SaraEA

"I think these days most students have debit cards so it should be relatively easy to keep track of expenses." That is the source of the problem! Even the 1098Ts are sent to the students, usually electronically. Lots of Moms and Dads sit at my desk texting their kids to get that document to them ASAP. And debit card purchases at the college bookstore don't count for much. The bookstores sell sweatshirts, itunes cards, coffee, you name it. You need an itemized receipt, something the students will almost never be able to produce. Better for them to buy their books online where you can actually print out the order proving you bought books and not a milkshake. I have a client right now with three kids in college who just won a no change audit for 2009 over 529 distributions. Now that he knows the kind of documentation required he's already gathering it for anticipated audits of 2010, 2011, and 2012. He makes too much to claim any education credits but had substantial distributions from 529 plans for all three kids each year. When responding to the 2009 audit the IRS wouldn't accept the T. They wanted the print out of the actual expenses, what was paid for what and when. One of the kids lives off campus and he had to get from the school the standard room and board expenses the Dept of Ed uses in its calculations for that school. Not one kid could produce receipts for books. The T does have it issues, starting from its very first year when colleges had to issue it but didn't have to fill in any boxes. Remember that? Now there is a box for "amount billed" and another for "amount paid." What is the point? I also see a lot of adjustments for last year in the box provided. Financial aid often doesn't come through until January so that messes up last year's numbers. At least this year we can enter into the program that some of the billing was for the next year's tuition, so the IRS gets notice that the kid is a student the following year even if no T is issued. There has to be a better way.

I have had many audits of 509 distributions in the past couple of years, even where the taxpayers made too much to claim any education credits or adjustments, so yes, it has become a hot topic. I think the underlying issue is that the IRS knows that the forms 1098T are useless (been to several seminars where IRS presenters said exactly that). And the 509s can cover many things like room and board and books that don't appear on the T. The IRS computers just can't match anything so the agency is reverting to the old fashioned way of requesting paper proof. You DO have to enter amounts in the program. It's under "qualifying education expenses," which is what's left after taking advantage of any education credits or adjustments. That's the number the IRS is auditing. Another situation the computers can't understand is when a student is in their senior year and final semester tuition was paid in December. They were a full-time student in the spring semester, and 509 distributions paid for their room and board, etc., but the computer doesn't see them as a student because there is no T.

My son and I visited MIT a number of years ago when he was in the process of choosing a college. He refused to even apply for two reasons. One is that he read on one of those college ranking places that 50% of accepted students scored a perfect 800 on their math SATs. (That was perfect before they inflated the scores in more recent years.) He only scored 793 and thought he would be inferior! (Driving back from the exam site he actually had an "aha" moment and realized that one problem he got wrong and wondered if he could go back and change it!) The other reason he didn't apply is that when we went for a site visit we sat in a huge rotunda waiting for the tour to begin. It was like a crossroads where students coming to and from lunch and to and from classes passed through. He noticed that except for a few girls, most of the students walked alone. He put that observation together with the many presentations we heard that day stressing the point that students are not competitors. They're a team, they're the best, they all got into MIT, and they share that special status and love and cooperate with one another. He just couldn't match the words with what he saw. And the words were almost overemphasized, like the lady doth protest too much. He just couldn't buy it. He ended up at Carnegie Mellon, which is ranked right up there with MIT. He excelled, graduated with multiple honors, immediately got a high-paying job, and now just a few years later makes more than his parents put together ever made. And he loves his work as an engineer. What more could anyone ask for their child? And we're sure he'll be able to support us in our old age. When you visit the campus, just be sure your son is comfortable there. Prestige means nothing if it's not the right match for him.

