When the IRS Talks to Your Banker, Customers or Neighbors: Third Party Contact Rules

One of the things people fear most about a collection case is embarrassment. The Revenue Officer calling their customers. Their landlord. Their brother-in-law. Showing up at the bank and telling everyone.

The IRS can contact third parties. But Congress put conditions on it, and the IRM spells out how employees must meet them. Know the rules and you will know when a third party contact is coming, what it can and cannot reveal and how to find out who was called.

What counts as a third party contact

IRM 25.27.1.2 (rev. 2026-05-06) uses the regulation's definition. A third party contact is a communication initiated by an IRS employee, made with someone other than the taxpayer, about the determination or collection of the taxpayer's tax liability, that discloses both the taxpayer's identity and the employee's association with the IRS.

The IRM lists things that are not third party contacts. Computer database searches with no person on the other end. Contacts with government offices, like asking the Postal Service for a current address, unless the contact concerns the taxpayer's business with that office. Unsolicited information from someone who called the IRS. Contacts with your power of attorney. Contacts with your own employees or officers acting within the scope of their jobs, who are presumed to be acting within scope during business hours on business premises.

And it lists things that generally are third party contacts, including a levy or summons issued to anyone other than the taxpayer, such as a bank, a credit card processor or an employer.

The 45 day notice rule

IRC 7602(c), as amended by the Taxpayer First Act, sets the notice requirement. IRM 25.27.1.3 lists what the employee must do. They must not contact any third party without first giving you advance notice. They must actually intend, when the notice is issued, to contact third parties. The notice must specify a period, not to exceed one year, within which the contacts will be made. And it must be sent at least 45 days before the first contact.

IRM 25.27.1.3.1 says employees may not contact a third party until the 46th day after the notice. It also says that, effective August 15, 2019, Publication 1 no longer satisfies the advance notice requirement. The notice is Letter 3164, which the IRM says comes in more than twenty versions for different functions. It must list the tax periods involved, and on a joint liability each spouse must receive a separate letter. A copy goes to your power of attorney.

If the IRS plans continued contacts, the IRM tells employees to send a refresher Letter 3164 no later than 46 days before the current one year window expires to avoid another waiting period. That is in the IRM because the clock is real.

What a Letter 3164 really means

Read a Letter 3164 as a forecast. Under IRM 25.27.1.3, a notice shall not be issued unless there is an intent to contact third parties when it is issued. It is not boilerplate. Someone has decided they may need information from outside sources.

IRM 5.1.10.3 (rev. 2025-04-24) says Revenue Officers decide during the initial investigative interview whether third party contact is needed, and in special circumstances may send the Letter 3164 at the same time as the appointment letter, after consulting management, when third party contact will be the only way to get necessary information. The IRM's example is prior experience with an uncooperative taxpayer.

So a Letter 3164 arriving with your very first letter is a signal about how the officer views your case history. Responding fully and quickly is the best way to make third party contacts unnecessary. IRM 25.27.1.3 states the IRS's practice of obtaining information directly from the taxpayer whenever possible.

Where the officer may make contact

IRM 5.1.10.2 adds a location rule for Collection. Third party contacts may be made in commercial locations only, and should not be initiated in a residential location unless necessary, with a reference to the IRM's field activity guide for the contacts allowed at residences.

IRM 5.1.10.6.4 also reminds officers that when a phone call to a third party produces information such as a levy source, they must identify themselves as an IRS employee and follow third party procedures, including the reprisal determination.

And if an officer calls you and reaches someone else, IRM 25.27.1.3.1 says the officer may not seek additional information from that person unless the Letter 3164 has been sent and the waiting period has passed. Simply identifying themselves as an IRS employee is not a third party contact.

Exceptions

IRM 25.27.1.3.2 lists the statutory exceptions where advance notice is not required and the contact need not appear on your list: when the third party fears reprisal by the taxpayer, when the taxpayer authorized the contact, when notice may jeopardize collection, and when there is a pending criminal investigation. The regulations add government entities, confidential informants and non-administrative contacts in pending court proceedings.

Reprisal is taken seriously. The IRM requires a reprisal determination for every contact, contact by contact, with no blanket determinations, and says any reprisal concern raised by the third party is taken at face value. A potentially dangerous taxpayer indicator alone is not enough to find reprisal.

Authorization is voluntary. IRM 25.27.1.3.5 describes Form 12180 for taxpayers who authorize specific contacts. It also says the IRS does not need your authorization, and refusing to authorize does not prevent a contact.

Your right to the list

Here is the part most people miss. The IRS has to record third party contacts and give you the list on request. IRM 25.27.1.4 says each reportable contact is recorded on Form 12175, or systemically through ICS, and that record is the source of the list.

IRM 25.27.1.5 says you can request the list at any time, orally or in writing. The request must include your name, address, taxpayer identification number and the tax periods, cover only one taxpayer and be made no less than 90 days after a previous request. The response is Letter 3173, and IRM 25.27.1.6 says it should be mailed within 14 calendar days of the request.

The list covers contacts made after January 18, 1999, or since your last requested report, excluding contacts withheld for reprisal or another statutory reason. IRM 25.27.1.6 says the paper Form 12175 records are retired one year after cutoff and destroyed 10 years after cutoff, so the record exists for a long time.

IRM 5.1.10.7.3 lists this among the taxpayer rights Revenue Officers must observe. If you want to know who the IRS has been talking to, ask.

What a third party is allowed to be told

Third party contacts are limited by disclosure law too. IRM 5.1.10.7.4 says IRC 6103(k)(6) lets Collection employees disclose return information only to the extent necessary to obtain information not otherwise reasonably available, and it does not authorize disclosing your actual return. The IRM separately stresses that authority to disclose under 6103 is different from the 7602(c) notice requirement. Both apply.

In practice, a bank receiving a levy learns that you owe federal tax and the amount on the levy. It does not get your tax return. I cover the disclosure side in Who an IRS Employee Is Allowed to Tell About Your Case.

The best way to keep the IRS away from third parties is to give it what it needs directly. The second best is to know the rules it must follow when it goes around you.