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delayed in making any payment of those tax liabilities on account
of an act or omission of IRS personnel. With respect to interest
occasioned by a late payment of tax, the essence of section
6404(e)(1)(B) is that the Secretary may abate that interest if,
but for some act or omission of IRS personnel in performing a
ministerial act, such payment probably would have been made
sooner. If, notwithstanding that act or omission, no earlier
payment would have been made, then no abatement is called for.
We have applied that principle by upholding the Secretary’s
discretion not to abate interest where the taxpayer failed to
establish that he had the financial resources to satisfy the tax
liability when the claimed error occurred. See Harbaugh v.
Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2003-316; Spurgin v. Commissioner, T.C.
Memo. 2001-290; Hawksley v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2000-354.
Certainly, petitioners cannot claim that the IRS caused any
delay in the payments contemplated in their various offers;
petitioners could have commenced those payments at any time.4
Regarding the balance of their 1993 and 1994 tax liabilities,
petitioners have made no showing that they would have (or could
have) paid those amounts sooner if respondent had rejected their
offers sooner. Among petitioners’ proposed findings of fact are
proposed findings that they had net assets of about $20,000
4 As noted earlier, petitioners indeed made a series of
nine $500 payments in 1998 prior to submitting their final offer
in compromise.
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Last modified: May 25, 2011