To Our Valued Clients,

As the coronavirus (COVID-19) continues to affect local communities and global economies, you may have concerns about your financial well-being. Or you may be wondering about how recently passed legislation impacts you. We’re providing a high-level summary of some of the key provisions impacting individuals and recommend discussing your particular circumstances with us in more detail.

Relief available

There are several recently enacted tax changes and new or expanded benefits that might be helpful to you.

Income tax provisions:

  • The IRS has provided broad relief and extended the filing and payment deadlines to July 15, 2020. However, we continue to work on filing returns as soon as possible.
  • Estimated tax payments due on or after April 1, 2020 and before July 15, 2020 can wait until July 15 to make the payment without penalty.
  • New York has extended the tax filing and payment deadlines identically to the IRS.
  • North Carolina has extended the tax filing deadline to July 15, 2020. However, tax liability payment deadline remains on April 15, 2020. While North Carolina has suspended the late payment penalty until July 15, 2020, interest on unpaid tax liability will accrue after April 15, 2020.

Recovery rebates:

  • Payments to individuals of $1,200 ($2,400 for joint filers) plus $500 for each qualifying child are expected to be delivered around mid-April.
  • The recovery rebate begins to phase out for taxpayers with adjusted gross income (AGI) above $150,000 for joint filers, $112,500 for heads of households and $75,000 for other individuals.
  • The payment is not taxable.

Retirement accounts:

  • Through the end of the year, individuals who are under 59 ½ years old can take up to $100,000 in coronavirus-related distributions from retirement plans without the usual 10% penalty for early distributions. The distributions may be repaid within three years and any resulting income inclusion can be taken over three years.
  • If you were over 70 ½  at Dec. 31, 2019 you won’t have to take required minimum distributions (RMD) in 2020. If your retirement assets have taken a hit, not having to take an RMD may allow those assets to recover some value before you liquidate them.

Student loans:

  • If you have a federally-held student loan, your payments will be suspended through Sept. 30, 2020 and interest won’t accrue during this period. Note that this relief does not apply to private student loans.

Other benefits:

  • Other benefits are available including expanded unemployment, emergency paid sick and family leave benefits (with some limitations and exceptions). Unemployment benefits are extended to self-employed and part-time workers.

Protecting our clients and our team

There are limitations on our physical work environment due to COVID-19; however, we’re working to minimize disruptions and impacts to you so that we can still offer the same level of superior service and support you have come to expect from our team.

We have implemented procedures to protect the health and safety of our staff, clients and community including restricting access to in person meetings, restricting travel, providing remote working solutions, enforcing the use of client portals for document transfer, adding virtual communication channels to stay connected, and implementing continuity plans. We continue to monitor the situation and adjust our procedures, as necessary.

Our commitment to you

Whether you have tax or accounting questions or need advice on ways to navigate the expanded benefits outlined above, we’re here for you. If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact us at 980-434-2044 or email us at info@tanfs.com.

During this unpredictable and challenging time, it’s more important than ever to stay connected. We’re in this together and our thoughts go out to all that have been impacted by this unprecedented situation.

Rest assured, we’re here for you!

-Tee
Principal