Tax season help

[99mtamchamp]

Have a question regarding seasonal tax help with ATX. In the past it's just been me doing all the tax work in my office. I've had it with the workdays going from 8am-midnight. I'm going to look at hiring someone (maybe college intern) to help with taxes next year. I'm looking for suggestions re: how ATX works in this environment. Would it be best to set up some kind of network (would wireless network work?) or use stand alone computers. I worked for a firm for twenty years and the procedure there was the staff accountants would do the work and print out the return for review. I would like to work around printing out the return for review (pretty much have a paperless office) and be able to review on screen. I would appreciate anyone in the same situation giving me some tips on how you handle this. I understand with ATX Total Tax Office which I use I can have up to 3 users. Thanks in advance

[Margaret CPA in OH]

I have one part time person who mostly does the bookkeeping for my clients but helps with simple returns and the local returns for the business clients. I have her computer networked (wireless) so she works on the returns and I review on my computer with the same data she has. Generally this is from original documents, but I also have everything digitized by the time the returns go out. Her computer also has access to the folders on mine that have the client data. Her computer is also stand alone in the sense that the QB programs are independently on that one as well as mine. I can't afford to pay the cost for multiple users for QB.

My computer is backed up daily to an external hard drive which I keep in my fireproof safe. This summer I will put into place the system to upload to my website for offsite storage, too.

[jasdlm]

My tax files are on our server. The software is installed on my machine and on my assistant's machine. We are each able to open returns, make changes, etc. It works very smoothly.

[kcjenkins]

I would not use a wireless network for tax work, due to security issues. I'd use a wired network. It's easy to connect two computers with a network cable.

[Margaret CPA in OH]

My network was secured by my computer guy who also makes my computers. Perhaps someone could actually crack it but I have a difficult time imagining that happening in the short random time window when my employee actually works on such things in my middle class neighborhood in my home office in a cul de sac. If someone is browsing for wireless access, there are 2 others that show up as unsecured. My computer is hardwired to the internet as is hers. There is wireless use only when she works on returns once or twice a month.

No question that there are more perfect solutions but I don't stay awake worrying about this. Hmm, maybe now I will. I'll have to call Doug and ask him about a cable connection.

[kcjenkins]

It probably is not a big problem, but it's also easy to add an extra cable so that she can plug in rather than use the wireless.

[Jack from Ohio]

Cable connection is also much faster than the wireless.