § 6656(b).
(4) Failure to File Correct Information Returns
An employer may be liable for (1) failing to file an information return (like a W-2 Form) by the due date, (2) failing to include all required information on a return, or (3) for including incorrect information on a return. The amount of the penalty will depend upon the when/if the correct information is supplied. IRC § 6721(a)(2). The amount may vary from as low as $15 to as high as $250,000.
(5) Fraudulently Withholding Information
Employers who willfully provide the IRS with false or fraudulent wage or tax statement may be subject to a $50 penalty for each statement (IRC § 6674), plus a $1,000 fine, and imprisonment up to one year (IRC § 7204).
Employee Penalties
It is not just an employer who may be liable. Employees may be subject to civil or criminal penalties for filing a fraudulent withholding allowance certificate or failing to provide a correct tax identification number (TIN). IRC § 6682(b); § 7205(a).
Seeking to Mitigate Tax Implications Through Properly Classifying Employees
To avoid misclassification allegations, employers can proactively reach out to the government and ask them to confirm their employee and independent contractor classifications. This is an important step to avoid unnecessary tax implications, but seek experienced tax counsel before contacting authorities. The government will make their determination based on the information you provide them. If any information is overlooked or skewed, you could still be found responsible for misclassifying employees as independent contractors even after complying with the government’s determination.
When you select the Tax Law Offices of David W. Klasing, my legal team and I will take every measure possible to protect your company from back taxes and penalties for misclassifications on employment tax. We have an extensive background handling worker classification audits and know how to preserve your interests with minimal tax and legal implications.
Voluntary Worker Classification Settlement Program
Recently, the IRS announced a new Voluntary Worker Settlement Program to help employees obtain relief from federal payroll taxes they owe the government. This program is targeted at companies that are now compliant, after misclassifying employees as contractors. Employers accepted into the program will not incur interest or penalties.
We Can Help.
It is not difficult to get into payroll tax trouble. Employment tax law is notoriously complex, so it is understandable that mistakes occur. The IRS, however, is not so forgiving. That is why if you are an employer who has reason to believe that you have intentionally or unintentionally committed one of the above offenses, you need competent legal counsel. Due to the complexity of the intersection of taxation and criminal law, few attorneys are experienced to handle payroll tax violations.
The Tax Law Office of David W. Klasing, however, has vast experience in this area of law; we can help you navigate through your legal options. After reviewing the facts of your case, we are able to inform you whether you are likely to obtain an arrangement with the IRS to deal with your payroll tax program, to eliminate or reduce your liability, or to pay it at a manageable level.
Contact my law office or call 800.681.1295 for a reduced rate initial consultation, in Orange County, Irvine, or Los Angeles.