michaelmars, you need to add an experienced person to your staff to help with the "16 to prepare and 130 to review" returns. I am not trying to be unkind, but I think you have an issue with trusting anyone but yourself to accurately prepare a return. I remember an instructor I had years ago cautioning us students about believing that we were the only ones who knew how to do things right. I do think that most of us believe that we know more/do a better job than a prior preparer whose return a new client gave us. Yes, sometimes we find mistakes or something we would have done differently. But maybe that's why the new client is sitting in front of us instead of returning to their prior. Many people stay with their priors because they've never had an issue or uncomfortable feeling, and we don't get to meet those folks. If you're working until 11PM from Sept 1, you clearly need competent help. In our office for the first time this past season we hired someone to input raw data from W2s, 1099s, etc. At the end of the day a CPA and I each took half his returns to finalize them. At first I thought it took longer to check the work than to do the whole thing myself. Then I realized that the data input was nearly error-free (sometimes there were issues WHERE it was input). As the season rolled along I appreciated the tedious work being done for me. I just checked totals, and then went on to deal with the things I told the guy not to input (OIH, Sch C and E items, etc.). I can't tell you how wonderful it was to have someone input Sch D entries, and if they were "see attached" to copy and label the appropriate pages for the 8453. My point, though, is that there were two of us checking these returns. Sure we worked until 11PM, but that was during tax season. There are a lot of experienced people in my office and we normally check our own work. When any of us finishes something really complex or that we're just not sure of, we always hand it to another to review. Simple Schs A, B, C, D, E are really just data input that we're competent enough to check ourselves (unless there is all of the above schedules, in which case we want someone else to look at it in case we got dizzy). I do hope you can hire, or recognize someone already on staff, that is as good at tax prep as you are and take a load off yourself.

What a mess! The laws mandating deadlines on still in effect, so pay up. But the IRS can't pay out. We know that when refunds aren't paid within 90 (???) days the IRS must pay interest. This could prove to be an expensive shutdown, even if it only lasts a few days. We can't call the IRS because no one will be there to answer. Even on the practitioner hotline many days it takes an hour to get through, so once they get back up and running and all of us who need to speak to someone call, expect the wait time to be three hours. Automated notices will still go out but we can't respond to them. Hmmm...does that mean 30-day notices will become 30+ day notices, or will our clients be in trouble? It will take a heap of expensive lawyers to figure out if taxpayers are being denied due process. Everyone except Congress seems to know that every dollar spent on an auditor returns hundreds of dollars in tax collected. But audits are cancelled during what the IRS calls the "appropriations lapse." So we won't be collecting all this money and, for some at least, the SOL will hit and we'll never be able to collect it. This is plain idiocy. Some people in that Congress are making a very expensive point, making the gov't spend more because they don't want it to spend as much. Where is the logic in that? And all of them, Dems and Republicans alike, are staging a p**sing contest, grabbing for the limelight and making a stand. They think they're winning power and fame, but they're doing so at the lowly citizens' expense. Last national election I voted against EVERYONE who was already in office (even some I kind of liked). If all of us do the same next election, we can clear the floor of all these partisan egos and get some people who will actually run the country like they're paid (handsomely) to do. In the meantime, we're the ones who have to help clients through deadlines that haven't been "lapsed," calm those who are waiting for refunds or anxiously awaiting scheduled audits, and hang on the phone for three hours and wait forever for POAs to be processed. Those of us who anticipated a breather after the Oct 15 deadline will have to remiind ourselves why we really love our jobs.

"This part is WAY overstated. It is NOT easy for a hacker to read your e-mail unless he gets your e-mail username and password. This is how the great majority of e-mails get compromised." Jack, you're kidding, right? Please ask your software engineer son to explain this to you. The danger is not someone wirelessly connecting to your email account or finding out your access info. Email accounts go through account providers, ISPs, routers and backup systems that may or may not abide by encryption (if any). Here's just one example from Wikipedia: "Because email connects through many routers and mail servers on its way to the recipient, it is inherently vulnerable to both physical and virtual eavesdropping. Current industry standards do not place emphasis on security; information is transferred in plain text, and mail servers regularly conduct unprotected backups of email that passes through. In effect, every email leaves a digital papertrail in its wake that can be easily inspected months or years later." I have a client who is also a software engineer. When I offered to send him his signature docs via password-protected email he refused. He then gave me a 10-minute lecture about how insecure that practice is. Believe me, email is NOT secure. Please do not use it for any sensitive information. Someone on this board recently posted that Circ 230 forbids practitioners to use email for sending tax returns. I did a word search of the Circular and found no matches. Is that mandate in the proposed revisions that haven't been approved yet?

