irsonlinerefundformfornoncitizens.com

[Arthur Rubin]

I'm not sure which category to put this one. Last month, I received an E-mail from this fine organization, purporting to have a form to exempt one from income tax. The text of the E-mail reads:

Subject: Tax Exempt Notification!!

Sir/Madam,

Our records indicate that you are a Non-resident. As a result you are exempted from United States of America Tax reporting and withholdings on interest paid to you on your account and other financial benefits. To protect your exemption from tax on your account and other financial benefits, you need to recertify your exemption status and enable us confirm your records with us.

Therefore, you are to authenticate the following by completing Form W-4100B2 and return to us as soon as possible through fax number no +1- 858-xxx-xxxx.
You can find the full phone number elsewhere on the web.

When completing the Form W-4100B2, please follow the steps below:
1. We need you to provide your permanent address if different from the current mailing address.
2. You must indicate as a Non-US resident, the country you are residing, to support your non-resident status and if your bank or other financial institutions you are dealing with has a US address for mailing purposes.
3. If any joint account holder is now a US resident or citizen, or in any way subject to US tax reporting laws: please check the box in this section.
4. Please complete 1 through 19 and have all account holder/s (if more than one account holder) sign and date the form separately and fax to the above-mentioned fax numbers.

Please complete Form W-4100B2 (attached) and return to us with one week from the receipt of this letter by faxing it, to enable us confirm your records immediately.

If your records are not confirmed on time, you will lose your Non-resident status tax exempt benefits and your account or any other financial benefits will be subject to US tax reporting and back up withholding*

*If back up withholding applies, we are required to withhold 30% of the interest/benefits paid to you.

We appreciate your cooperation in helping us protect your exempt status and also confirm our records.

Sincerely,

Margaret Dunn,
IRS Public Relations.

The form, in addition to some spaces for information related to tax protestor arguments, has spaces for bank account number (and date opened), debit card number (and date issued, expiration date, and "Reverse Side Debit Credit Card"), birth date, and US social security number.

I'm not sure whether this belongs in TP, Nigeria, or another scam area of this board.

The phone number, by the way, appears to belong to a land-line in La Jolla, CA.

[Cathulhu]

IRS has repeatedly publicized that it NEVER contacts people about their tax accounts online. The only email program exchange they even have is the ETLA (Electronic Tax Law Assistance) program where you may submit a tax law question online and get a written reply. (It's buried, deliberately, in the menu online at irs.gov.) The account questions frequently submitted by idiots who didn't read the repeated statements that they don't accept account questions, only tax law, get a standard reply, ever so politely written telling them they are idiots who really shouldn't put their SSNs onto a public forum. There's actually some protection for the emails, but IRS feels it isn't enough, so account questions are told to call the hotline, and the only kind of accounts done online are simple refund questions. And on those, the filer has to contact the email, not the other way around.