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Merry Christmas! There are many nice things about this time of year, but for anyone not associated with a particular Christian church, I invite you to attend one of the concerts, fellowships, or rituals in your community. Happy new year! If you don't already have your resolutions in order, may I suggest the following? I know of none better. On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country, to help other people at all times, to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.

I just wanted to wish everyone Happy Holidays!!!! MAS

I never send anything to third parties under any circumstances. (This includes tax returns, by the way). Everything goes to the client. If a third party absolutely requires a document from me as a condition of approving something for a client, then the client isn't going to get the loan, approval, grant, whatever. The more adamant they are about this, the more convinced I become that they want to drag me into some sort of potential liability situation.

I understand the reaction, Tabby, but this is not a "little thing". The penalties for not taking 'due care' are much higher than they used to be, plus more people are filing suit over this sort of thing. It used to be a 'little thing'. but it's really not any more. Be smart and CYA.

Well I'm and old ATX'er who switched to Drake for the 2013 tax year. Looked at the Form-Based data entry tutorial for 1040s, looks easy to get accustomed-to,... not much different from ATX, if not better. Most of my workload is 1040s with a few 1120Ss & 1041s so it shouldn't be much of a hassle to get acquainted. Has to be better than ATX last year.

Famous Last Words!!!

Most tax preparers would probably refuse this request, citing IRS ethical standards. Without a written authorization to release information, there would be little defense against a malpractice suit if the landlord denies the application. Even with a release, fax is basically NEVER considered a reasonable business practice for handling confidential information because there is no control over who has access on the receiving end. It was different in the past, but nowadays the professional approach is to hand the letter to the client personally. Period.

THIS ONE IS HILARIOUS

Well, got the conversion to work. The problem being for some reason Drake UPS'ed a mailer which included a conversion disk for CCH Prosystem fx rather than just plain o'le ATX to me. I sorta looked at the disc that said "CCH 2013 Conversion Package" thinking it was the ATX conversion disc. After discussing with the Drake support, I noticed that it was for the wrong software. Not sure why Drake did this to me, I downloaded the correct Conversion file from their software support site and all of the files automatically converted. All is well.

An EA I know here in Mass who specializes in OICs recommended to me several years ago to put in a very lowball offer, get it rejected, and get to Appeals as quickly as possible. The idea is that only the folks in Appeals have any real authority to negotiate -- the "regular" office staff are only able to agree to near-full-payments. Worked for me the two times I went all the way through. After which I decided that trying to do OIC's as a one-person office is madness; tons of paperwork up front, the IRS offices ignore you for months, after which time you get maybe two weeks to re-do all that paperwork while every other client's work gets ignored. No, thanks - I have easier ways to hurt myself! YMMV.

Drake is not CCH/ATX and from my short experience does not do the things that CCH has done that caused this board to be created and needed. I see members candidly discussing Drake and its flaws on its board, with no cencorship whatsoever (except for direct attacks on Named staff or other members, which really isn't approriate on any forum - and this I only saw from posts that this had happened in the distant past). On the other had, for the most part members there are happy with Drake and you see virtually no bashing.

Do you like to read a good murder mystery? Not even Law and Order would attempt to capture this mess. This is an unbelievable twist of fate!! At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, (AAFS) President Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal Complications of a bizarre death. Here is the story: On March 23, 1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a 10-story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to the effect indicating his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor, his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly. Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had been installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned. The room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was threatening her with a shotgun! The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger, he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window, striking Mr. Opus. When one intends to kill subject 'A' but kills subject 'B' in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject 'B.' When confronted with the murder charge, the old man and his wife were both adamant, and both said that they thought the shotgun was not loaded.. The old man said it was a long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore, the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is, assuming the gun had been accidentally loaded. The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's son loading the shotgun about 6 weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his Mother. Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was guilty of the murder even though he didn't actually pull the trigger. The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus. Now for the exquisite twist... Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to jump off the 10 story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window. The son, Ronald Opus, had actually murdered himself. So the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide. A true story from Associated Press.