That coffee shop in Austin where I overheard a freelancer getting audited

I was at Radio Coffee on Menchaca last Thursday grabbing a cold brew and a guy at the next table was on the phone with the IRS. He kept saying things like "I didn't know I needed to report that" and "I thought PayPal counted as personal income." It sounded like he hadn't tracked a single 1099 or square receipt all year. After he hung up he looked sick so I asked if he was okay and he said he might owe over $4,000 in back taxes. Has anyone else run into someone who didn't realize their Venmo payments were taxable income?

3 comments

3 Comments

paige_bell813d ago

@drews55 sounds like he met the crypto version of that Radio Coffee guy.

danielowens4d ago

Honestly I used to think people were overreacting about the whole Venmo thing, but @drews55 that story and the guy at Radio kinda flipped my opinion. I figured if you weren't getting a 1099 you were in the clear, but sounds like the IRS is way more on top of this than I gave them credit for.

drews554d ago

Man that reminds me of this one time at a bar in San Antonio where this guy was trying to pay his tab with Bitcoin and the bartender had no idea how to even ring that up. He kept saying it was "crypto income" and the bartender said they only take cash or card. Whole thing got weird when another guy at the bar claimed he was a freelance tax consultant and started giving him advice between sips of his beer. Turned out the Bitcoin guy had never filed a single return on any of his trades and was convinced the IRS would never find out. He walked out without paying his tab too.