Publications Archive

The IRS is halting some collection and audit activities until July 15 as the coronavirus pandemic spreads. The IRS has already taken some steps to ease enforcement, including suspending most notices and all levies issued by the automated collection system (ACS).

The U.S. Department of Labor recently published their model notice for employers, pursuant to the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA). According to the DOL, notice of the FFCRA's requirements must be posted, in a conspicuous place on it premises, by each covered employer by April 1, 2020.  

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act provides two new refundable payroll tax credits for covered employers to help reimburse them for providing leave to their employees. On March 20, 2020, the U.S. Treasury Department, Internal Revenue Service, and U.S. Department of Labor announced plans to implement Coronavirus-related paid leave for workers and tax credits for covered employers to recover the cost of providing Coronavirus-related leave.

This update includes information on the CMS Extension of MIPS, MSSP, and other Quality Reporting Programs deadlines and waiver of penalties by the DHHS Office for Civil Rights  for HIPAA violations in connection with telehealth. 

This article discusses the impact of COVID-19 on loan and credit agreements and discusses the provisions in your loan documents that should be reviewed to determine if a borrower’s access to credit could be limited by the the COVID-19 crisis. Also included is a a brief overview of the current governmental response to COVID-19 as it specifically pertains to matters related to finance. 

Telecommuting—also known as working from home, working remotely, or telework—is a work arrangement in which the employee works outside of the office. With the COVID-19 outbreak spreading across the United States and a number of states issuing “stay home” or “shelter in place” orders, many employers have effectively been forced to transition to temporary telecommuting arrangements with their workforce in order to continue operations. 

President Trump signed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (“HR 6201”) into law on March 18, 2020. Accordingly, Covered Employers (those with fewer than 500 employees) will be responsible for providing employees additional FMLA leave and paid sick leave beginning April 2, 2020. Related questions also answered here.

The ongoing spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus is continuing to cause hardship and concern for many employees and employers as organizations work to mitigate the damage the virus is causing to their workplace and business. In an effort to reduce the burden on employees and employers, Governor Ricketts signed Executive Order No. 20-04, Corona Virus – Emergency Unemployment Insurance Benefit Relief, on March 17, 2020.

There are many business issues to consider surrounding COVID-19 Coronavirus outside of the general employment issues that arise. We have put together a list of top 10 non-employment related things a business should do.

On March 14, 2020, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (“HR 6201”). HR 6201, expected to be approved and signed into law, currently awaits Senate approval.

In order to achieve social distancing during the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak, millions of employees in the United States are either already working from home, or businesses are sprinting to prepare for their employees to work remotely. As everyone settles in for what could be weeks or months of remote work, it is important to ensure that companies, and their workers, are aware of heightened cybersecurity risks facing them and follow best practices when it comes to keeping company systems and data secure.

The spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus in recent weeks has caused growing concerns for many individuals and employers as organizations prepare to manage their operations in the event the virus impacts the workforce. Koley Jessen has been in regular contact with our clients to address the many issues facing employers and workers in the current climate. 

If you fear you may have been the victim of email hacking, here are some tips and best practices we recommend to follow in order to prevent further exposure.

For the past twenty-five years, businesses seeking to protect marks used in the United Kingdom (UK), that is, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, have had a choice for protecting their trademarks. They could either register at the UK Intellectual Property Office or protect the mark through a European Community Trademark (EUTM) registration. Because the latter provided even broader coverage, including the UK and extending into the European Economic Area, many clients had opted to use the EUTM registration route.

On January 28, 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) announced the annual changes to the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvement Act of 1976 (the “HSR Act”) pre-merger notification thresholds (see attached Federal Register publication). The revised thresholds will become effective February 27, 2020.

The SECURE Act includes many provisions intended to help Americans save more for retirement. In this article, Lisa Lehan highlights changes made and the importance of reviewing beneficiary designations in light of the SECURE Act’s changes.

Debtors sign their federal tax returns digitally all the time. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) allows digital signing, without reservation; the Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutes digital signers for cheating on tax returns, without a problem; and the DOJ gets convictions against digitally signing taxpayers, frequently. So, why can’t debtors digitally sign their bankruptcy petitions and schedules, too?

