My Accountant father died. How long do we have to keep copies of his clients taxes?

[Dasani]

Hi

I worked for my father and he died on 9/13/12. I was wondering how long do we have to keep copies of the clients taxes. Is it three years? I also am registered with the IRS and helped do the taxes.with my father. Any advice on this would be great. Thanks.

Dasani

 

[kirby]

Sorry about your Dad.

First, are you skilled enough to take on his clients? If so, you should consider doing that. If you do not wish to do so, there is value in the business he had and you should look into "selling" the business to another preparer. If that happens, be sure to get written approval from the client before you hand any of your father's files to the new person. And you might want to limit that handoff to just copies of the tax returns (because your Dad's related but self-created workfiles might contain info that could be misinterpreted and cause a problem.)

If you decide to just retain the files, then look at IRS code section 6107.