The American Association of Debt Management Organizations (AADMO) is the first trade association for the credit counseling industry to offer an analysis of the "Characteristics of a Tax-Exempt Credit Counseling Agency."

January 6, 2005 -- The report, written by Jeff Tenenbaum and his colleagues at the Venable law firm in Washington, D.C. -- the nation's leading legal experts in the federal and state laws and regulations impacting credit counseling agencies and debt settlement companies -- examines the characteristics that a nonprofit consumer credit counseling agency must have (and not have) in order to be recognized as tax-exempt, or to maintain its tax-exempt status, under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

At present, there is a limited amount of published guidance from the Internal Revenue Service and case law specifically addressing federal tax exemption for credit counseling agencies. The report is the result of extensive information-gathering and analysis by Venable, and follows the recent release of numerous letters from the IRS denying 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status to new credit counseling agency applications and public speculation about the imminent revocation of 501(c)(3) status for a number of existing agencies.


About AADMO

AADMO is the credit counseling and debt management industry's largest trade association. It is an industry education and advocacy organization whose mission is to promote and ensure the continued operation and viability of credit counseling and debt management organizations. AADMO provides its members and the consumer public with information about the credit and debt counseling industry. AADMO members are consumer credit counseling agencies debt management organizations, credit counselors, personal finance educators, credit and debt information educators, consumer lawyers and many others.

AADMO is the only trade association to have held state law compliance workshops with the New York State Banking Department and the California Department of Corporations upon enactment of their respective laws governing credit counseling and AADMO is the only trade association for the industry to publish a formal summary of state laws that has been reviewed by state regulators.

For additional information, contact Mark Guimond at 540-548-1965 or Mark@aadmo.org.