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After being married for 50 years, I took a careful look at my wife one day and said, "Fifty years ago we had a cheap house, a junk car, slept on a sofa bed andwatched a 10-inch black and white TV, but I got to sleep with a hot 23-year-old girl every night. Now, I have a $500,000 home, a $45,000 car, a nice big bed and a large screen TV, but I'm sleeping with a 69-year-old woman. It seems to me that you're not holding up your side of things." My wife is a very reasonable woman. She told me to go out and find a hot 23-year-old girl and she would make sure that I would once again be living in a cheap house, driving a junk car, sleeping on a sofa bed and watching a 10-inch black and white TV. Aren't older women great? They really know how to solve an old guy's problems.

I know! When they insist on yakking: ("This is your busy time, huh?"), I start opening envelopes, throwing them away, rolling up glue balls, handing back the donation receipt, even though they can't itemize: "You need to decide what your three bags of clothes and microwave were worth, all microwaves are not created equal..." Oh, and here's your electric bill. Looks like it was due Thursday.

The mental image is amazing.........................................

Have you ever opened envelopes with old uncashed checks in them?

I get the clothes laundered, but not until my husband starts asking me if his underwear is in the dryer. I give him his socks and underwear to fold and put away. I hang up his shirts out of the dryer in the basement; he can bring them up when the wrinkles have hung out. I do fold his sweaters as he makes a mess of them. But, my own clothes?! I had such a huge pile on the guest bed that I brought up all my laundry baskets and have a basket for socks and underwear, a basket for jammies, slippers, and the fleece tops/sweaters/sweatshirts I wear over them, one for exercise clothes and sweats, and a stack of nice tops and sweaters still on the bed. That's as organized as I can get now. When no clients are here, I'm in my flannel jammies and fuzzy slippers with a sweatshirt or something over. Our clothes are so over-dried and wrinkled. I set the dryer and then the phone rings so by the time I get back to the basement the clothes are cold, so I turn the dryer back on to warm them up so I can fluff them and shake out the wrinkles but then a client drops by and.... And, I've used up all my baskets. Oh yeah, and a stack of rugs and towels on the guest bed and another stack of Christmas linens and clothing that I won't need until December anyway. At least hubby folds the sheets for me.

I love a sharp Vermont white cheddar, but also love feta [fantastic in an omelet, BTW], Swiss on ham, Gouda, Roquefort with an apple, oh good grief, there is just NO WAY I could choose just one, or even two or three or............

Same Here...everything is much better.. Finally getting some work done. I am planning a marathon to do my best to get the work out. Hate..Hate extensions. I have had a few times when a big error box comes up and it forces me to close, so I have been careful to save save save as I go. It has only happened 3 times..I am still looking at other options for next season. I have rode the wave this year because I had no choice, but ATX will have to do some real bargains and proof that this will not happen next year for me to stick around. April 4th is better late than never, but has sucked the life out of me this year with both my time and my employees. Lost productivity has cost all of us both financially and physically.

You can e-file a 2011 return provided that the return in question qualifies as MeF. This holds true for most federal return, and a few states... notably, OH, NY, and CA. Most states, in 2011, were still legacy; therefore, most states will have to be paper filed for 2011. For 2010, roughly 25-30% of federal returns were MeF, and no states were MeF. If your ATX 2010 program will allow you to create the e-file for the federal return, then you can safely transmit it; however, you will have to paper file most federal and all states for 2010 due to this. This holds true for individual returns; the IRS will accept e-filed business returns for current year plus two years back and most states will as well. Some states require they be paper filed for prior years. The IRS, in 2011, stated and posted that this is how it is going for individual returns going hereon out. For next year, you will be able to e-file 2013, 2012, and 2011 returns provided they meet the MeF guidelines. 2014 will see the e-filing of 2014, 2013, and 2012... at which point every individual return, with minor exceptions, would be MeF.

Yes! And overdue bills, and letters and tax department notices - I could go on. I just don't understand why people don't open their own mail.

I am amending taxes prepared by a preparer named Hack - who would go to a tax preparer or CPA named Hack?

If my clients have not removed the glueballs from their 1099-SSA before presenting it to me, I peel them off while I am talking to them. If they talk back, I remove the perforated edges while listening to them. This is a detail-oriented business, LOL.

