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No, if you've been to the official forum, there are a few that have complained that the software was crashing, not opening, and losing data as recent as a week ago. Anyway, I was talking about the possibility of the rollover data having problems, not anything to do with running a demo.

Jack, clicking on that link "tax return preparer" in windmill's post above will take you to the NY website's page that outlines who must register and who is exempt. You/your firm would be exempt as EAs.

Isn't anyone worried about whether the data will roll over correctly? Wasn't the 2012 program losing data when creating the e-file, saving, closing, then reopening? Sorry, I wouldn't have too much confidence in the rollovers if I stayed with ATX. I'd be rechecking every one of those returns, and if that's the case, you might as well convert to other software. After all, we're only going into the second week of November now and the program usually isn't released for several more weeks. I sincerely hope that those of you that are patiently waiting for the rollout of ATX 2013 have at least spent some time this offseason to demo other software.

Thanks for that reminder to donate, Jack. Eric, thanks for taking care of us so well.

I have a top loading Maytag Centennial that we purchased 3.5 years ago that I mostly like. We've had no problems with it at all. It does have bleach and softener dispensers, and a very nice high capacity stainless steel wash basket. I think it cleans the clothes really well and has lots of settings. It's the first washer that I've ever owned that has a delicate cycle. Husband didn't understand the necessity of this in shopping for the first appliances. There are two things about it that I would change if I could. The first is that it automatically senses the water level needed once the lid is closed and the machine is started. This feature really does work well and saves water, but not if you are like me and occasionally drop a sock or find one more piece to add to the load after closing the lid. If the lid is opened after the machine is started it defaults to the highest water level. It's possible to raise the lid about 1/4" and slip that wayward sock in, but any more than that and it shuts off and defaults. Annoying! The second thing is that the wash time is the same length of time for all selections no matter whether it's sturdy/extra soiled or delicate with the only difference being the amount of agitation. That seems like a waste of time and electric to me. I've never owned or used a front load so I can't comment there.

I've had slow response on this site for about a week now. For the last hour, I've not been able to access at all and getting either "page cannot be displayed" and lastly SQL error without any error message shown. At least I now know it's not just me or my computer. Maybe Eric's been working on something?

Yes, that might be a good deal. When I posted above, I realized that your credit card would be on file, but that if CCH tried to charge you that the charge could be disputed. That was one call I made that my credit card company said would be difficult to dispute last year because I had prepaid in the previous May. My credit card company couldn't understand that it is common in this industry for users to renew early to take advantage of a discount. In the end I did receive my refund because I followed their policy to the letter, including using the preferred method of request via their website. But I also followed that up with a letter in writing that I faxed, kept a copy of the transmission report, and included all of that in the mail also. Overkill to be sure. After that I called the new account rep and the accounting dept every single week until I had my money. It took until early April, but I did get the money back.

I would want to know how this offer works with their refund policy. Their current policy says that a user requesting a refund is charged $20 per e-filed return starting with the second one. If you have agreed to purchase the software on this deferred payment plan and choose to not pay for it, wouldn't you still be obligated to pay $20 per return that you did complete through the end of Feb? This was one problem some disgruntled users had last year when they thought about leaving, that they had filed so many returns that the $20 per return charge ate up the entire refund, had they asked for one. How many returns do you file early in the season?

Margaret, did you run it from one of the links in the ATX blog or from the letter? The letter only came out yesterday is the one that contained the faulty link.

Several users over on the official forum are reporting that the system analysis tool that is accessed by the link in the letter does not run. One person that called in was on hold for about 20 minutes until the rep provided a different link. Sheesh!

Rich, I am sorry to hear that the cancer wasn't completely removed with the surgery. That is such a hard decision to go for the double mastectomy, especially when still recovering from the first surgery. I'm praying for you both.

This past year one of my wealthier clients fell for one of those newspaper ads and purchased gold coins, the kind that are collectible and that there is no market for. He called and asked what I thought, but he'd already done it, although he didn't tell me. His wife told me later on at another meeting.

KC, maybe this thread belongs in the politics section since you took it to that with your second post that jumped straight to "hatred of conservatives" and your follow up post that included the phrase "typical small minded liberal, ad hominem attack". That seems like a big reaction to someone's questioning the validity of a story, don't you think?

I don't have any big hatred of the conservative talk shows or their hosts, but I have to admit that I had the same reaction that this story may be fabricated. Maybe it's to protect this person's identity, but because of the way this was written there's nothing in it that can be substantiated. To be totally fair to Mr. Beck, I'll go one step further and say that I would have had the same reaction no matter the source because I've seen too many instances of friends posting stories such as this one that get passed around on social media sites that are later found out to be totally false or fabricated. I shared a story 2 days ago that was a warning of a scam and within a few minutes one of my friends provided me with the facts that what I'd shared was not true at all.

