 Internal Revenue Service RIS Tax News filing season 2023 has begun. Employer January 31st statement deadline almost here. Oh no! The IRS has once again unleashed another zombified line, known as a deadline to terrorize the American taxpayer. Kind of like Eric Swalwell releasing gas to terrorize Congress for kicking him off the Intelligence Committee. To ask the Ukrainians to help him cheat an election. And the complaint that I've heard from Republicans. Simply because he was humping a Chinese spy. I mean it's ridiculous. And uh, and you're claiming this is absolutely not. Total exoneration. Total exoneration. He's like, hey, hey, wait a second here. You don't understand. I was playing 3D chess on behalf of the American people with that Chinese spy acting as like a double-agent man. Honestly, I had that Chinese spy rocked around my little, well, it doesn't. We are, uh, we're going to slow it down one more time. Because I feel like if we see anything in your face, this would be how we know. The point is, this is outrageous. This is outrageous. If you're telling fate, let's take one more look. Ask the Ukrainians to help him cheat an election. You're going to regret all the extra time I now have on my hands after being kicked off the Intelligence Committee. I think he'll regret giving all three of us more time on our hands. But at the end of the day, our mission now is to restore the credibility and integrity of this institution. Speaking of which, do you happen to know where the nuclear codes are kept? Because, like, I got a date with this nice Russian hottie and she just seems to have an interest in this kind of thing. What? I can't use the nuclear codes because Hunter Biden is using them over at his dad's house to impress some Ukrainian prostitutes by sniffing Parmesan cheese off of them to blow their minds? Wow. Does that really work? Anyways, whatever. Honestly, isn't it funny how one day you're, like, in demand? But you just don't have the time due to being, like, on the Intelligence Committee. And then once you have the time freed up because you've been, like, removed from the Intelligence Committee, it's like, it's like you're totally not in demand anymore. It's just part of life's inexplicable kawinky dinks, I guess. Let's get to the news here. IR 2023-15, January 26, 2023, Washington. The Internal Revenue Service today urged employers to be aware of the January deadline to file forms W-2 and other wage statements. Filing these documents timely prevents late filing penalties for employers, helps employees file their income tax returns and prevents tax fraud. It also helps you to not get the IRS pissed off at you and hit you with their sticks of penalties and interest. So employers must file copies of their 2022 Form W-2 wage and tax statement. There's a link to that here in Form W-3, Transmittal of Wage and Tax Statements, kind of like the summary of all the W-2s, with the Social Security Administration by January 31, 2023. This deadline applies for all forms W-2 and W-3, whether filing by paper forms or electronically. Employers must also provide copies of B, C and 2 of Form W-2 to their employees by January 31, 2023. For more information on filing Form W-2, see general instructions for Form W-2 and W-3. So just a quick recap of how this whole thing works. We have an income tax kind of system, of course. So the IRS has an interest in double checking that people are reporting their income. When you have an income tax system, the leverage from the government is actually on the payer of a transaction. So you've got the recipient and the payer of the transactions. The person that's receiving the money is getting income. The one that's paying might have a deduction, an expense, which could be deductible. The deduction is good for taxes, and therefore the IRS has the leverage on the person that may get the deduction. In this case, of course, the employer. And so they force the employer to give the W-2 not only to the employee, which isn't really their concern, even though obviously they're going to frame it as if it is up here. We're trying to help out the employees to make sure that they have the information. No, they want the information so that they could double check and look over everyone's shoulder kind of thing. So the point is, then they have to give the W-2 and the W-3 summary to the government as well as the employee. And then, of course, the employee, if they don't report their income exactly as it's on the W-2, then it doesn't even take like a person to figure out. You don't need a random audit to figure it out. They can put it through the machine and say, hey, look, this thing doesn't tie out to what our side of the W-2 says, and you'll almost surely get some type of notification. So clearly before filing your taxes, you want to have the documentation such as W-2s and 1099s because the government has those things. And if you report something different than what's on their side, then there's going to be an issue with it. This is also kind of why the government tends to, whenever you read some of these IRS articles, lean towards wanting the people in an employer-employee relationship. The kind of argument that they will make is that that's the best relationship for the employees. That's always the argument they're going to make. I'm not saying it's always a bad relationship, but it's not always the best relationship. The thing they want is to be able to force the employer to do things like report the W-2s and make the withholdings on the employee's behalf. That's obviously easier from the IRS's perspective than to have a bunch of individual contractors who they don't have as much leverage over because they're smaller type of businesses and so on. That's why they don't like gig works oftentimes. That's why they're not always liking cash-based businesses, salons, restaurants, and that kind of stuff. So in any case, use same employer identification number on all forms. Employers need to make sure the employer identification number, otherwise known as the EIN, on their wage and tax statements, that's the form W-2, W-3, et cetera, and their payroll tax returns, that's the form 941-943-944, et cetera, match the EIN and the IRS assigned to the business. So if you have employer information, then you need an EIN. That's your employer number that they need to tie in and everything's got to match out. You're a number to the government. If you have a business, then you want a business number because you don't want to be given out your social security number. And if you have employees, you have to have the EIN number to file properly with the IRS. So do not use a social security number, an SSN or individual taxpayer identification number, I-10, on forms that ask for an EIN. So the 941-943 and so on, 940, you can't really generally use your social security number there. You have to file for an EIN number generally, which is fairly easy process to do. Do not truncate the employer's EIN or the employee's social security number, SSN, on any of the forms. So you want to have the whole number on there because the IRS needs to know who they are so they can go after them. So if an employer used an EIN, including a prior owner's EIN on their payroll tax returns, that's different from the EIN reported on their W-3, they would review general instructions for forms W-2 and W-3, specific instructions for form W-3, box H, other EIN used this year. Filing wage and tax statements and payroll tax returns with inconsistent EINs or using another business's EIN may result in penalties and delays in processing and employer's returns. Even if an employer uses a third party payer, such as a certified professional employer organization, professional employer organization, or other third party, or a different entity within their business to file these documents, the name and EIN on all statements and forms filed must be consistent and exactly match the EIN the IRS assigned to their business. For more information on third party arrangements, you can see Publication 15. It's in Circular E, Employer's Tax Guide. Extensions. Employers may request a 30-day extension to file form W-2 with the Social Security Administration by submitting a Form 8809 application for extension of time to file information returns. You can do that by January 31st. However, they must meet one of the criteria on line 7 of Form 8809 to be granted an extension. For detailed information, you can see Form 8809 and general instructions for forms W-2 and W-3. There's a link to that here. Filing form 8809 does not extend the due date for furnishing wage statements to employees. Filing a separate extension of time to furnish forms W-2 to employees must occur by January 31st. Detailed information and instructions on how to file an extension of time to furnish forms W-2 to employees in the general instructions for Form W-2 and W-3. Electronic filing. The IRS and Social Security Administration, the SSA encourages all employers to e-file. It is the quickest, most accurate and convenient way to file these forms. Once again, they're pushing the e-file so all those thousands of new employees they got with all that money from the Inflation Reduction Act, which was an act that spent a whole lot of money, it seems like. They can just kick it and watch the money roll in and the forms get processed automatically in the machine system. E-filing is mandatory if an employer is filing 250 or more information returns. For more information about e-filing form W-2, you can visit SSA's business service online and employer W-2 filing instructions and information. There's links to that stuff here. There's links to this in the description.