The quote from the Freedom group that started this thread is ridiculous, meant to rile people up. At this point no one knows how the operation will run so bashers are imagining things and putting them out there as facts. For example, "After all, we know the NSA believes they have the right to read your emails and listen to your phone calls. So, why wouldn't they have the right to any and all of your private information, even your banking information?" Only people who don't read real news from reliable sources would swallow any of that. First of all, NSA did not listen to phone calls, just kept massive data bases of who called whom. Calls to/from suspected terrorists were flagged by the software, but there was no way to eavesdrop on calls already completed. Unless you have anything to do with terrorism, you have nothing to worry about. Second, email is a very nonsecure way of communicating. Any hacker could read your email in no time at all. Don't blame NSA for that. If you don't use password protection and encryption for sensitive emails, blame yourself. And if you do use those tools, realize that they are not foolproof. I seriously doubt that the IRS will share any personal data with anyone because the IRC says they can't. (Well, after 9/11 they have been allowed to share with Homeland Security for suspected terrorists, but anyone in their right mind can understand why.) My hunch is that initially people who buy health insurance through the exchanges will have to disclose their income and, if eligible, will receive credits in the form of payments made from the government to the insurance company. The following year when they file their income tax returns, the IRS will verify their eligibility IN HOUSE. If they ended up making more than they stated, the IRS will inform the data people how much credit will have to paid back (through reduced payments for insurance the following year--kind of like Social Security does if you're collecting and earn too much). Either that, or the IRS will verify income to the exchanges, but they cannot disclose tax returns. Maybe this is why the IRS was given a role in health care reform in the first place. They're the only agency who knows someone's income and since they can't share that information, let them take responsibility for determining the amount of the credits. Finally, the IRS already has access to your banking information. Many audits start with bank statements. If you refuse to supply them, the agency can suponea them from the bank. This is not new and has nothing to do with health care reform. We as tax professionals know these things, especially how private tax return information is. (Ever try to talk to the IRS without a perfectly executed POA?) Our job is to assure clients that this is LAW and has not changed. Instead of riling them up, it is our professional responsibility to calm them down.

"Under the federal system that has been enjoined, enrolled agents were exempt from the registered return preparer requirements." Does this mean that NY now wants EAs to register and pay? I thought we won that battle when the state started to require paid tax preparers to register and pay $100 fee. CPAs and attorneys were exempt from both requirements, and before the system went into place EAs were deemed exempt (thank you, NY chapter of NAEA). Registration applied to every one else who did more than 10 NY returns. What bothered me about the requirement was that it was a clear money-grabber because preparers got nothing in return. They had to pay to keep doing what they've always done, and the money went into the state's general fund to be used for new subway turnstiles or sidewalks in front of the new ballpark. (I can't bring myself to mention the team.) At least the IRS system that was declared out of the bounds of their authority to enact gave registered preparers a designation they could promote, likely would have weeded out many of those preparers who give us all a bad name, and would have enhanced the creditability of the profession by requiring continuing ed. EAs are already regulated by the IRS (like CPAs and attorneys are by their respective boards), have to take continuing ed and have clean records. If NY decides they too must comply with the state regulations, what are they proposing to do that the IRS doesn't already do (except take more of our money)? In our office, which is not in NY but we do a considerable number of NY returns, we have several preparers who have more knowledge and experience than the CPAs and EAs among us (one actually taught NY state tax prep). Once the NY registration rules went into effect, all NY returns had to be routed to those with the designations, not that we could do a better job but because we weren't going to pay $100 for each of them for the "privilege" of filing NY returns. This is the same state that several times has postponed issuing refunds until after April 15 when the people who owed paid up so they had funds to pay the people who didn't. We already follow their mandate to efile, which carries a software cost. They're as arrogant as their team. Go Red Sox!!!

Anyone who has lived with mental illness in themselves or in their family could not take a lighthearted approach to such "jokes." Do you think a parent of a teen who committed suicide would get a big laugh out of that joke? Or the mother of the Navy yard shooter who tearfully apologized and sympathized with the victims of her son's actions? Politics aside, our nation's policymakers have time and again legislated "parity" in mental health care (treating it the same as any other medical condition), but they never put any teeth into it. Lots of folks who pay nothing out of pocket for visits to their internist or pediatrician and $10 for prescriptions forego mental health treatment because it costs $225 for a 50-minute hour with a therapist and the meds are over $800 a month, out of pocket. Insurance might pay for three or four visits, but even if you have schizophrenia or bipolar disorder you better be cured by then. The ACA will at last put an end to this denial of treatment. The saddest part of the Navy yard story is that the killer was actively seeking treatment and had recently been seen by psychiatrists. Years ago it became PC that it wasn't nice to institutionalize anyone, and I read today that our nation now has 5% of the beds in mental health facilities that it had 50 years ago when the deinstitutionalization movement began. If the killer had in any way threatened to harm himself or others, he could have been put into a mental health facility. He apparently did not do that, so there is no way the doctors could have given him the inpatient treatment that would have kept everyone safe. Jokes about Catholics and Jews and Irish and Asians, and tax preparers for that matter, can be tasteful and fun. Jokes about someone's anguish and pain are just mean.

