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Who took a picture of my office?

I see lots of familiar names appearing that haven't been on in a while. Welcome back to those of you MIA over the summer and fall of last year, and welcome to our new members that have joined recently. Also, thank you to all that have stuck around through the slower months to keep this site one of the best. I'm looking forward to this year and this filing season being better than the last one.

Gotta Love Taxes??????

My 2015 fillable blank organizer with page numbers is attached. The software that makes it fillable did a poor job on both the Dependents page and the Noncash Charitable page, but overall it's pretty good. If you don't like my cover letter, delete it. Feel free to email this to new clients. 2015 Blank Organizer.pdf

"free federal and $9.99 for state" You can bet no one will walk out of an H&R Block office not paying more than that by the time they get through adding on all the extra charges. They advertise all kinds of gimmicks to get people in and then they stick it to them.

And today, Alan Rickman as well. Also 69; also cancer. Rest in peace, Professor. BBC article

It's another loss of a man with incredible talent, and a sad week so soon after the loss of David Bowie. Two of my favorite characters that AR played are Col Brandon in Sense and Sensibility and Dr Alexander Dane in Galaxy Quest. GQ always makes me laugh.

Server 2011 Small Business I have complained about this rookie programming problem since it showed up in 2013. When they stood firm on their price increase, I told them that if this problem and 3 other nagging things like the automatic backup feature that does not work, were not corrected, I would send an e-mail to the entire group in the tech/development division every day till it is fixed. I was given solid assurance, by more than one person, in more than one department, that those problems were corrected.

I am using this program to stop Windows 10 upgrades from installing. I can't guarantee that this is virus-free, but Avast did not block it, and I have noticed nothing unusual since I installed it a month ago. http://blog.ultimateoutsider.com/2015/08/using-gwx-stopper-to-permanently-remove.html

I would probably charge pretty close to your planned fee BUT -- I would put the full price on the invoice and give a discount. People LOVE getting the discount. I get (occasional) thank you letters for the discount. And the client has a better idea of what my services are worth. (I price by the form and have a high per-form charge, so PITA clients and complex clients get no discount. Easier forms - like the elderly lady who does a smattering of translation and has a three-line Sch C - get small to deep discounts.)

Depends on what people are looking for. That group is for software-related questions and has 44 members and would duplicate what we have going here. It's not a bad thing to get additional input on the MAX program from anyone that uses it. Maybe we should invite those 44 to join here. ETA - I see you are one of the 44 already. It really depends on what people are looking for: a place for more personal and fun postings, or more tax-related and professional items. Personally, I like to keep FB as one of my fun places to relax and share with friends, not more work-related material because I have enough of those sites already.

Our minimum fee this year, the fee that will entice me to put my signature on a return, is $200. For the scenario you posted, I would charge that guy $200. Where I work and play, that means, assuming he did not move during the tax year, three returns - federal, state and local. Where I work and play, the state and local do not play off of the federal. I practice in a town of about 5,500 people in what seems to be an area not so different than yours. I do not seek out the type of client you describe - but if he shows up and we do the return, he will pay us $200. And we will not apologize for charging him that/

And he recorded the album as a farewell to fans, which I've been since I was 13.

I always put Health benefits and Housing Allowance in Box 14. Neither are required, but the tax preparer may not know about either of those if the W-2 preparer doesn't make him aware of it. And it's always good for the employee to know what he really made. They sometimes forget.

He did an absolutely *fabulous* job as Col. Brandon -- and also as Dr Dane -- and also as Professor Snape. Such talent. We are diminished.

I never connected him with Hans Gruber until recently. That's how good of an actor he was.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/2945412/microsoft-windows/windows-nagware-patches-kb-2952664-and-2976978-install-repeatedly.html

They only appear if you have both SE health insurance and premium tax credit. They show after the Ln 29 tab on the 1040.

There's a closed group we all could join. It's not very active but I'm sure we could liven it up! https://www.facebook.com/groups/827167400659499/

Not any official site that I've found. Lots of us are probably on FB with personal pages if you want us as personal friends. Would people want an unofficial group on FB for sharing pictures and such? We could set up a group called something like "Friends of..." that could be managed so that friends could be referred and approved. Those are pretty easy to set up and would be much easier for sharing personal stories and pictures.

We say we have a $250 minimum, but a client with one W2, standard deduction, no child care, health insurance all year, no IRA, no HSA, etc., etc. would probably be $125-$150.

That is correct. The due date changes are for tax years AFTER Dec 31 2015.

I thought this went into effect for the 2016 tax year (2017 filing season).

You can give this information to YOUR clients if you choose. I am too smart to do so.

Why not give yourself the best of all of your operating systems by using a multiple boot program? I cloned my Win 7 operating system and upgraded this clone to Win 10. I also downloaded from MS a clean install of WIN 10 and installed that as a third operating system. All of my programs and data are kept on separate hard drives which can be accessed from any of the three operating systems. All of my hardware and 103 out of 106 of my programs all work perfectly under WIN 10. It took a few weeks for Soundblaster to release the WIN 10 drivers, but that was a small price top pay. If either of the WIN 10 installations acts up, I can just boot to WIN 7 and continue on with whatever program and data I was using. ProSeries loaded from 1999 through 2015 with no problem and ATX also loaded from 1999 through 2012 (the year I left) without any problems. As I said, I can open any of these programs and work on them with any of the three installed operating systems. Of the 3 systems, my favorite is the clean install of Win 10. It is the fastest of the three in handling all of my programs from all of the tax programs, to MS Office professional, to my Scan Snap. The new internet browser, Edge, needs some work, but I can use IE 11 and Chrome from Win 10 and use Edge when I want to use some if its new features such as being able to highlight and mark up web pages. I have another computer running strictly XP networked with my main computer which goes back to my 1988 Pro Series tax programs and clients (it was Chipsoft then) and back to 1992 to my first business returns with ATX Saber. I have used this approach of dual and triple booting since Windows 95 to allow myself to be able to ease into new operating systems at my own pace and always have the "old standby" available at a moment's notice. That way I can pick and choose what I want out of the new operating system (such as speed) and not give up anything until I am ready. The multiple boot program I have used is a free program Easy BCD. If you have at least two hard drives on your system, this might give you an opportunity to check out WIN 10 and not have to worry about having to "downgrade" back to WIN 7, since you will also have your complete WIN 7 installation at a moment's notice.

I have always asked my clients to get the student's account from the bursar with dates, amounts, etc. Some colleges actually print it out on the back of the 1098 or include in the same mailing. In a time pinch I have settled for clients going through their check registers for amounts paid. And, like our Dear Abby says, most of my students are at schools with tuition in the tens of thousands of dollars with little in the way of scholarships, so just checking that the student didn't pay it all himself via student loans is really enough. Except for the last year when tuition was probably paid the previous December.... But, that student at a community college, I really wait for the bursar statement for anyone that might possibly have paid less than $4,000 out of pocket. As a rule of thumb, if tuition is less than $20,000 I need to see a breakout of who paid what and when and how much. See it now or see it later when the IRS letter arrives!

We have clients who have kids in colleges that REFUSE to issue 1098-T citing some rule about not required to, if the scholarships exceed the amounts billed. Colleges' apathy and carelessness are as much to blame for all the mess as the inconsistency of the IRS about this.