The Roles and Functions of Tax Practitioners

The tax practitioner in any part of the country are the people who deal in taxes, the tax laws, their application and their settlements. Usually when we see the tax practioner who automatically draw a conclusion that the said person deals in taxes, but the fact is often neglected that sphere of taxes that they must work in. Here in the discussion which follows one has tried to categorize the work that is done by the tax payers, and how two major roles that they play, one for being the tax advocates of the people, or individuals in general and that one being the tax law upholder is balanced or need balancing or that they might or might not contradict one another. It is for the same purpose that one has discussed who exactly is a tax payer, what could be his roles and responsibility and how they can be facing challenges which they try to balance these two major roles which has been mentioned above.

Like the name of the profession suggests, tax practitioner are people who deal and work with taxes. When one talks about taxes one should have a very clear idea that practicing tax includes lot of work, which could be for individual, or government, companies or units. They have dual roles to play which might contradict each other, and therefore it becomes important to analyze their roles as whole (Tran-Nam, 2016).

One understands that tax practitioner are people who investigate the work which is related to taxes in the country. They assist the people to pay taxes which means they make people comply with the obligations set out by the laws regarding the taxes, thus playing the individual tax advocate. One has noticed that over the period the number of tax Practitioners in the country has increased, which means that more individual now would like to seek advice from the tax practitioner and need their assistance for fulfilling their respective obligations.

The discussion about the main functions of the tax practioner is not exactly exhaustive. If one was to categorize the same one would say that the that the main services which are to be provided by the tax practitioners includes the education of their clients about the methods and preparations which are required so that their tax returns can be filed and that the tax related documents can be maintained, they have to assist their clients, whosoever it should be in providing for any kind of advice specially the ones which are involved in some or the other kind of risk and lastly they should have the capacity to represent their clients in case there is any kind of a dispute related to the tax.

Balancing the Dual Roles

Like mentioned the main problem that they face is balancing the dual role, and when research and observance is conducted in the same, the roles can be defined by the markets that the practice in which has been later discussed as well, and this division of their services also helps them in categorization their roles, which is an indication as well that they should adhere to only one side. The categories which seek advice could range from the high-income tax payers to tax absconders, to other professional, and this would further differ from market to market and sub-market, because then they would also include the small service providers along with the big ones and the services that they require from the provisional individual is way different (Shafer, 2011).

The structure of the market, it being a monopoly, oligopoly or others also affect the way the tax Practitioner would carry out their work. This also indicates that the advice which is provided by the practitioner to the individual or the unit or the company is not always true to the legislation which have been formed over the period, and that is that was the case the black market would not have been running so something.

The individuals tend to depend so heavily on the advice of the tax payers because the application of laws and the tax related legislation correctly would help the individuals to file accurate returns and help them in maintaining their files related to taxes in the right manner. The tax practitioner are people who include people to comply with the tax related legislation and thus can also be said that they are people upholding the laws which are related to tax. Therefore, on hand one can say that there are situations which lets them play both the roles at the same time and then there are the ones which makes it difficult for them to balance the two.

Tax practitioner are people who have who work along the lines of the tax related legislation and as not people who can be called accountants. They have answers to all the tax questions, and in Australia they require special licensing and requirements, like passing certain exams and practicing under a senior and so on. Like mentioned the responsibilities and the roles of a tax payer would differ depending upon the sector in which they are practicing and on the unit in which they are working. When working for the individuals their main function after they get the required certificate and the recognition is that they provide advice to the individuals, regarding payment of their taxes keeping in mind the background of the individuals, the work that they do and also file the returns and reports based on the same, but many a times when a tax practitioner works as a public accountant, he mainly works from the side of the government, where he truly can be claimed to be the upholder of the tax laws, because the government units mostly check the payments of individuals and companies in the light of law, making the tax practitioner people who uphold the law and work accordingly (Pickhardt and Prinz, 2014). Either of the work which is done by the tax payer is done in a manner that they stick to their jurisdiction and the legal framework, and that is almost the basic reason why the individual clients engage the tax payers, for the legal accuracy and the apt returns. The practitioner provides for information and the advice at the given point of time to the individual regarding their taxes and their returns and they are even Authorized to be representing individual clients (or others) in case their compliance is under in investigation of the tax authority. It must be mentioned that the tax authority one is talking about, are a group of tax practitioner themselves, who have certain additional qualifications and if not, they simply have the experiences to be working as an authoritativeness power.

Challenges Faced by Tax Practitioners

The reason why the tax practitioners’ roles with the individual and with the government units are being mentioned and discussed is so that the differences can be spotted and at the same time, these differences are what could be looked at as challenger which the tax practitioners could be facing when trying to balance the above mentioned (Stuebs and Wilkinson, 2010).

Tax practitioner investigate the working of the taxes from either of the sides and the role that they play depends on who they are working for. There as instances when the tax practitioner who is working for the individual can also be called an upholder of law because by providing the right kind of advice and by doing that they are helping the said individuals to comply by the obligations which has been laid down by the legislation, thus making them the upholder of laws as well.

From the discussion that has been given above, one could state that the tax payers can play both the roles not only simultaneously but also with ease keeping in mind the instances where compliance by an Individual would also mean upholding the laws which have been made in the same context.

