Recent surveys indicate that individuals and businesses purchasing goods over the internet are not properly remitting sales or use tax, many times in violation of state law (the estimated non-compliance rate in California was greater than 98%).

Basically, 1099 reporting requirements will continue to be the same as they’ve always been. This change will significantly decrease the compliance burden small businesses were anticipating. However, this recent change does not do away with the requirement that payers obtain and retain a form W-9, Request for Taxpayer Identification Number and Certification, for all payees.

In addition to the changes made for Bonus Depreciation and 1099 reporting, several other items of interest were changed by the recent legislation for 2011 and 2012:

We would like to remind our clients of the importance of the new W-9 rules set into effect by recent tax legislation. We cannot stress enough that your attention to this new rule is crucial.

The red flags rule may actually go into affect on December 31, 2010. The Rule was originally supposed to become effective on January 1, 2008, with full compliance required by November 1, 2008. The FTC or Congress has delayed enforcing the Rule a couple of times in the last two years.

Enforcement of the rule has now been extended to December 31, 2010, while Congress considers legislation that would affect the scope of the included entities.