The Treasury and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) produce an annual plan “that focuses resources on guidance items that are most important to taxpayers and tax administration”.
As is customary, the plan will be updated during the year as other items become priorities and guidance is published.
The priorities for tax accounting guidance cover regulations such as those regarding:
· procedures for adopting or changing methods of accounting for research and experimental expenditures;
· sales-based royalties and sales-based vendor allowances;
· procedures and rules for non-automatic changes in method of accounting;
· the treatment of vendor allowances under the retail inventory method;
· the application of the lookback interest rules to certain pass-through entities with tax-exempt owners; and
· the inventory price index computation (IPIC) method.
“The 2012–2013 Priority Guidance Plan contains 317 projects that are priorities for allocation of the resources of our offices during the twelve-month period from July 2012 through June 2013,” said a joint statement from Mark Mazur, the Treasury Assistant Secretary (Tax Policy), Steven Miller, Acting Commissioner of the IRS and William Wilkins, Chief Counsel of the IRS.