Ezel / IRS Rulings / 200851110

CCA 200851110: Prove the power of attorney before treating a request as the partner's

Number
200851110
Outcome
Advice
Document type
Chief Counsel Advice
IRS subject
Notice to Partners of Proceedings
Topics
Procedure, penalties, and administration
Code sections
§ 6223
Ruling dated
September 3, 2008
Publicly released
December 19, 2008
Source
View Official PDF

Apply this to your situation

This page covers legal advice the IRS Office of Chief Counsel wrote for IRS staff, issued in 2008, which can't be cited as precedent. Ask about your situation and see what the current Code and IRS guidance say, with citations.

Currency note: this determination was released in 2008
Statutory amendments, regulation changes, court decisions, or later IRS guidance may have changed the analysis since then. Treat this page as historical context, not current tax advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, threshold, or position mentioned here.
Not precedent. Under 26 U.S.C. § 6110(k)(3), this written determination may not be used or cited as precedent. It is advice from the IRS Office of Chief Counsel to IRS personnel on the facts they presented, and identifying details were redacted by the IRS before release. The official IRS release (linked on this page as a PDF) is the authoritative source.
About this page: The plain-English summary and ruling snapshot below were written by Ezel based on the official IRS release. The full text is the IRS's own document.
View official IRS release (PDF)

Plain-English summary

This is a three-sentence email, and the whole of it is one point about who is asking.

Under the partnership audit rules of that era, a partner could ask the Service for a copy of the final partnership administrative adjustment notice issued to the tax matters partner. Someone had made that request on a partner's behalf, holding a power of attorney. The question raised was whether the Service could simply act on it.

The answer given is that if the power of attorney has no authority to act for the partner in this matter, then the partner has not in fact requested anything. A representative without authority is not the partner speaking; it is a third party asking for another taxpayer's information. That is why the Service was asking the partner to supply proof that the purported representative actually had authority to make the request.

The practical shape of the advice is worth noting. The Service is not asking the representative to prove its own authority, which would be circular. It is asking the partner. Only the partner can confirm that the person holding the document speaks for them.

This is a clean digital release rather than a scan, so no OCR correction was needed. The document is an internal email; the sender, recipients and office are redacted, and the subject line "RE: POA" indicates it is a reply in a longer exchange that is not part of the release.

Ruling snapshot

  • Question: May the Service act on a request for the tax matters partner's FPAA made by someone holding a power of attorney whose authority for that matter is unconfirmed?
  • Outcome: Advice given. If the power of attorney carries no authority to act for the partner in the matter, the partner has not made the request, and the Service may ask the partner to establish that the purported representative has authority to make it.
  • Key authorities: IRC section 6223.

Full text (IRS public release)

ID: CCA-931454-08 Number: 200851110
Office: -------------- Release Date: 12/19/2008

UILC: 6223.00-00

From: -------------------
Sent: Wed 9/3/2008 2:54 PM
To: -----------------
Cc: ------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: RE: POA

If the POA has no authority to act for the partner in this matter, the partner has not in fact requested the
information from the IRS. The information that we are asking the partner to provide is that the purported
POA in fact has authority to make the request for the TMP FPAA.

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