There are significant changes in store for the H-1B nonimmigrant visa process for this year’s cap-subject petitions that are to be filed in the coming months. On January 9, 2020, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) issued its long-awaited final guidance on the H-1B nonimmigrant visa registration process for cap-subject petitions.

Construction liens, sometimes called mechanic’s liens, are useful tools to secure payment for unpaid services and materials under a contract to improve real estate. In this article, get answers to 10 questions addressing the basics of Iowa law governing construction liens.

If it has been a while since you’ve reviewed your estate plan, use this list to help you determine if your plan needs any updates. If you do not yet have your estate plan in place, review this list to help you think through some key decisions before meeting with your lawyer.

With the new year quickly approaching, it is a great time for employers to revisit handbooks, policies and procedures to ensure they remain in compliance with constantly changing employment laws. Each year, federal and state governments ring in the new year by rolling out new laws. This year is no different – on January 1, 2020, dozens of new employment laws impacting employers took effect in various states. 

Among the tools a contractor should have in their toolbox is the Spearin Doctrine, derived from the 1918 Supreme Court case, United States v. Spearin. This particular tool, when properly used, protects contractors from liability for damages resulting from faulty plans and specifications provided by project owners or engineers.

Upon a shareholder's death, an S Corporation's assets do not receive a basis step-up - and unfortunately, Subchapter S does not contain a provision similar to §754, which provides entities taxed as partnerships with the ability to adjust the basis of its assets when a partner’s interest is sold or when a partner dies. In certain situations, however, there may be an opportunity to obtain a tax-free basis adjustment for the assets held by an S corporation.

President Donald Trump recently signed into law several bankruptcy law changes, one of which was the Small Business Reorganization Act. In this article, Don Swanson answers commonly asked questions on the SBRA.

On October 23, 2019, in response to Executive Order 13847, the Department of Labor proposed new regulations for the electronic disclosure of pension plan documents. The proposal creates a new safe harbor for electronic disclosures that can be made in addition to, or in lieu of, the 2002 safe harbor.

On October 13, 2019, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed California Assembly Bill 51 into law, which bans employers from requiring applicants and employees to enter into mandatory arbitration agreements governing disputes that arise under the California Fair Employment and Housing Act ("FEHA") or the California Labor Code.

The Fair Labor Standards Act requires that most U.S. employees be paid at not less than time and one-half their regular rate of pay for all hours worked over 40 hours in a workweek, unless the employee qualifies for an exemption. On September 24, 2019, the Department of Labor ("DOL") announced changes to the "white-collar" employee exemption and the "highly compensated" employee exemption. The following outlines the changes set to go into effect January 1, 2020.

Construction liens, sometimes called mechanic’s liens, are useful tools to secure payment for unpaid services and materials under a contract to improve real estate in Nebraska. What do you need to know to utilize this tool?

In March 2019, the IRS announced that the ruling program for section 355 distributions created under Rev. Proc. 2017-52 has been extended indefinitely. While taxpayers and practitioners were previously hesitant to implement a section 355 distribution in the absence of a favorable IRS ruling, now taxpayers can obtain a transactional ruling and confidently implement a section 355 distribution

Over the last several years, the demand for H-2B nonimmigrant visas has exponentially increased. Because of the intense competition for H-2B visas, the technology and available staff resources of the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) have been challenged to handle the increasingly large volume of H-2B applications filed on January 1 of each year. As a result of stakeholder comments and the most recent filing period in which the iCERT electronic filing system experienced a service disruption due to the large volume of system user requests, the DOL’s Office of Foreign Labor Certification (“OFLC”) has announced several new procedures that employers should be aware of if seeking to use the H-2B program during the Fiscal Year 2020 H-2B season.

Staying in compliance with record retention requirements as an H-2B employer can often seem like a daunting task. However, such compliance is crucial, especially in the case of an audit or investigation by the Wage and Hour Division or the Employment and Training Administration Division of the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) or the Fraud Detection and National Security directorate of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”).

This article provides an update on planning considerations relating to the concept of “portability” in federal estate taxes – and what new caselaw may mean for the estate planning practice in Nebraska.

Just as caring for a family member with special needs requires extra effort, so does estate planning for families with a special needs beneficiary. There is more to consider than nominating a guardian to care for their physical well-being. Careful planning is necessary to properly provide for the financial well-being of a special needs beneficiary.

