Not Happy with ATX Changes

[mwrightea]

Thank you for letting us know that you are not happy with the separate payroll/max
programs. Making Payroll a stand-alone application is actually going to make it easier
for you for a number of reasons. Payroll and Income Taxes run on different filing
deadlines. By separating Payroll and ATX, this allows us to be more responsive in the
future to the demands and timing of the Payroll calendar, delivering form sets when they
make the most sense from a payroll perspective. Separating Payroll from ATX also makes it
easier for us to develop a more robust Payroll application now and in the years to come.
Again, if you are still not satisfied with the separate programs, you can send a request
to our developers by logging into the myatx support site, click on community board then
post a message under the enhancements thread.

If you need further assistance, please contact our customer support department at
1-800-638-8291.

Thanks, ATX for letting me know that you are now running my practice, your changes are costing me a lot of wasted time, and time wasted is money lost. The software worked very well, for my practice. I have been a user since 1986. Your customer service response (see above) is based on a developers vision not your customers! We need one progarm, import of Quickbooks and Peachtree into 1040, 1065, 1120, and 1120s, Accuwage, spreadsheet and the ability to unlock forms. Your customer service should pass all request to the developers without the customer having to log in and complain again when an email has been sent to customer service.

[JohnH]

"Thank you for your concerns. Be assured that we make every effort to respond to all customer requests promptly with the suggestion that you engage other levels of our bureacuracy. We have many levels to enable you to express your feelings. We are always aware of how important your feelings are. You have a right to express your feelings and we try extra hard to accomodate your feelings. We know how you feel - we've felt that way ourselves. Remember that we are all about feeling. We concentrate on feeling even more than caring. What does that mean, you ask? Well, we really don't care, but sometimes we feel bad about not caring."

[schirallicpa]

I don't like the 2 separate packages either. I don't do much payroll and it is just more monkeying around for us.

[mwrightea]

"Thank you for your concerns. Be assured that we make every effort to respond to all customer requests promptly with the suggestion that you engage other levels of our bureacuracy. We have many levels to enable you to express your feelings. We are always aware of how important your feelings are. You have a right to express your feelings and we try extra hard to accomodate your feelings. We know how you feel - we've felt that way ourselves. Remember that we are all about feeling. We concentrate on feeling even more than caring. What does that mean, you ask? Well, we really don't care, but sometimes we feel bad about not caring."

John.

Thank you for the laugh!

mwrightea

[Medlin Software, Dennis]

Can of worms for me. I admit, I chuckled at the message. I also cringed.

I cringe when someone contacts me for help and assumes I do not want to, assumes they could not have made a mistake, or worse yet, gets irate when the honest answer is not one they want to hear. I have to say "no" to some requests (for various reasons) and the number of times I get told "but I am the customer (or potential customer), you have to do what I ask" is stunning. For today's example, getting "ripped" by a caller who wanted me to license them our software, because they were tired of paying a payroll service. I said "no" because they had no payroll experience or training, and were simply not qualified to do their own payroll. (Payroll software does not make a payroll processor any more than tax software makes one a tax preparer.)

I suppose I am simply saying while the message is funny, it can be written with the participants reversed, and still not be true in the vast majority of the cases.

[BulldogTom]

Medlin,

I think the issue this year is that the program is so radically different, and it does not work as advertised. It has us all wondering if ATX (or more correctly, CCH) has a clue what they are doing. And as the time comes closer to client appointments, with little progress from the software vendor, we start getting aggitated.

And of course, we cannot pull out our typewriters (like we can for payroll taxes) and whip out a return without the software anymore. The e-file requirements and circular 230 regs make us beholden to our software vendors. That loss of control over our own businesses does not make things any better.

Finally, we have already paid for the product. And it did not work or perform as advertised. We can't change vendors at this point. We have no choice.

So when a form letter type response to our concerns about our livelyhood comes back like that, we blow off some steam at them.

Not sayin' it is right, I'm just sayin'.....

Tom

Hollister, CA

[JohnH]

Can of worms for me. I admit, I chuckled at the message. I also cringed.

I cringe when someone contacts me for help and assumes I do not want to, assumes they could not have made a mistake, or worse yet, gets irate when the honest answer is not one they want to hear. I have to say "no" to some requests (for various reasons) and the number of times I get told "but I am the customer (or potential customer), you have to do what I ask" is stunning. For today's example, getting "ripped" by a caller who wanted me to license them our software, because they were tired of paying a payroll service. I said "no" because they had no payroll experience or training, and were simply not qualified to do their own payroll. (Payroll software does not make a payroll processor any more than tax software makes one a tax preparer.)

I suppose I am simply saying while the message is funny, it can be written with the participants reversed, and still not be true in the vast majority of the cases.

Be assured I know how you feel.

I've felt that way myself before...

and so on and so on .... :)

[Medlin Software, Dennis]

Tom, I see both sides, both as user (programming tools I depend on) and as vendor (software I create).

Nothing can stay the same, much is out of my control, and I acknowledge and embrace that I can't make software which will please all. No one can do those things for me either...

[DougO]

Medlin - while I am sure you can see both sides I suspect that you would not put out into the public realm (your customers) a program that does not function. I am not talking about being slow or not having all the bells and whistles right up from (being worked on) - but rather a software product that has performed very well and adequately for a long number of years, but now you have determined that you need to change the platform and along with that, eliminate some of the most basic features that many of us "customers" use. Well that could be fine except the product that you ask us to pay for in advance and then you deliver in early December does not work. It is not the forms for IRS, it is the programming. And along the way you did not bother to mention to us "customers" that you were planning on doing such radical changes during a time frame when we could have considered making some changes if we did not agree, but NO you just dumped a heap of crap on our desks and now you "CCH" have been unable in nearly 6 weeks to revise and improve it to where one can at least open the program to see what you may or may not have done.

Why would you do that, why would you not thoroughly test the changes out, and why would you not inform your customer base ahead of time. Seems to me to be a business plan that is doomed to failure. Of course I can't see the other side right now, I am trying to figure out whether I can survive the tax season that is upon us !!!