Regarding land value, tax records don't help. You need to see the assessor's report, which breaks down the assessed value of land, "improvements" (e.g., house), outbuildings (e.g., fences, sheds, pools), etc. Then you can figure the ratio of each component to the total assessment. I am now doing tax planning for clients who sold an oceanfront cottage they bought in the 1960s and began renting out in the 1990s. When put in service as a rental the land value was 8 percent. A little doubtful in my mind, but it is a small lot common to beach house communities. I checked the assessor's report from last year, and the land value is now 76% (which makes more sense--run down old cottage and prime real estate). This is actually good for the clients because so much of the sales price will be allocated to the land. I haven't run the detailed numbers yet so am not sure how much depreciation will be recaptured. (There were a few structural improvements over the years, so various parts went into service at various times.) The new tax laws, however, are proving to be very expensive for these clients. They have a HUGE gain and will thus lose their personal exemptions and most of their itemized deductions. To add insult to injury, this and their other capital gains from investments will be taxed at 20%, and all their investment income will be subject to the 3.8% Medicare surtax which alone will add over $10k to their tax bill. They've been thinking about selling for a long time, but I'm not even going to mention at this late date that they should have sold last year.

All that targeting was for naught! Apparently the IRC states that social welfare groups must exist EXCLUSIVELY for social welfare purposes to be tax-exempt. The IRS, however, wrote regs stating their activities must be PRIMARILY for social welfare. ""The IRC provides that tax-exempt social welfare organizations must be 'exclusively' engaged in 'promotion of social welfare.' The IRS' implementing regulation recognizes that electoral activity does not fall within the scope of activity promoting social welfare. But the IRS's regulation also purports to provide that an organization operates 'exclusively' to promote social welfare as long as it is operated 'primarily' for social welfare purposes. By redefining 'exclusively' as 'primarily' in violation of the clear terms of its governing statutes, the IRS permits tax-exempt social welfare organizations to engage in substantial electoral activities in contravention of the law and court decisions interpreting it." A Democratic congressman is suing the IRS over the issue, which should be a nonissue because the code is the code. None of these groups, liberal or conservative, should have been granted tax-exempt status. http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/08/23/60534.htm

If your whole computer is slow, I'd worry about some spyware or malware in there. Be sure your protection is up to date (should be on automatic update). Install a free one too, like Malwarebytes, and run that every so often. I find it catches a few things Symantic doesn't.

The IRS says same-sex married couples "may" but do not have to file amended returns. It's going to be tricky to calculate, especially when you consider the state tax implications. Around here these marriages are legal, so couples had to file S for federal but MFJ or MFS for state. No word yet from the states about whether amending the federal will require a state amendment to have uniform filing status. The couples it will help the most are those who paid for medical insurance for their spouse. Both the employer's and employee's share was taxable income and appeared in Box 1 of the W2. Those amounts can be removed through an amendment. Before doing it, though, I'd wait to see if the states will require a change in filing status to conform to the feds and then play with the numbers for both fed and state to see if changes really benefit the taxpayers. It will be a lot of work on our part. My fear is that you spend a few hours calculating all the scenarios and then telll the clients it's best to leave things be and that will be $300 please?

A relative just got a notice of a class action settlement for some stock he owned. Seems as if the corp was misrepresenting its financials. After the lawyers are paid, the settlement will be 5 to 13 CENTS per share. If he owned a million shares I'd consider filing. With less than 100, not worth the time. I do remember some time ago when HRB and some class action lawyers reached a settlement but the judge actually threw it out, stating it did not help the affected parties enough and that the company and attorneys were too cozy with one another instead of acting like adversaries. That's the only time I remember reading of such a thing. Everyone who had trouble with ATX last year deserves real compensation, starting with the full cost of the software and going up from that point for lost business etc. Don't join the class action but sue on your own?

