Overview
AICPA Requests Delay to Partnership Audit Regime: In a letter addressed to the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate Committee on Finance and the House Committee on Ways & Means, the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) requested that Congress enact enabling legislation to delay the effective date of the new centralized partnership audit regime for one year until December 31, 2018. Under the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, the new regime generally goes into effect for tax years beginning after December 31, 2017.
Although Treasury and the IRS have issued several sets of regulations implementing the new regime, the AICPA notes that many of these regulations have not been finalized and contain significant gaps. Further, the recent passage of the tax reform bill signed into law on December 22 will require Treasury and the IRS to redirect significant levels of resources to providing taxpayers with guidance on the substantial changes to the Code, negatively impacting the ability of the agencies to issue guidance under the new centralized partnership audit regime. Because of these issues, the AICPA argues that Congress should delay the effective date of the new regime and authorize the IRS to continue to audit partnerships under the existing TEFRA regime during the delay period.