March 20, 2020 Tax Filing Deadline & Office Update

The US Treasury department officially moved tax day from April 15 to July 15.  This was welcome news to us and other tax practitioners who are dealing with the normal stresses of tax season – now coupled with being displaced from their coworkers, offices and routines due to the COVID-19 outbreak.  While the state of Tennessee has yet to extend their filing deadlines beyond April 15, we hope and expect news of that to come very soon. We encourage everyone to contact the governor and your local state legislators and ask them to extend the tax filing deadline for all Tennesseans to July 15.

Please email our governor and your state representatives.  Here is a link to the governor’s contact info.  https://www.tn.gov/governor/contact-us.html

Here is a link to “find my legislator” that you can use to find out what district you are in and their contact info. http://wapp.capitol.tn.gov/Apps/fmlv3/districts.aspx

We want to let you all know that we’re still diligently working, but not at the crazy pace we normally would at this point in tax season. Frankly, we cannot, given the circumstances we are currently facing.

PHB will keep our office closed (we are working from home) for the foreseeable future until further updates are available from the federal and state government. We have had to modify our processes and procedures as the closure of schools, daycares and other businesses affects our community. Certainly, these factors have caused uncontrollable delays in our normal delivery of services. While we will continue to work remotely, the filing deadline extension will allow us to forego the same breakneck pace we are accustomed to this time of year.  It also allows our staff to adjust back to a normal work week and spend time with their families and loved ones during these unique times.  Practically, this means that we will not be able to meet our standard “two week” turnaround for tax return completion.  It also means that our deadline of March 25 to receive tax documents from clients for tax return completion before April 15 no longer applies.  Tax returns that we currently have will be completed as quickly as possible.

We realize that many clients need their income tax refunds more than ever, and we recognize our role in making sure those happen as soon as possible.  We remain committed to serving our clients for all of their tax and accounting needs. Please reach out to us with any specific questions you may have.

Thank you!

The Staff of Patterson, Hardee & Ballentine CPAs