www.PTIN DIRECTORY.com

[erchess]

Anyone else get an email from this outfit recently? Anyone heard of them other than getting an email or reading this post? It strikes me as likely Phishing but I'd like to know if anyone else believes or knows I am wrong.

[Peachie]

I haven't Erchess,

I agree. It's phishing or fishing for $$. I would ignore.

Peachie

[WhiteOleander]

I received one today. But, I'm going to ignore it. If they were legit, they wouldn't try to make me believe that I am required to go to their site.

[mrbill]

I also received the E-Mail. I will not respond.

[JSLATER]

I also received the E-Mail. I will not respond.

[Uncle Sam]

www.ptindirectory.com

As as result of these posts and others I've seen on other boards - I have e-mailed Bob Kerr who is NAEA's liaison to the
Government Relations Committee - who is presently at NAEA's Annual Conference in Las Vegas and will be meeting with IRS officials - and asked that he speak with IRS on this - so perhaps an IRS e-blast will go out warning all Circular 230
practitioners regarding this issue.

[Brian EA]

Never heard of it

[bridgman]

PTINDirectory

Anyone else get an email from this outfit recently? Anyone heard of them other than getting an email or reading this post? It strikes me as likely Phishing but I'd like to know if anyone else believes or knows I am wrong.

The website looks IRS-esque, but the domain is registered to cpadirectory.com. I see that it does list business information for several preparers in my area, including myself. The fine print indicates that all the information was received under FOIA. Their business model seems to be to entice you to part with $25 a year for an "enhanced" listing.

Tom

[FEDUKE404]

Looking for money

IIRC the "business" address information of anyone with a valid PTIN is already available to anyone who pays a fee to the IRS.

How else would I be receiving spam emails related to professional tax software, tax study courses, professional organizations, and the like???

Rest assured if you "joined" this directory you would be subjected to even more spam emails, phone calls, and the like.

Basic operating rule for yours truly: "If I did NOT call your business on my own initiative, more than likely I have zero interest in your products/services."

Minor rant: It would be nice if the national "Do Not Call" system actually had some teeth in it.....................

FE

[KathMorgan]

Spam!!!

Not only is this SPAM it's also very dangereous possible worm/virus related according to my anti-virus software. It wouldn't even let me open it up. I wasn't silly enough to hit the link, I typed the URL in separately and still got the virus alert. Be careful out there.

[AZ-Tax]

I tried it and it

If we are talking about the same email, I got it and did a search on myself. The fields are:

Last Name, Credentials, Services Provided, Languages Serviced, City, State, Zip Code. I entered my last name, choose EA under Credentials and I didn’t see tax preparation under services provided so for the rest of the fields I didn’t complete. Then I hit search and I had to at least enter state and zip code. So I did that and nothing came up under my name. I went back in and left blank Credentials blank and hit search, then my name appeared with my full address that I did NOT enter so it looks to have some data on those with PTIN’s.

[kpangelinan]

Anyone else get an email from this outfit recently? Anyone heard of them other than getting an email or reading this post? It strikes me as likely Phishing but I'd like to know if anyone else believes or knows I am wrong.

Thanks for posting....I've been hanging on to the email (didn't click on anything) just in case and had a feeling it was spam. Deleted.