Tips to Keep IRS from Taking Your Passport

Your US passport can now be revoked or refused to be renewed by the IRS. There have been many speculations before that this will happen and it actually did. In the next few weeks, the IRS will start enforcing this travel ban. Now the question is, what can you do to prevent the IRS from taking your passport?

Here are the following tips to follow to keep IRS from taking your passport.

1. Watch The Taxes You Owe - The key term here is “seriously delinquent tax debt”. Your passport won’t be touched if you don’t have one. This means that if you can’t avoid owing taxes, at least keep your debt below $52,000. Although you still need to be careful because that also includes penalties and interest. Before you even know it, your tax debt is already growing to $52,000 from just $20,000. Even if you pay your debt down to $51,999, if your tax debt is already labelled ‘seriously delinquent’, paying it down won’t make any difference. Even if the taxpayer pays the debt below $52,000, the IRS will not reverse a certification.

2. Don’t Stop Your Dispute with The IRS - If you promptly do it, you can typically contest tax bills. Multiple notices for any tax debt are being sent by the IRS and you must respond to all of them. Keep protesting and explain why the IRS is incorrect. You need to respond if you receive an IRS Notice of Proposed Deficiency or Examination Report. The deadline for response is the reason why it is sometimes called a “30-day letter”. Before the deadline arrives, you need to prepare a protest and sign and mail it. It’s best to send through certified mail so you can keep a copy and proof of mailing. You will get another chance to resolve your complaints in the IRS Appeals Office since that’s where a protest normally goes into.

3. Visit the Tax Court. It’s highly possible for you to receive a Notice of Deficiency if you fail to protest or you don’t resolve your case at IRS Appeals. The IRS Notice of deficiency comes via certified mail and is often called a “90-day letter,” simply because you are given 90 days to respond. You are only permitted to respond once to a Notice of Deficiency. Your case won’t be heard by filing a Tax Court petition in the U.S. Tax Court clerk’s office in Washington, D.C. The U.S. Tax Court if you miss the 90-day deadline. The tax debt does not become final as long as you keep your tax dispute going.

4. Request for Extensions. If you keep communicating, you can sometimes get extensions from the IRS. The IRS grants an extension of time to response for a lot of notices although there are cases where they can’t. When you receive a Notice of Deficiency (90-day letter) for example, you must file in Tax Court within 90 days and there will be no extensions for that. There are other notices that are less strict. Make sure to confirm your request for an extension through writing or everything you do with the IRS.

5. Get In Touch With the IRS. A phone number listed on the IRS notice can be used to contact them if you get a certification that your debt is ‘seriously delinquent’. Send proof to the address on the Notice if you’ve already paid the tax debt. 

6. Provide a Proof That You Need Your Passport. If for example, you need your U.S passport to keep your job, you must fully pay the balance, or make an alternative payment arrangement to keep your passport once your seriously delinquent tax debt is certified. The IRS will reverse the certification within 30 days of resolving the issue after you’ve resolved your tax problem with the IRS. 

7. Make an Installment Agreement. Getting an installment agreement with the IRS to pay your tax debt over time is usually not too hard. Be sure to stick to its terms if you do end up signing one. The IRS won’t call it ‘seriously delinquent’ even if your debt is huge as long as you’re paying the installment on time.