tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6318055043707993918.post7522806000507317132..comments2024-02-20T02:12:18.090-05:00Comments on THE WANDERING TAX PRO: A LITTLE THIS-A AND A LITTLE THAT-A – WITH THE EMPHASIS ON THE LATTARobert D Flachhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06034127763662917220noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6318055043707993918.post-4139580732648361282009-05-02T19:43:00.000-04:002009-05-02T19:43:00.000-04:00"I do share my client’s curiosity about why the le..."I do share my client’s curiosity about why the letter was opened in the first place by the company who received it in error."<br /><br />Many companies that handle significant volumes of routine mail have automatic letter openers that open all their mail.<br /><br />Expecting a company to hire an employee to manually screen the addresses on all its mail before it is fed into the automatic opener, in case the PO screwed up and misdelivered a piece of mail, is an unreasonable burden to impose.<br /><br />Some lockbox services are simultaneously processing large volumes of mail that are addressed to many different addresses, so checking the address on every envelope to verify that it is one of the addresses that they handle before feeding it into the machine could really be time-consuming.<br /><br />As long as the company did not knowingly and intentionally open mail addressed to it, it seems to me that they will not and should not be prosecuted.<br /><br />The fact that they took the time and trouble to return the mail to the sender, along with a note, is an indication to me of their good will and good intentions. <br /><br />Since there was no tax due, the boy is not going to face any penalty for the late arrival of his return, and it seems to me that he's better off being notified that it DID fall into the wrong hands rather than if the company had simply handed it directly back to the PO.<br /><br />(If they'd just resealed the envelope and forwarded it directly the IRS, the boy would never have known that his information had been compromised and that he might want to be especially vigilant about monitoring his credit record.)Mary O'Keeffehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14662977706706048151noreply@blogger.com