CHAPTER 48If the IRS Examines Your Return
Because the IRS is only able to examine a very low percentage of returns, it follows a policy of examining returns which, upon preliminary inspection, indicate the largest possible source of potential tax deficiency. Various weights are assigned to separate items on each tax return, thus permitting the ranking of returns for the greatest potential error.
This chapter discusses what may trigger an audit and how you can handle an audit if your return is selected for examination.
Also discussed in this chapter are various penalties the IRS can assess if you file an inaccurate return, and the penalties for not reporting your foreign financial accounts.
48.1 Odds of Being Audited
The odds are quite low that your return will be picked for an audit. The IRS 2021 Data Book for its 2021 fiscal year (October 2020 through September 2021) does not give statistics for 2021 (2019 audit rates are the most recent, when the overall audit rate for ...
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