Who has to sign the non-willfulness certification in a streamlined submission?
The filer does. The certification is a signed personal narrative about that person's own facts, and it is the submission rather than a cover sheet for it. An adviser can assemble the chronology, test it against the returns and the foreign-account reports, and say where it is thin — but the statement being attested to is the filer's. That is why the drafting takes longer than people expect. What is being certified is why returns and foreign-account reports were not filed, in terms that hold up against the rest of the package, and nobody else is in a position to attest to that.
I live in Canada and have not filed US returns for years — do I qualify?
Two things decide it: where you live and why the filings were missed. The route this certification belongs to is for US persons resident outside the United States who are behind on returns and on foreign-account reports, and whose failure to file was not willful. Long residence in Canada with no US filings is a common starting point, so the question is rarely the residence half. It is the second half — whether the reason for not filing can be set out truthfully and consistently — and the answer comes from the facts of your own history rather than from how many years are outstanding.
Can my accountant sign the certification on my behalf?
No. The narrative is a personal statement of your facts and it carries your signature, which is exactly what gives it weight. A preparer's job is the surrounding work: reconstructing the years, preparing the returns and the foreign-account reports, and checking that the story you sign is consistent with every figure in the package. Where those two things diverge — a narrative saying one thing and a return showing another — the submission stops looking like a relief application. So expect to be questioned about your own history in some detail before anyone puts a draft in front of you.
Does this route still work if the IRS has already contacted me?
That is the point at which the position changes, and it should be established before any drafting begins. A narrative written after an IRS contact is the classic way a relief application turns into an examination, because the timing of the story becomes part of what is being examined. If a letter has arrived, the first task is to read it properly and work out what it is: routine correspondence, a request about a particular year, or something more. What follows is a different conversation about routes, and taking it in the wrong order forecloses options that were open the week before.
What actually makes a failure to file non-willful?
It is a statement about your state of mind at the time, evidenced by what you did and did not do — and most of that evidence sits in the filings themselves. A history that reads consistently, where the accounts, the income and the absence of reporting all fit one explanation, supports the certification. A history with gaps the narrative glosses over does not. The test we apply internally is simple: could a reader holding the returns, the foreign-account reports and the narrative side by side find a sentence in one that the others contradict? If so, it is not ready to sign.
I have moved back to the United States — is this still my form?
Probably not. Residence is what separates the two streamlined certifications, and there is a domestic version for filers living in the United States. The distinction is not cosmetic: the two programmes are built differently and the cost of going through them is not the same, so establishing which one your facts put you in is the first piece of analysis rather than an administrative detail settled later. If you moved during the period a submission would cover, that analysis needs doing properly against your own residence history before any certification is drafted.
What is Form 1042-S and what do I do with it?
The statement a US payer issues to a non-resident showing US-source income paid and tax withheld — the non-resident counterpart to a 1099. Use it two ways. In your own country it evidences the US tax paid for credit purposes. And where the rate withheld was higher than your treaty entitlement, or the income was not taxable at all, the way back to the money is a US non-resident return claiming the refund. Check the income and exemption codes before assuming the rate was right. See Form 1042-S.
Do dual citizens pay taxes in both countries?
Both countries can have a claim, but paying double taxes on the same dollar is the exception rather than the rule. The United States taxes its citizens wherever they live; Canada, India and most others tax on residence. So a dual citizen living in one of them often files in both — a resident return in one, a citizen return in the other — while the credit and exclusion rules mean the total is usually close to the higher of the two, not the sum. Filing twice is not paying twice. See two returns as a dual citizen.
