joelgilb

JB If I had to charge rates that low I would be starving! And I thought I was pretty cheap.

Thx KC Always good to to get confirmation of an idea.

Have a new client that went to a CPA to prepare their 2008 return Hub was in military for 16 years and when he left the service they paid him $170K. Later they told him they had made an error and requested $88K back. Of course they already spent it (bought a house), so the military agreed to a $500/month repayment plan plus interest, essentially converting it into a loan. W-2 gets issued for full $170K and is under withheld by $25K (must admit thet the taxpayers should have set aside tax $) Of course the military refuses to correct the W-2, and instead tells taxpayer that they will issue vouchers for each years repayments and that they can deal with it on future returns. Since this is now a loan the W-2 is clearly incorrect. Not sure how to handle it or where to find support for the position First thought was to report the entire W-2 and then offset on the other income line for the portion (with full disclosure attached) that needs to be paid back. Thought there rather than just reducing the W-2 to reduce IRS exposure, since if reduce the W-2 it is guaranteed that IRS will look at the return closely via the matching program. If offset separately then there is a possibility that it will never be questioned. Thought of Suing the US military, but dollars are not enough to make this worthwhile, besides this is like suing City Hall and I may need to get help from someone to get standing in Federal Court (only licensed to practice before the Tax Court myself, and can;t bring it there. Also thought of contacting their Local US Senator and asking for assistance. With all that is going on in our economy though wonder if they would bother taking the time to deal with it. Any thoughts?

H&R used to publish rates on a sheet and a few years I was able to get a copy. Now they are far more careful about it. Form firm to firm rates are all over the place. I generally charge $175 per hour with the appointment and discount the first year slightly. Future years tend to be drop offs and obviously the return gets prepared in less time, but fee tends to stay consistent, with increases for cost of living (so long as the return is similar). Afraid this causes my fee to be less than H&R in many cases due to speed of prep. Larger firms, big cities and fee tends to be higher. Rural areas generally cheaper. You can also still find some accountants that publish their rates by form out here. although I am not so sure a per form rate is really fair to the taxpayer/client when the form may have virtually no effort on our part due to software capability.

Again Agree with Jack, and you should keep the client name confidential unless the client authorizes you to disclose it.

Looks to me like Jack has it in a nutshell

So glad I left the midwest to move to Vegas. NO SNOW! and 70 here now

Note, that the entire cfd loss should show up on the 1040 page one under the line for Sched E.

Well put Jainen

I find that it makes more sense to use the new address and the do the following: In IL I used to file a non-resident ZERO IL return to avoid them coming back years later looking for the tax on income derived form the previous states. Illinois is notorious for doing this. and the Zero return is no effort at all! Works for all states that I have seen.

It should still come through as a direct deposit, but if somehow the transmission didn't show direct deposit the state will mail a paper check. Worst case your clinet has to wait a little longer.

by the way does anyone remember the class actions suits against both H&r and Jackson Hewitt just a couple of years ago? And that IRS investigated hundreds of their offices!

for anyone that has any real knowledge, (not H&R or Hewitt I might add). You can almost always look at a prior return and in just a few minutes with some ques determine if the return has errors. (do not mean to offend anyone that works for them that is on here, they do have a few good preparers, but you are the exception, why else would you be here?) BUT>>>>> With the interpretation of tax law, you can give a return to 10 different Tax Professionals and you will get 10 different returns. Now which is correct, probably all of them! I am not sure I am right on the source, but I think it was Money magazine that would go to several preparers and have the same return prepared. They would also go to more than one H&R office and do the same thing. The multi H&R office returns would be IDENTICAL (surprise surprise), but the other returns would all be different. Some more or less aggressive than the others. So How aggressive is your client? What a crock those ads are!!!

I think most printers have this ability. Also, for those of you that still have PDFactory from an earlier release of ATX, you can print to the pdf driver and use its stamp feature. This way you can actually customize where and how you want you watermark. Personally I give my clients an unstamped complete copy which I sign.

Think I'll walk!

Just had this question from a client and had originally told them the return would be direct deposited last friday. But this return missed the IRS deadline for Friday by 1 hour. Sheesh. Helpful link though!] Thx

I get my clients to pay me because they like me then I do all the returns for free. Maybe I should stop signing any of them! lol

Think with those moves he is going to get the Girls too

Well done Lynn! And how about "Anger Management Classes or Counseling"? LOL

so KC has an Eidetic memory and Zeke ... well I don't think I will comment there. At any rate, you don't need an Eidectic memory to hang someone, Hangman!

loss in the annuity is most likely not going to give rise to a loss on the tax return since it was inside a retirement type vehicle. However, they should not have to pick up any income on the distribution. Does the 1099r show the Annuity/insurance premiums on line 5? This should offset the amount on line 1.

presume the condo fee is just regular association fees and if so no deduction.

Whew! MADE IT!!!! Throwing my party hat Shooting off fireworks!! drinking lots of booze well one out of 3 ain't bad!

btw, thanks for the help in getting me closer to that elusive 500!

Well I was going through a 2 year plan to relocate from Chicago area of IL to Las Vegas NV. Then in mid July last year made the move to NV permanently. But the majority of my clients are in IL and still use me for a variaty of things including tax prep. Ahh technology is a wonderful thing. So in my typical facetious manner I changed my profile to denote the long commute technology has to take to get stuff to me! Ahh so nice not to have to deal with the Chicago Winter, and summer for that matter (dry here and it does make a difference).