"But who has a 1040 and Sch A without a Sch B? Or a D? Who can buy a house without sufficient resources to have other accounts? " Catherine, am I the only one who has lots of clients who make well into the six figures and the only interest they have is from their mortgage escrow? I always wonder how they can spend it all, but they sure do. And KC says he has clients who are "both polite and respectful of your advice, and pay promptly." I have a few clients who take over $100k from their retirement plans every year, have 10% withheld and NO state tax. How about the self-employeds for whom you calculate and print out estimates every year and they never send them in? My advice goes unheeded year after year so they end up paying interest and penalties. I want more of Catherine and KC's type clients! What is missing from this discussion is those clients you have had for years, raising their fees a bit from time to time. It suddenly hits you that by now they are paying way less than what you charge for similar returns. What do you do? Some of them come in with their check already made out--are they being clever or just trusting? As for clients who don't pay promptly? I feel strongly that we should not release or efile a return unless payment is in hand. The problem is there are always exceptions (those who always pay when their refund arrives, businesses where the invoice has to go through the accounts payable dept, etc.). The exceptions become the norm, and we end up chasing people for payment for months. (Some pay when they come in next season and we tell them no dice, but then they do the same thing that year. When will we ever learn?) This year we have decided to fire a number of clients. Those who don't pay relatively promptly are going on the list. This is relatively tricky because if they owe you money when you fire them, you'll never see it. There are others whose income and expense records are not believable, who you have to nag for info, are downright nasty when you nag, piecemeal their info, you know the types I mean. How do we respectfully fire them without making it sound like we are downsizing our business or that we hate them and never want to see them again? Maybe someone wants to start a new topic on this issue.

"I told them to suck it up and file joint and split the refund and be done with it." Um, marital status is determined on the last day of the year. If on Dec 31 they were divorced, they CANNOT file jointly. I actually had a couple this year whose divorce decree said they were to file jointly the year of the divorce, but that is against what the IRS says they must do. No wonder the Supreme Court is reluctant to take on tax cases. Judges don't understand the law any better than laypeople. The "income splitting" part is different and I could see how it could confuse the IRS computers that match reporting documents filed under one SS# with the tax return of the person who has that SS#.

I don't think any one of us is belittling our clients. These are just the kind of comments we hear frequently that put a chuckle in our day. As MAS says, "Only us get a kick out of this." Of course we explain the rules and the law, over and over again, and most of the clients are glad they asked because they really don't want to get in trouble with the IRS (which is why they asked). I for one would feel that I was missing something if I didn't have at least one client each season whose car taxes or mileage or charitable contributions were not printed on the ceiling over my desk.

But unemployment isn't taxable, right? But disability isn't taxable, right? I put a new roof on my home and want to deduct it. I bought an energy-efficient washer and want to deduct it. I have to buy nice clothes for work, so I want a deduction.

The estate tax was enacted to prevent families from amassing wealth over generations and becoming dynasties. Think about it. Without some curbs on inheritances, a child and grandchild and great grandchild born into the Campbell or Walton family would never ever have to work or pay a dime in taxes. In other words, they would never have to contribute anything to society. The Warren Buffets and Rockefellers and Carnegies, and now even the Gates, have voiced their beliefs that the people of this nation helped them create their wealth and deserve a piece of it after they are gone. These ultra-wealthy have created trusts or foundations to give their fortunes back to the people. Seems wiser than paying an estate tax to the government that will only squander it. Has anyone here ever done a federal 706? I haven't. In our firm we have prepared a few state 706s where the limit is much lower. Rich people didn't get that way because they're stupid.

You have to understand the source of these data. We all know you can spin statistics any way you want. The Cato Institute is libertarian and in the past has published "scientific" studies "proving" that minorities have lower IQ scores than whites, that the nation's most effective preschool program for low-income children (Head Start) doesn't work, that all child care is harmful, and all manner of treatises to support their conservative views. They start with a conclusion and bend the data to prove it. Usually their biases are exposed in the scientific literature, which soundly disputes their conclusions, but that reasoned discourse doesn't make for good headlines and is typically ignored by the media. That said, and acknowledging that I haven't yet read their "study," I wonder how they account for a few inconvenient facts. Biggest is that TANF (welfare) is time limited to 24 months at a stretch (20 in many states) and 5 years lifetime. People just can't stay on it forever anymore, so the Institute's income levels must presuppose that the recipient is currently eligible and hasn't reached any limits yet. Similarly, WIC is only available for pregnant women and those with children under the age of five. Families can't collect that support for very long. I can only surmise that the numbers Cato used represent hypothetical families who are in that sweet spot of being eligible for all available benefits. That probably characterizes some families but certainly not most of them. Yes, this critique comes from the same poster who a couple of weeks ago lamented that my charitable nature was curbed by an encounter with a hairdresser who was looking for a luxury rental and assuming Section 8 would cover it, was going to bring a baby home from the hospital and was looking for a way to get paid for not working, was mad at the electric company for demanding that she pay her overdue bills, and bought a gigantic flatscreen TV, all of this while surfing on her expensive smartphone with a clearly expensive data plan Obviously I'm not denying that there are people who work harder at using the system than they do at, well, working. I'm just alerting people to the fact that everything that purports to be scientific isn't necessarily so. Anything with the word "Cato" in the byline should be approached with caution and should never be cited as "proof" of anything except their skill in using statistics to support their cause.