I pull stuff out of the dryer to wear. Eventually what's remaining gets put away. I met my clients in socks but no shoes today. Still only wearing socks....

We had Wisconsin Gruyere on rosemary crackers with red grapes as a snack today. Heaven! My favorite cheese depends on the season, my mood, and what else is around. Sharp cheddar - yum. Muenster fried between two pieces of hand-made pasta dough rolled thin (Italian "grilled" cheese sandwich) -- incredible (and a boatload of work). Gruyere on crackers or melted -- like in fondue; ah! Parmesan and/or Romano on fresh pasta; who needs sauce? You expect me to DECIDE?!?!

When I bought a new file cabinet for my office, I did NOT apportion it. Flooring for that one space -- I would call it 100% business.

Thanks guys. I did a google search because something told me there is such a form. Will IRS form 1127 Application to extend time of payment due to hardship work? Anyone have experience with this form. I just want t make sure I don't give bum advice and have this poor lady pay penalty and interest.

My friend Dennis Leeking has a company named: Leeking Plumbing

I feel bad because I promised, but that was before I knew he had PTPs and hadn't giving me the K-1s! (And, he bought them in 2011, per the online site, so now there'll be IRS letters and amendments, but that's for this summer.) So, I'd already pulled three more clients out of my stack in the middle of the night when I was dealing with his Puts and missing K-1s and emailed him questions. No response from him, so working on other clients. When he contacts me, I'm saying extension. But, do I have to divide every line into 40% and 60% doubling my data entry? Every return seems to have a new twist this year. One that I'd set aside, thinking complete, waiting for them to confirm banking information -- when he emailed this morning he told me about a missing W-2 and gave me a final check stub. This one's too close to done so I'll do the substitute, but really didn't need any more issues today. And, he's complaining about his balances due, wanting explanations which I love to give BUT NOT THIS WEEK. Sign here and leave please.

OK, hubby's underwear is in the dryer; I can make it through the rest of tax season! I keep wearing the same dress slacks and sweater when clients come by, until the sweater needs cleaning and gets swapped out; the slacks have made it through a long time with no spills for the short time I'm in dress clothes.

For me it has to be Whip Cheese in a can

I just ate leftover Hamburger Helper cheese something for breakfast. Yummy.

There is no bad cheese. Some better than others!!

I have not had a single crash since the update!!

Swiss Cheese for my sandwich and crumpled blue cheese for my salad.

I'm glad to live in Wisconsin, where we all wear cheese on our heads. But sometimes, when no one is looking, I buy Vermont white cheddar. Because it is so good. Maybe I should move to Vermont?

I am so glad I don't use the client letter, after hearing complaints about it all tax season. I have custom sticky notes printed with my business name and number. I hire staff to write refund amounts, filing instructions, etc, on the sticky notes and affix them to the client copies. My clients rave about it. It's that extra personal touch that sets me apart from the other preparers in town who spit out the letters.

Hi Guys and Gals, It's been over 5 years since I got laid off from ATX in Caribou, but the local "rumor mill" composed of my former co-workers made me want to visit this community again. WOW. I considered a lot of you as friends and feel really bad for all of the trouble you are having. You are just trying to make a living. I wince when I read about the crashes, support issues and hold times. I was a Sales rep and Customer Service Manager for ATX back in the day...can't say as I would want that job this year. Anyway, I just wanted to say a quick hello and wish everyone well Kerry

If you see William, tell him we sure miss him too. And do post a picture of the girls. Last one I have they were just a toddler and a new baby. I'd love to see how they've grown.

I have run into this before. If the decedent had a business activity (including rentals) which sustained losses during the administration of the estate, the estate has an NOL. You would calculate the NOL pretty much the same as you would on a personal return. If the duration of the estate is more than one year, you would carry the NOL forward from year to year. In the final year of the estate you would pass the NOL through to the beneficiaries on K-1. If the house is a personal residence, the loss on its sale is nondeductible. If, in the final year of the estate, nonbusiness deductions (such as the administrative fees I love so much) exceed income, you have Excess Deductions on Termination. You can pass this through to the beneficiaries on their final K-1, but it is only a miscellaneous itemized deduction for them.

Actually, while 10,000 will get an automatic report filing by your bank it is my understanding that they at required to report any suspicious cash transaction or pattern of transactions. So making two deposits of $5,000 might not prevent the report from being filed.

