Will, a self-employed plumber from Dallas didn't file his tax returns. Last May, he lost his records in a flood, and had not found time to fret about it because his sub-contracting work was finally picking up. Luckily, the IRS had not seemed to notice, which allowed Will to ignore the his unfiled taxes completely.

Nearly 6 months later, the IRS sent a notice through mail. Will put it on the kitchen table and made a mental reminder to read it later that day. In spite of this, a new customer needed the addition to her house complete as soon as possible, and Will's wife was pestering him to finish their new garage. Soon, the notice was lost under papers and work on the table, and it had been again forgotten, He did not bother to learn how to file back taxes

Months passed and business continued to prosper. The IRS began mailing certified correspondence, but Will and his wife ignored them because they simply did not have any time to take a look at them. Eventually, Will decided to get a bookkeeper to figure out the numbers on his taxes for him, but he quickly lost track of the progress. The correspondence continued to appear up in their mailbox, but Will was perplexed because he understood he had taken care of the problem.

Finally, Will picked up a notice on a Saturday morning to find out what was going on. He was astounded to learn that the IRS said he now owed over $500,000 in taxes. He reread the notice several times, but each time it said the same thing. Feeling sad, confused, and humiliated, Will hid the letter in his workshop, hoping that his wife wouldn't find it before he had an opportunity to handle it it.

Because Will didn't file his tax returns, the IRS filed and prepared his tax returns for him and claimed he earned more and owed a lot more than he actually did. What Will did not know however, was that he still had a an opportunity to solve the problem. All his missing books were able to be reconstructed so that his unfiled tax returns could be legally prepared by a genuine tax attorney. The tax attorney prepared, filed his missing tax returns and this would allow his total taxes owed to become drastically lessened and he would have a probability to negotiate the debt down according to his ability to pay.