We had an IRS auditor doing an audit in our office a couple of weeks ago . In chatting with him we mentioned how the IRS response time even on the practitioner hotline is taking forever. He said, "It will only get worse." Not encouraging for an agency that says it considers us stakeholders.

What a masterpiece! And Margaret, if you have deer don't even bother thinking about serious gardening. I have to put bird netting over the tomato plants because they eat every single growing tip. This year my sedum is finally being allowed to bloom because I put stakes around it and strung fishing line around them. The deer tend to feed at night when they can't see the line, and once they hit it they don't know what they're up against so leave it alone. I HATE deer, even though others think they're so cute and peaceful. I consider them garden terrorists.

Not all clients with an OIH are lazy/busy/paperwork challenged. Many simply do not meet the regular and exclusive use tests. Sure they have a home office, which doubles as a place to park their exercise equipment, or where their kids do their homework and use the printer, or where they spend their weekends watching streaming video or playing internet games. I suspect that many who claim OIH don't meet the tests. On the other hand, I have a self-employed client who uses the entire basement of his large home as his home office--there is no other office--who has never taken OIH because HE told ME the use isn't exclusive. Maybe he has his washer and dryer down there, I don't know. The safe harbor rules will certainly benefit him.

In addition to those who claim EITC, many elderly clients use VITA services. I believe that AARP runs many free sites and might have its own training sessions. I've seen two major problems with those returns. One is that Box 2 of the 1099R is blank (and the "taxable amount not determined" box is checked), so the preparer leaves it blank. The software reads a "zero" when the entire amount is actually taxable. Second is gov't employees who paid into their retirement with after-tax dollars. The amount in Box 1 is not fully taxable, but unless you see their retirement letter containing the data, you can't tell what the ratio is and most of the VITA volunteers don't know enough to ask for the letter. Both Congress and the IRS know that the tax code is indecipherable. And they both want to assist low-income and elderly taxpayers so they don't have to fork over some of their sparse dollars for professional tax prep. The VITA sites are a "feel good" solution, but the TIGTA audit results show that they aren't much of a solution. The real fix will be to simplify the tax code so more people with relatively simple financial lives can actually figure out how to do their own returns correctly.

The IRS quality review rules sound ideal--the volunteer who prepares the return makes a few judgement calls re filing status etc and enters the data. Then a person more knowledgeable goes over everything before the taxpayer leaves the office and the return is filed. EXCEPT THAT the knowledgeable person isn't there every minute the site is open. And when there's a line out the door, those checklists aren't always followed to the T. IRS's own audits have shown that. The situation reminds me of my days at HRB. The computer locked certain returns for quality review, either because they had something unusual (even a K-1) or the client bought the peace of mind guarantee. At the end of the day, those returns were checked and the checker's code entered so they could be released to efile. Problem was that the client and his/her original documents were long gone. There was no way to verify that the client really qualified for HOH status or was entitled to claim that dependent. All you could do at that late date was check that the W-2s etc that we retained were entered correctly. And often when the original preparer was a respected colleague, you just signed off on it without questioning anything. Out of the hundreds I reviewed, I can only think of a dozen that I continued on hold because something seemed out of whack. What a waste of time and false sense of security. And that's exactly what I think of the IRS rules for its VITA sites. Sound good on paper but.... I too know many really good preparers who pride themselves on volunteering for VITA. Several EAs, others with 20+ years tax prep experience, even a former IRS agent. I'm sure they do a really good job with those clients who are lucky enough to see them. That said, a very experienced pro I know left VITA because she was the one who checked returns and said that 90% of them were wrong. She thought they were harming rather than helping their clients. The problem reflects the fact that so many people think they know how to do taxes. (How many returns have you corrected that were done by someone's coworker or brother in law?) The IRS reinforces the idea by giving people a brief training session and a rulebook, and then certifying them as "trained" volunteers. Yet filing status and EITC are among the most complicated parts of the tax code. at times stumping even those of us with extensive training. As much as they'd like to make it seem that anyone can quickly learn how to do a "simple" return, I don't think there is such a thing as a simple return anymore. We do few EITC returns where I work, but I confess that I have referred to VITA a couple of them where I suspect unreported income. The unpaid volunteers don't have to answer the due diligence questions on Form 8867, nor are they subject to the huge fines.