A A taxing time of year By Josh Mullins CPA Arledge & Associates Q: Will the federal govern- ment shutdown delay my abil- Ity to file my federal tax return or claim and receive a refund? A: The IRS announced it will begin accepting both paper and electronically filed tax re- turns on Monday, Jan. 28, 2019. The agency said it intends to issue tax refunds as well. Q: What documents willl | need to prepare my tax returns? A: You can expect to start seeing W-2s from your employer, 1099s from your bank, brokerage firms, mortgage company, the state of Oklahoma if you received a refund from last year's taxes, county for property taxes and even credit card summary statements for the year. All these things are helpful or necessary when preparing your tax return. This is not an all-inclusive list but should help you keep an eye out for impor- tant documents. Q: | receive a lot of my tax Infor- mation In digital format now. Should | print that out to take It to my take preparer? A: Unless your tax preparers or CPA firm requests paper documents | suggest providing them with digital documents. Don't go to the trouble and expense of printing everything out. Q: If | am going to have someone do my tax return for me this year, what information will they need to Prepare my return? A: Keep in mind that your CPA firm or tax preparer doesn't know everything about you the first time you have them prepare your taxes. You will need to provide your prior year tax return, your family members’ full names, dates of birth and social security numbers, all the information you would use to prepare your tax re- turn and that we discussed in an ear- lier question, and your address. If you bought and/or sold a home, you will need to provide the buy/sell closing statements. If you Py have a business, you will need to discuss the entity type with your tax advisor and provide a balance sheet and profit/loss statement. Again, this is not a compre- hensive list but should help you show up prepared for your first visit with your tax professional. Q: Any other quick points we should know about? A: We had a significant new tax law passed that applies to the 2018 tax year. For those filing with a status of Married Filing Joint, the standard deduction increased from $12,700 in 2017 to $24,000 in 2018. Fora number of people, this will mean no longer choosing to itemize deduc- tions on your tax return. If you item- ize deductions on your tax return, your deduction for combined state taxes and property taxes will be capped at $10,000. This is a signifi- cant change for those of us who live in states, like Oklahoma, with both income and property taxes. Also, the personal exemptions that were $4,050 per person in 2017 are no longer available in 2018. Josh Mullins, CPA, is a partner at Arledge and Associates, PC, an Ed- mond-based accounting firm. Arledge and Associates, PC is a recognized leader in the accounting industry of- fering practical solutions in the areas of tax planning, auditing, consulting, accounting advisory services and client accounting. This article contains general infor- mation only and does not constitute tax advice or any other professional services. Before making any decisions or taking any action that might affect your income taxes, you should con- sult a professional tax advisor. This article is not intended for and cannot be used to avoid future penalties that may be imposed by the Internal Rev- enue Service.