Your EA Advantage
You do not have to face the IRS alone.
As an IRS Enrolled Agent, Glenn Sarver has unlimited practice rights to represent taxpayers before the IRS. From notices and audits through to tax resolution and payment plans, he steps in so you can get clarity and a path forward.
An Enrolled Agent is licensed by the United States Treasury and holds unlimited practice rights before the IRS — the same scope of representation as a CPA or an attorney for tax matters, valid in every state. It is the highest credential the IRS itself awards, and it is earned by examination on tax law rather than by accounting or legal training generally.
Practically, it means that with a signed Form 2848 power of attorney on file, Glenn talks to the IRS instead of you. He can pull your transcripts, respond to notices, negotiate with a revenue officer, and represent you through an audit and its appeal. You do not have to sit on hold, and you do not have to say anything to the IRS yourself.
Not every IRS letter is an audit, and treating them all the same wastes the difference. A CP2000 is an automated underreporter notice — a computer matched a third-party document against your return and found a discrepancy. It is a proposal, not a bill, and not an examination. It can very often be answered with a document and an explanation.
A statutory Notice of Deficiency is a different order of seriousness. It carries a hard deadline to petition the United States Tax Court, and unlike most IRS deadlines that one cannot be extended. Miss it and the assessment becomes final. Collection notices escalate in a predictable sequence, and contact from a revenue officer means the case has moved out of automated processing and into the hands of a person.
The code in the corner of the letter and the date beside it tell you which of these you are holding. That is the first five minutes of any consultation here.
An installment agreement spreads the liability over time and stops the escalation while it is in place. It is the most common resolution and the most straightforward to obtain, and for many people it is simply the right answer.
An Offer in Compromise settles a liability for less than the full amount, but only where the financial position genuinely supports it — the IRS looks at income, expenses, and the equity in what you own to work out what it could reasonably collect. It is worth being blunt here, because the industry is not: most offers submitted are rejected, and the advertising that promises to settle any debt for a fraction of it is selling something other than tax help. Where an offer does fit, it is a powerful outcome, and it is worth evaluating properly rather than either assuming or dismissing.
Currently Not Collectible status suspends collection when paying anything would leave you unable to meet basic living expenses. The debt does not disappear and interest continues, but the levies and the letters stop while the status holds.
Penalties frequently make up a substantial share of a balance, and they are the part most open to challenge. First-time abatement is available to taxpayers whose compliance history is otherwise clean, and it is routinely left unclaimed simply because nobody asked for it.
Beyond that, reasonable cause relief covers circumstances that genuinely prevented compliance — serious illness, a death in the family, records destroyed, reliance on bad professional advice. It requires a documented argument rather than a request, which is precisely the sort of thing worth having someone build for you.
A Notice of Federal Tax Lien is a public filing that attaches to your property and follows it. There are established routes to have one withdrawn, discharged from a particular asset, or subordinated so that refinancing becomes possible — each with its own conditions.
A tax levy is different: it takes. Wage garnishment continues each pay period until the liability is satisfied or the levy is released, and a bank levy freezes funds on the day it lands. Releases are obtainable, particularly where the levy creates genuine hardship or where a resolution is being put in place, but they are time-sensitive in a way that almost nothing else in tax is. This is the situation where calling the same day matters.
When returns go unfiled long enough, the IRS may prepare a substitute for return on your behalf. It uses the income reported to it and allows essentially none of the deductions, credits, or filing status advantages you would have been entitled to — so the resulting balance is very often substantially higher than what you actually owe.
Filing the genuine returns for those years typically reduces the liability, sometimes dramatically. It also restores you to compliance, which is a precondition for nearly every resolution option above. Unfiled years feel worse from the inside than they usually are on paper.
Unpaid payroll taxes are not treated like other business debt, because part of what the employer holds back was never the employer's money — it was withheld from employees on the government's behalf. The Trust Fund Recovery Penalty can make that portion personally assessable against the owners, officers or bookkeepers deemed responsible, and an entity structure does not shield it.
If a business is behind on Form 941 deposits, this is the item to address before any other, and it is a bad one to wait on.
Signing a joint return makes both spouses liable for all of it, including tax arising from income or errors that were entirely the other person's. Innocent spouse relief exists for exactly that situation, along with separation of liability and equitable relief for cases that do not fit the first test.
These claims turn on the specific facts — what you knew, what you benefited from, what has happened since — and they are worth pursuing where the facts support them.
Anyone dealing with an IRS notice, audit, back taxes, or unresolved tax debt who wants licensed, experienced representation.
No. A CP2000 is an automated underreporter notice generated when third-party information such as a 1099 or W-2 does not match what was reported on the return. It proposes a change rather than assessing one, and it is not an examination. Many are resolved by supplying a document and an explanation, and some are simply wrong.
Sometimes, through an Offer in Compromise, but only where your financial position genuinely supports it. The IRS assesses income, allowable expenses and asset equity to determine what it could reasonably collect. Most offers submitted are rejected, and anyone promising to settle any debt for a fraction of it regardless of circumstances is not describing how the programme works. It is worth an honest evaluation either way.
Releases are obtainable, particularly where the levy causes genuine hardship or where a resolution such as an installment agreement or Currently Not Collectible status is being put in place. These are unusually time-sensitive — a bank levy freezes funds immediately and a wage levy repeats each pay period — so this is a same-day phone call rather than a next-week one.
Unfiled years are worked through in order, usually beginning with IRS transcripts to establish what has already been reported. Where the IRS has filed a substitute return for you, it allowed no deductions or credits, so filing the real return commonly reduces the balance considerably. Getting current is also a precondition for most resolution options.
No. With a signed Form 2848 power of attorney, an Enrolled Agent communicates with the IRS on your behalf — requesting transcripts, responding to notices, dealing with a revenue officer, and representing you through an audit. You are not required to be on the call.
Often more than about the tax itself. First-time abatement is available where compliance history is otherwise clean and goes unclaimed surprisingly often. Reasonable cause relief covers circumstances that genuinely prevented compliance, such as serious illness, bereavement or destroyed records, and requires a documented argument.
Do not respond alone. Bring the notice to a free consultation with a licensed Enrolled Agent.