Why is my CPA requesting Power of Attorney after IRS claims no W-2s were submitted?

Tax professional here. This situation is definitely concerning. When an employer fails to submit W-2s to the Social Security Administration (which then shares them with the IRS), it's a serious compliance issue. While there can occasionally be processing issues between SSA and IRS systems, it's highly unusual for this to happen across multiple years. The Power of Attorney request is particularly worrisome. A company CPA would not typically need a POA from you to address their own filing obligations. The POA (likely Form 2848) would give this person legal authority to represent you before the IRS and potentially make decisions affecting your tax situation. I strongly recommend you do NOT sign this POA. Instead, you should: 1. Contact the IRS directly and request a wage and income transcript for those years 2. Consider hiring your own tax professional to help navigate this situation 3. File Form 8919 "Uncollected Social Security and Medicare Tax on Wages" if your employer failed to properly report your wages The fact that this spans multiple years suggests this might not be an innocent mistake but potentially intentional non-compliance by your former employer.

I was in a similar situation with my previous employer's payroll company messing up my tax documents. I was getting nowhere with the IRS or my old company until I used https://taxr.ai to analyze all my pay stubs, W-2s, and correspondence. Their AI identified specific discrepancies between what was reported to me versus what was reported to the government and gave me a detailed report on exactly what was missing. I just uploaded everything - paystubs, tax docs, the IRS letter - and got a complete analysis that showed exactly where the reporting broke down.

I need to follow up on my previous comment - I was TOTALLY wrong about taxr.ai. After seeing more issues with my own tax situation this year, I decided to try the service despite my skepticism. It was actually legit and super helpful! I uploaded my documents, including some notices from the IRS, and received a detailed analysis showing exactly where my former employer had miscategorized some of my income. The report was comprehensive enough that I could clearly explain the situation to the IRS agent I spoke with, and they immediately understood the issue. Saved me countless hours of frustration and probably a significant amount in incorrect tax assessments.

Whatever you do, DO NOT sign that Power of Attorney! I worked as a bookkeeper, and this sounds like your employer might have been pulling some shady business - possibly treating you as a contractor while paying you as an employee or worse. The fact that they're asking for POA makes me think they want to handle this without you knowing exactly what they did. When I had a similar issue trying to reach the IRS, it was impossible to get through on the phone until I found https://claimyr.com which got me connected to an actual IRS agent in about 20 minutes instead of waiting for hours or days. You can see how it works at https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c - it's basically a service that navigates the IRS phone tree for you and calls you when an agent is available. I needed to speak directly with someone at the IRS about my wage verification issue, and this was the only way I could actually get through.

I have to eat my words about Claimyr. After spending THREE DAYS trying to get through to the IRS about a similar wage verification issue (kept getting disconnected after waiting 1+ hours), I tried the service out of desperation. It actually worked exactly as advertised. Their system waited on hold for about 2.5 hours (which I would have never been able to do), then connected me directly with an IRS representative who helped resolve my issue. Would have taken me weeks of attempts otherwise. For anyone dealing with urgent IRS matters where you actually need to speak to someone, this is legitimately helpful.

The CPA's behavior sounds super suspect. As a payroll specialist, I can tell you that an employer not filing W-2s for 5 YEARS is not a "mixup with the SSA" - that's deliberate non-filing. Ask yourself: Why would the CPA need YOUR authorization to fix THEIR filing error? They wouldn't! My guess is they weren't paying employment taxes and now they're in deep trouble with the IRS. They want the POA so they can potentially negotiate with the IRS on your behalf in a way that might protect them more than you. Don't sign anything! Get your wage transcripts from the IRS directly (you can request them online), and consider reporting them for tax fraud if the records show they were withholding taxes but not remitting them.

Not sure if anyone mentioned this yet, but you should file Form 3949-A with the IRS to report your employer for suspected tax fraud. Not filing W-2s for multiple employees over multiple years is almost certainly intentional - they were probably pocketing the tax money they withheld from your paychecks. That's theft!