# Delinquent fbar/interest income but net owe no tax - advise please



## xtrados (Jun 15, 2015)

Hi all

Looking on advice/suggestions how to handle late FBARs and unreported interest.
I have been reading this excellent forum for days.
I am dual citizen, 10 years ago I moved back to my country of origin to take care of my aging parents.
I have been filing taxes but for last 6 years or so, but I failed to report interest income from bank accounts where I live now. 
We are talking total 600-900 USD intest per year, with yearly aggregate for accounts around $40K (source of this was transfer from my US accounts), 5 accounts (2 virtually w/o any interest 0.2%, 3 with interest)
I wrongly assumed this is not taxable because of mutal tax treaty to avoid double tax so I did not report this interest on my tax return.
When preparing tax for 2015 the FBAR issue came to my attention and that scared me a lot becasue of penalties for failure to report foreign accounts.

Even had I reported this interest I would owe no tax on it becasue it would fall under foreign income exclusion limit. 

How should I proceed ?

1) silent disclosure ? first file late FBARs 2008-2013 + current 2014, then file a 2014 tax and include interest income from banks for 2014 ?
2) ODVP ? what penalties do await me in this program ? 
3) streamlined ? I dont qualify because is for people what did not file.
4) other ?

I appreciate any advise/help

cheers

PS today is last day of my deadline to file, should I take an extension to give more thought to it ?


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## Bevdeforges (Nov 16, 2007)

Just file the back FBARs (but only for those years where your total in foreign accounts exceeded $10,000) and be done with it. If you've been filing tax returns anyhow, it's a major PITA to amend your filings for what will amount to literally only a few dollars of potential tax anyhow (if that).

They don't check the back filings (or even the current filings) for what you reported on your returns for that year, as so many foreign accounts just don't pay much, if any interest anyhow. 

If you had a million or two stashed away in foreign accounts somewhere, I'd be concerned. But you haven't really violated any major rules here, and frankly the IRS doesn't have the resources to run down every minor omission or misinterpretation. You filed in good faith. Get the FBARs up to date and get on with your life.
Cheers,
Bev


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