Money Magazine

Joyce Rebhun, The Tax Therapist Will See You Now

Her clients call Joyce Rebhun a “tax therapist.” While the title might sound as though it belongs to a kooky new character on L.A. Law, Rebhun, a 45-year-old Los Angeles tax attorney and C.P.A., is deadly serious. A former Internal Revenue Service auditor, she has since 1985 assisted more than 3,000 clients who failed to pay their taxes because of personal crises such as drug or alcohol.

Rebhun works to cut deals with the IRS.

dependency, medical catastrophes and emotional traumas. “The terror of the IRS becomes a terrible block to putting their lives together,” Rebhun maintains. Her mission: convincing IRS agents to either lower her clients’ tax penalties, abate them or negotiate a payment plan. Her cost: $2,500 for a typical client billed at $250 an hour.

Rebhun says she has had some impressive successes. For example, in the spring of 1988 she persuaded the IRS to drop $19,130 in late-filing and late-payment penalties for a cystic fibrosis patient whose C.P.A. failed to file his tax returns during his two years of on-and-off hospitalization.

A reformed problem drinker, Rebhun has spent much of her time lately trying to get penalty abatements for drug and alcohol abusers. “I tell my clients,” she says, “your sickness is not forever, and your tax problem can be interim too.” She explains that recovering addicts and alcoholics who can prove to the IRS that they lost control of their lives are prime candidates for abatements. Some examples that would bolster a case: an unraveled marriage, a job loss, or a repossessed car.

Somewhat surprisingly, the IRS applauds Rebhun’s efforts. Says Steven Pyrek, an IRS public affairs officer in Washington, D.C.: “If this tax therapist is bringing taxpayers back on the rolls, there’s some good in that-this country is getting the money it’s owed.”

You don’t necessarily need a therapist to handle a tax delinquency, however. If you can document your crisis with letters from physicians, write to your regional IRS service center (the local address is in your 1040 booklet) and ask for a penalty abatement for humanitarian reasons.

- Laura Meyers – November 1989