Haha, my husband spent his youth living in Decatur, Illinois and followed the Chi White Sox. I don't need to tell anyone how bad their year was, do I? We've all but turned off baseball for the year. The Phillies are our closest local MLB team and they need also to rebuild the team with younger players. I think my husband probably dislikes both the Cards and the R Sox teams equally, and with FOX covering the series, I know that we won't be tuning in terribly much...or will wear out the "mute" button on the TV control if we watch at all. Neither of us can stand listening to Tim McCarver and Joe Buck.

Darn! I think you are correct, the picture must have been photoshopped. The date should be 10/21/2015. Oh well, it's a good reason to watch the movie again.

Look what happened yesterday -

Someone on the other board reported that it was the organizer update, and it created all sorts of problems that caused that particular person's system to start crashing again. They had to take all of their computers in the network offline. Message from Stephanie at ATX: from Stephanie B CCH SFS once you have ATX installed, you can get the latest update (12.19 in this case), it contains all of the updates in that one. this is what we have in 12.19 The 1040 Comprehensive Organizer and the shorter version - The 1040 Standard Organizer - are included in this release. Organizers can help clients organize tax information for the upcoming tax season. By adding an organizer to the client's return, the client's previous tax year information is populated in the organizer worksheets. Send the worksheets to your clients so they can provide you with the new numbers for the upcoming tax year stephanie

JohnH, you bring up an important aspects of being a good sales person, and that is knowing your audience and addressing their needs, wants, and concerns. A good sales person can be taught how best to present a product's features and benefits, but a great sales person will tailor the presentation to that potential customer. The ATX reps would be more effective if they know who has attended the sales conferences, knows the mix of returns we prepare, and the client base we serve. Knowing about the customer's needs makes it easier to get the add-on sales.

I'm not specifically picking on CCH, but that is unfortunately the case with all of the vendors. We preparers have only contact with the sales team that may not have all of the facts in place for us to make very informed decisions about our purchase, and the program we are given to test drive is from the prior year. With all of the problems that the ATX program had last year, I have to agree with Eric's statement in the last month or so that CCHSFS needs to go beyond their SOP to reassure their customers that things will be different going forward. Having a sales rep talk in generalities doesn't carry much weight at this point, especially after the repeated promises of fixes over the course of this last busy season.

I agree about going to an attorney that specializes in business, tax and estate planning to have the document written up. The accountant/tax preparer should possibly be involved to provide the attorney with information concerning the level of income of the company and the effect of the agreement on company going forward and in the event of a retirement or death of an owner. The OP said that these clients that he/she was concerned about were small business clients but didn't mention the type of entity that the business was. When deciding whether to use life insurance to help fund payouts made as determined by buy-sell agreement, we need to think ahead to the time that proceeds may be issued and the tax impact. Tread carefully when using life insurance to fund a buy-sell agreement involving a C corporation. It can give the corporation greater exposure to the corp AMT because of its effect on yearly book income, and the payout to a corporation at death can also trigger the corp AMT. A cross-purchase agreement can work there are only two shareholders where they maintain insurance on each other, but that technique does not work when there are more than 2 shareholders because of the transfer for value rule. Also, life insurance will cover death, but the company needs to consider how it will fund the payout to a retiring shareholder as well. Years ago I acquired a client whose existing stock redemption agreement had some big problems. Its valuation formula was poorly designed and had been worked out by the 3 owners. Whole life insurance was purchased by the corp with the corp named as the beneficiary, and the corporation would have paid a lot of money in corp AMT on the proceeds at death. This would have resulted in the corp not having enough to fully fund the redemption, and the widow would have ended up with an extended payout over years. This was far from what the owners intended or wanted. The entire agreement was redesigned with the life insurance placed in a partnership that would shelter the proceeds from the corporate AMT.

You or the programmers?

The few schema errors I've had have been invalid characters, usually in a name of a company or street address. I've seen them for an apostrophy, comma, & in the wrong place, etc. I found out that Drake doesn't like commas in business names or periods after the abbreviations like "inc." but the system gives a warning before getting to efile. Are there many manual entries on the 2555, or is it flowing from other sources such as the dividend input. If there aren't many manual entries, maybe you should try deleteing the 2555 input form and reentering again. Have you posted this also over on the official forum. If you can't find any invalid characters and reentering doesn't work, the ATX staff is addressing problems such as this if you can't find what's wrong. That board should be a lot quieter now that the 15th has passed.

I agree 100%, Jack. IRS also said the PTIN fee for what used to be free was to help pay for their program of testing and monitoring of CPE. Now that's gone and we are still paying. I do think the testing and monitoring will be back in some form though.

No, Jack. lol There was a comment about political strategy regarding the shutdown that didn't belong here so I removed it. If anyone would like to start a related thread about the ongoing effects of the shutdown as it relates to politics in the politics forum, that is OK. If it's something that directly affects tax preparation and what we will be facing as tax preparers, it stays here. There are some original posts like this one that are more of a PSA so that we are aware of a sitch.