Lawyer insists I amend tax return for gambling

[dealingsdone]

My lawyer insists i refile my tax returns for 2008. He says that all my losses and wins must be included...obviously the losses were much more than the wins. at this point it is a bit of a pain in the butt to do this, and i would be bs'ing the whole thing essentially because i don't remember what I won and lost on any given day. I had no W2G's from the govt. This seems like an unnecessary thing for me to do. What do you think?

[OhioFiler]

I too hired an attorney and take her advice. That is why I retained her. She is the expert.

However, I am not sure fudging your tax return as an amended return is a good idea. You can audit your credit card statements and bank statements to get a pretty good idea of the ACTUAL losses and winnings.

[Klesko]

I am pretty sure you can only take gambling loses against winnings. For example if you lost 20k and won nothing then you dont get any benefit. However if you won 20k and lost 10k you can take the loses against the winnings.

So if you lost more then you won I am not sure why the lawyer is suggesting this.

[jadams]

If you used your club/rewards/loyalty card you should be able to get a win/loss statement from the Casino.

One of the local Casinos here lets you order and view it immediately online. The other requires you mail in a form and get it back by mail.

I order them occasionally as proof that I in fact did not ever really "win" at the Casino, despite a few trips here and there that seemed good.

[OhioFiler]

I am pretty sure you can only take gambling loses against winnings. For example if you lost 20k and won nothing then you dont get any benefit. However if you won 20k and lost 10k you can take the loses against the winnings.

So if you lost more then you won I am not sure why the lawyer is suggesting this.

Well its probably because the petitioner has substantial debt related to gambling and the TT will want to see that he did in fact report all his income to the IRS even if it was offset by losses.

[catleg]

Sounds unduly cautious, as losses are only deductible to the extent of any winnings. Yet if you are in a high tax bracket, the phase out of schedule A deductions results in an out of pocket cost to you. I would press the lawyer as to why they want this. I raised this issue to my attorney, and he said hmmph, but didn't say i should refile (yet). Like you, I had perhaps hundreds of W2G's and it was just overwhelming.

[dealingsdone]

I too hired an attorney and take her advice. That is why I retained her. She is the expert.

However, I am not sure fudging your tax return as an amended return is a good idea. You can audit your credit card statements and bank statements to get a pretty good idea of the ACTUAL losses and winnings.

i would have to fudge or create the numbers...it is clear I lost much more than i won, hence the bk.

this lawyer (actually the assistant) does seem extremely cautious about the whole thing...the amended return will show losses that equal my wins because that is all I can do anyway....i'm not in a high income bracket so that is not a factor.

well anyway thanks for the advice and thoughts everybody,