e-Weekly

April 20, 2011

Association unveils financial counseling certification course
On May 2, the Association and REAL Solutions® will host a free webinar to introduce the FiCEP Credit Union Financial Counselor Certification Program. The hour long webinar will begin at 10:00 a.m. and outline the purpose, content, timing, and cost of this important new educational opportunity. The course will feature webinars and in-person learning sessions. Participants who successfully complete the eight modules and pass the proctored examinations will receive professional certification as Credit Union Financial Counselors.

“We’re very excited to be able to offer this course,” said Rob Kimmett, Association SVP Marketing. “Credit unions are doing everything they can to help their members confront the challenges that this economy is throwing at them. But the problems are complex and consumers are anxious. FiCEP gives credit unions the new and sophisticated tools needed to address these concerns.”

Click here to register for this free webinar.
 

Reminder – Form 990 and Form 990-T deadline approaching
Your credit union may be eligible for an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) credit. Certain eligible credit unions may be entitled to file for a tax credit with the IRS. Included in the Affordable Health Care Act, enacted in March 2010, the small business health care tax credit is designed to encourage small businesses and small tax-exempt organizations (including credit unions) to offer health insurance coverage to their employees or maintain coverage they already have.

The credit is available to small employers that pay at least half of the premiums for single health insurance coverage for their employees. The credit union must have no more than 25 full-time equivalent employees who earn, on average, less than $50,000 per year. The credit can be high as 25% of premiums paid by the credit union.

The credit is claimed on the revised form 990-T. The credit can be claimed even if the credit union has no unrelated business income.

The filing deadline for submitting Form 990 and Form 990-T is the 15th day of the fifth month after the end of the credit union’s tax year. For the 2010 tax year, the filing deadline is Monday, May 16th. An automatic 6-month extension of the filing deadline can be obtained by using Form 8868.

The Audit Department of New England Credit Union Services, LLC is available to assist your credit union with this filing. Please contact Kathy Enderlin at kenderlin@cucenter.org or 800-842-1242 to discuss the credit in greater detail.

President signs 1099 extension repeal
On April 14, President Barack Obama signed into law legislation that repeals an extension of Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Form 1099 reporting requirements that was approved last year.

The extension, which was approved as a "pay-go" effort to offset the cost to taxpayers of the new healthcare reform law, would have extended existing 1099-MISC reporting provisions to cover payments for goods valued over $600.

Credit unions and other businesses have long been required to report on their Form 1099-MISC certain payments of $600 or more that will be considered income by the IRS.

The Credit Union National Association has backed the repeal, noting that requiring 1099-MISC forms on goods would have been extremely burdensome and had questionable value in actually increasing federal revenue.

Representative Dave Camp (R-MI), who sponsored an early version of the bill, estimated that the tax law change would save taxpayers $20 billion over a 10-year span and would reduce the deficit by more than $166 million over that same time period.