Although perhaps not as anxiety-filled as the Return of the Jedi, the return of the "No-Match Letters" has employers on edge. Early this Spring, the Social Security Administration ("SSA") resumed distribution of Employer Correction Request Notices—also referred to as Social Security "No-Match Letters"— to employers around the country.

This Nebraska Department of Banking and Finance Interpretive Opinion is a welcome development that modernizes and streamlines Nebraska’s securities rules and regulations by providing a limited, Nebraska broker-dealer registration exemption for M&A Brokers that conforms with the broker-dealer registration exemption the SEC adopted in 2014. 

In the recent North Carolina Department of Revenue v. Kaestner Family Trust case, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled against the state of North Carolina and in favor of the taxpayer, determining that a trust beneficiary’s residence alone is insufficient for the state to tax the trust’s undistributed income.

The EPA recently issued a formal policy to avoid federal and state duplication of environmental inspections and enforcements. The policy, Enhancing Effective Partnerships Between the EPA and the States in Civil Enforcement and Compliance Assurance Work, promotes greater transparency, communication and planning between the EPA and its state counterparts that are delegated authority under federal laws such as the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).

Unless you have been hiding under a rock, you are aware that the use of social media has exploded over the past several years. Not only has social media become the go-to method for most communication and networking today, it is fast gaining popularity as a way of influencing consumer perceptions.

If you are the administrator for a group practice, a nursing home, a surgery center, an
imaging center or another health care facility, you probably have had to respond to requests
for a deceased patient’s medical records from a surviving family member. It is not an uncommon request, and providers often want to allow family members access to their loved one’s records, but providers also want (and need) to comply with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). How HIPAA and Nebraska law treat this issue may surprise you.

When drafting settlement and separation agreements with employees, California has imposed a number of requirements and restrictions that must be considered. One of these requirements is set forth in the recently amended California Civil Code Section 1542, which is intended to prevent an employee from inadvertently releasing unknown claims.

Can your business shake a judgment of thousands of dollars in back wages, liquidated damages, and attorneys’ fees as a result of a Department of Labor audit or a lawsuit filed by employees alleging misclassification under the Fair Labor Standards Act (the "FLSA")?

This year, in North Carolina Department of Revenue v. Kaestner Family Trust, the Supreme Court will address the issue of whether a trust beneficiary’s residence is sufficient for a state to tax the trust’s income.

Do your investments have unrealized gains which you are considering “harvesting”? Or are you currently contemplating the sale of appreciated real estate or business interests?

Nebraska recently became the latest state to expressly prohibit residential contractors from rebating any portion of an insurance deductible. In this regard, the Insured Homeowners Protection Act states, in part, that the contractor may not pay an insured, or a person directly or indirectly associated with the real estate, any form of compensation, except for an item of nominal value. What's this mean for you?

In the course of administering an employee benefit plan, lots of decisions must be made. Whether those decisions are being made by an individual or a committee, the process for making the decision must be prudent.

Let’s say you sue a defendant in state court for injunctive relief. The defendant then files bankruptcy and receives a discharge. Then, the state court says you can proceed, despite the discharge. And so you do. Then, the defendant seeks contempt sanctions in bankruptcy court for a discharge injunction violation. Can you be sanctioned, if the state court was wrong? Such is the essence of what’s before the Supreme Court in Taggart v. Lorenzen. 

When it comes to the federal Family and Medical Leave Act ("FMLA"), employers have long known that the devil is in the details. At its core, the FMLA requires covered employers to provide leave rights to eligible employees for qualifying reasons.

New Internal Revenue Code Section 1400Z creates qualified opportunity funds (QOFs) and qualified opportunity zones. This program incentivizes the reallocation of capital to
designated low-income census tracts. It presents a remarkable opportunity for taxpayers to defer and reduce capital gain and subsequently exclude the appreciation of qualified opportunity fund interests from income.

You can find a tutorial and a form online for practically everything, so do you really need to hire an attorney to prepare your estate plan? Here are some excuses I’ve heard from people who claim they don’t need an estate plan or think they can handle the preparation of legal documents on their own: We’re not rich . . . My sister knows we want her to raise our kids . . . Aren’t there forms on the internet for that? Have you told yourself the same thing?