The IRS is slowly modernizing. Some concern has arisen in SWE sections about new requirements for non-profit tax reporting in the USA. The IRS has selected a third party vendor to verify folks filing taxes with Form 990. Now that all filings of Form 990 are electronic, only the folks that had a login set up prior to the switch were allowed to circumvent the new verification process. With increased scrutiny for non-profits, the IRS wants to know who is submitting the section taxes.
So what happens with the upcoming officer transitions? Is there going to be someone new reporting section taxes to the IRS? The selected third party vendor has been verifying individuals identity, and otherwise has a self service option at time of Form 990 filing. There is expected to be no transition within the third party vendor software within the same email. This was some concern amongst section officers filing during the start up of the required electronic filings.
It’s been nerve-wracking for some individuals concerned about another officer that they may not know having access to their identifying document (ID) that they uploaded. The current ID vendor has stated that an email should not be used for a different identity verification. Although it’s still good practice to have a generic email address for folks to reach out to section officers, each individual shall have their own ID verification email unique to only them (or use the self service option). Remember that being a non-profit educational organization as a SWE section doesn’t typically help fund the IRS, so there’s really no incentive to make it easy for us.
The SWE Finance Committee is a standing committee dedicated to fiscal interests within SWE. If SWE finance questions arise, please email the SWE Finance Committee at financecommittee@swe.org or visit us during our office hours. Office hours are generally held monthly and at Annual Conference. The Executive Council does not have to go it alone with our SWE annual fiscal process.
