Seven Deadly Legal Mistakes in Business Taxes & Payroll

Shield Your Business From IRS Trouble & Payroll Mistakes Without Going to Law School

Seven Deadly Legal Mistakes in Business Taxes & Payroll: Shield Your Business From IRS Trouble & Payroll Mistakes--Without Going to Law School

Most IRS Audits Don’t Start With Cheating—They Start With Mistakes

Business owners get into trouble because they make reasonable decisions—about cash flow, payroll, contractors, software, and timing—without realizing how tax and payroll law actually works.
By the time the problem surfaces, penalties have accumulated, options have narrowed, and what felt like an administrative issue has become a legal one.

Seven Deadly Legal Mistakes in Business Taxes & Payroll is written for business owners who want to understand where IRS trouble really begins—and how to avoid it—without going to law school.

This book focuses on the most common and preventable legal mistakes that quietly create tax and payroll problems for small businesses. Not through dramatic misconduct, but through everyday assumptions: treating taxes as an annual chore, using payroll funds to manage cash flow, misclassifying workers, trusting software without oversight, delaying responses to IRS notices, and assuming compliance systems stay current as a business grows.

Rather than cataloging tax rules or filing requirements, this book explains how risk actually enters a business—and how to recognize it early, while you still have control.

Inside, you’ll learn:

• Why treating taxes as a once-a-year event quietly creates IRS exposure
• Why payroll taxes are not “just another expense”—and how personal liability arises
• How worker classification mistakes multiply tax and payroll risk retroactively
• Why payroll software doesn’t eliminate legal responsibility
• How poor recordkeeping weakens your position even when taxes were paid
• Why ignoring IRS notices escalates problems automatically
• How growth quietly breaks tax and payroll systems that once worked

Each chapter follows the same practical framework used throughout the Seven Deadly Legal Mistakes Series:

• The Deadly Mistake
• How It Plays Out in the Real World
• The General Legal Principle
• How to Avoid or Fix the Mistake
• The Bottom Line
• A clear, actionable checklist you can use immediately

This book is written in plain English for entrepreneurs, founders, and small business owners who want clarity—not jargon, fear-based warnings, or technical overload.

About the Series

Each book in the Seven Deadly Legal Mistakes Series can be read on its own. Together, they form a practical legal framework for understanding how risk develops inside a business—and how to manage it before it becomes expensive, personal, or disruptive.

If you want to shield your business from IRS trouble and payroll mistakes—without going to law school—this book shows you where to look, what to question, and how to stay ahead of problems before they start.

About the Author

Brett Bacon is a licensed attorney and entrepreneur with more than three decades of experience advising business owners on taxes, employment law, contracts, compliance, risk management, and liability avoidance. His work focuses on how legal problems actually arise in day-to-day business operations—and how they can be prevented through clear structure, informed decision-making, and early attention to risk.

He writes practical, plain-English guides for non-lawyers who want to understand the legal side of their businesses without jargon, theory, or fear-based warnings. His goal is straightforward: to help business owners recognize legal risks early and make smarter decisions before they turn into disputes, audits, or lawsuits.