I've been wearing socks and no shoes for weeks. Sweats as soon as the last client leaves for the day. Yes, this board is really amazing.

Crap, even W-2s were later this year. And the tax season is 74 days instead of 102 like last year. It's been hell. And the damn worksheet I was working on last night didn't save and I have to start all over again. It's a spreadsheet, not ATX. I'm about to have a meltdown over a frikkin spreadsheet. You think I'm tired?

FloridaTaxMan, I think you need to calm down, A LOT. And please drop the Caps and bold, for an entire post. Sure, it's fine for occasional emphases, but when you use them for entire posts, it is 'shouting', and really just plain bad manners. Please, we do not need personal attacks here. If you continue, you will be banned. I don't want to do that.

Are any of you on a stand-alone XP machine? until I hear good reviews from people sharing my specific set-up, I will not update...just too risky.

Good reports from the firm and my domain server!! Seems that all functions are faster. The search function in Return manager especially. Rollovers, opening returns all seem faster. I think they put the screen showing progress to keep people from forcing the progam to close, increasing the bad files etc. More news as the other people here report in. It even seems to work better on the one remaining XP machine.

Wow! Bam! We just upgraded to 12.13! A very complicated return KaPow! opened in warp speed!

I updated 8 am this morning and it is working much better so far.

I switched to Drake and prepare all the returns except 990s. Some returns are little, most are larger complex returns or business returns with lots of fixed assets. The program is fast, and I am faster now that I have learned where certain input screens are located within the program. The first thing I found that is superior to ATX is the credit for taxes paid to other states. In ATX, the credit took some juggling and linking, but with Drake it is automatic and I haven't found any that required corrections or overrides to the input. Second, creating the efiles and transmitting them with Drake is lightning fast. There is absolutely no comparison on speed of this part of the process. Drake is superior. On the negative side, when I converted my 1065 and 1120 series returns to Drake, the 2011 converted file had all of the proper figures, but the line items for the expenses didn't flow to the proper lines. Example, accounting expense might have shown on the supporting schedule as bank charges. This wasn't a big deal to me because we aren't really using that file for the actual return as this was only a conversion file. The only thing that was affected by this line mismatch was the 2-year comparision. My clients all like that form so I fixed those mismatched expenses and made sure that the 2011 conversion was correct in all ways. I spent one weekend checking every converted file. Someone warned to carefully check the fixed assets and depreciation on the converted files, but I found no errors at all there. Second negative, and this is probably me not knowing properly how to input this, but I preferred ATX schedules for the state estimates flowing over to Schedule A. I don't care for the input when the 4th quarter 2011 estimate is paid in Jan 2012 and the 4th 2012 estimate is paid in 2013, and then trying to get the proper amount to be reported on the state return for the paments. I've got it worked out, but I think ATX is easier for these inputs. The only return that I haven't been able to get worked out is one Delaware return that I will have to paper file. It has an oddball credit for the historic preservation of the taxpayer's home. This is a very large credit that is being used a little each year and carrying forward. Drake is trying to split 50-50 (yes, it is a joint credit), and is trying to allow more credit that the total tax. It should be taking the credit only up to the net tax after exemptions (Delaware's exemptions are a credit against the tax). On this one return I can get the Form 700 for the credit to print properly with an incorrect application on page 1 of the DE return, OR I can override the credit applied on page 1 of the DE return but the override stops the program from producing the Form 700 for the credit. So for this one return, I will efile the Fed and paper file the DE. Other than that one return above, I have had no problems using the program at all. I don't think it is quite as easy or flexible as ATX, and it has the forms I need for my clientele. Overall, I am very pleased with its performance, especially with those out-of-state credits. Delaware is so small, and I live right on the PA line and am 20 mins from MD and NJ, that a lot of my individual clients have multi-state returns, so that one improvement has been a real timesaver for me.

All computer programmers have deadlines and goals. Somewhere in the mid-point, if they knew they weren't ready in time, they should have paid their programmers major overtime and hired more good programmers to get the job done. You do what you have to do to make software work - and if you don't..well...kiss your brand and your customers goodbye. Again, I believe the people at the bottom saw this coming, but they didn't want to tell the people at the top what was going to happen. In short, slow motion train wreck.

Where did you leave it last? Seriously, look on the tabs at the bottom of the 4562, it should be at the far right.