Nevertheless, keeping aside such practitioner that tax practitioners can be said to be facing challenges when they must balance the roles in situations where the same does not coincide.

There are times when the tax practitioner is hired to be working for an individual, his taxes and returns and at the same time the client that he has, has certain requirements, like being able to present the tax books to the government in a certain manner, and this work can be only done by a tax practitioner. At times like this the tax practitioner might have to use his skill and knowledge and the experience which he has earned over the period to listen to his client’s instructions and present the tax book in the desired manner. At times like these the main concern for the tax practitioner becomes listening to the client and presenting the book in the required manner than thoroughly uploading the laws regarding the same. The tax practitioner in this case is the processional working for the individual and not someone who upholds the law in the truest sense though by the degree he has, and the legal obligations which has been conferred by him by his qualifications expect him to be the upholder of the law even when advising. Thus, the obligation towards the legal authority giving the practitioner the degree clashes with the obligation that the practitioner owes to the client then (Tan, 2016).

Conclusion

The main problem when it comes to balancing such a dual role which has been mentioned above, is the ethics, because between fulfilling the work for the individual client and presenting oneself as the upholder for law, there are ethical dilemmas which the practitioner tends to face. In a country like Australia one tends to find that the roles of the practitioner are rather expanded which might be one of the reasons why such people would face more dilemmas than required. These practitioner face moral and ethical issues as they tend to have moral and professional dilemma towards the client and at the same time they must evaluate the nature and the extent of the ethical concerns which exists from the right of the law makers (Hearson, 2014). In Australia the dilemma or the balancing g problem amongst the practitioner can be varied, having implications for the administration of the taxes as well as it as a profession.

It is often seen to prevent such a dilemma to exist, there are authorities (Doyle, 2013) which have been made which cottager the working of such practitioners, like the body of the tax practitioner in referral is regarded as one big group, but at the same time they are participation into broad bodies, one group looking into one sector and the other into another. It has also been noticed that the Practice which one group undertook was almost the same as the other, with only a little significant differences which conveniently gives rise to dilemma amongst the group as well, but one cannot at the same time deny that such categorization literally help the tax [practitioner to choose a way of work and not feel any moral guilt if the same is not complied and that they have chosen a path in the way of their profession and that they should concentrate on the same (Frecknall-Hughes and Moizer, 2015).

Conclusion

One needs to understand that the profession of a tax practice is a very well expanded and divided one. Therefore, the only way to balance of the dual role that a practitioner would have to play, would be by way of categorization, dividing the bandwagon of the practioner as per their experience and qualification in their respective sectors so that the focus of the individual as a practitioner is one thing. Therefore, when such practitioner is working for the individuals they should concentrate on the requirements of the individual and why and what he wants to do with his returns and the and the procedures should be followed to get maximum returns. There is nothing wrong in concentrating on what the clients required even if the same is not word to word correct in the legislation which is being referred to in this case (Becker, 2015).

At the same time the practitioners who have been assigned the job of working with individualizes in government state or have been given the chance to form unions or besides or authorities who would work to see whether the former category of the and its rules have been complied with or not, and these set of practitioners generally could be held as people who are upholding the taxation laws for the country.

Thus, the challenges which would have been there if the practices of the practicing were not even divided would include:

Playing dual role of a professional for an individual, and the one upholding the rule of law, simultaneously.

Ethical issues like it has been mentioned and discussed above, which often puts the practioner in a position where he cannot rightfully choose which side of the role he should be playing.

Conflict of interest depending on what kind of a practitioner the tax practitioner is and what kind of services are to be required from them by clients or units that they are working for (Fogarty and Jones, 2014).

References

Becker, J., Reimer, E. and Rust, A., 2015. Klaus Vogel on Double Taxation Conventions. Kluwer Law International.

Doyle, E., Hughes, J.F. and Summers, B., 2013. An empirical analysis of the ethical reasoning of tax practitioners. Journal of Business Ethics, 114(2), pp.325-339.

Frecknall-Hughes, J. and Moizer, P., 2015. Assessing the quality of services provided by UK tax practitioners. eJournal of Tax Research, 13(1).

Fogarty, T. and A. Jones, D., 2014. Between a rock and a hard place: How tax practitioners straddle client advocacy and professional responsibilities. Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management, 11(4), pp.286-316.

Hearson, M., 2014. Tax-motivated illicit financial flows: A guide for development practitioners. U4 Issue.

Tran-Nam, B., Lignier, P. and Evans, C., 2016. The impact of recent tax changes on tax complexity and compliance costs: The tax practitioners’ perspective. Austl. Tax F., 31, p.455.

Shafer, W.E. and Simmons, R.S., 2011. Effects of organizational ethical culture on the ethical decisions of tax practitioners in mainland China. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 24(5), pp.647-668.

Pickhardt, M. and Prinz, A., 2014. Behavioral dynamics of tax evasion–A survey. Journal of Economic Psychology, 40, pp.1-19.

Stuebs, M. and Wilkinson, B., 2010. Ethics and the tax profession: Restoring the public interest focus. Accounting and the Public Interest, 10(1), pp.13-35.

Tan, L.M., Braithwaite, V. and Reinhart, M., 2016. Why do small business taxpayers stay with their practitioners? Trust, competence and aggressive advice. International Small Business Journal, 34(3), pp.329-344.