Supports Taxpayer Confidentiality Legislation

The survey about confidentiality legislation for CPAs, “Taxpayers Want Confidentiality” (JofA, July98, page 56), prepared by the National Taxpayers Union, neatly summarizes what all of us instinctively know about the privacy that individuals and companies want and deserve regarding financial affairs and tax planning.

Query: If confidentiality is paramount to 72% of the clients of the CPA firms surveyed, what would these clients say about a state board of accountancy’s “fishing expeditions” through unrelated client tax files, looking for negligent tax advice or situations “where a CPA is in collusion with clients to avoid taxes”—as one board argued, in a recent state supreme court case, was its right.

Even the AICPA peer review process that might see documentation of tax advice as part of tax accrual workpapers could conceivably pose the same question.

Frank M. Zaveral, CPA
Denver