jklcpa

I'm sorry. It is hard when we build relationships with our clients over a long career. Most of the people I service are more than just clients to me. I've had 3 recent losses. First was husband of an elderly couple that I've known since college. He died of Alzheimers and in his younger days was brilliant, and to see his mind go and the body waste away was simply awful. Second was a husband that fought melanoma for about 10 years that had finally spread to most of his organs, spine and brain. I delivered their return on a Tuesday in March. He was in a hospital bed in their living room and passed 4 days later on that following Saturday. He was in his early 60s. Third was a friend of my husband's that had dermaschlerosis that affected her lungs as opposed to her skin being affected. She was in her mid 60s and chose not to be on a ventilator and basically died from lack of oxygen.

That is crazy and you are right, the system does stink. I have an elderly woman and her daughter as clients. I have known them my entire life and went through school with the daughter since kindergarten. The daughter didn't graduate HS because sometime around the age of puberty she deveoped severe schizophenia, paranoia, and other mental challenges. She can function (sort of) if she remembers to take her meds. She found a job that paid a small amount but it became almost more disabling than just living with the mental challenges she faces daily. No way she could live on the little bit she earned and she could not continue working. She's now 53 and still lives with mom who is in her 80s and in poor health. Mom fought hard to get the daughter qualfied for disability benefits, and even now sometimes she has to go through some process to have the drugs reinstated as being necessary. The amount of disability is very small, nothing she could live on, and no one has an answer to what will happen to her when mom passes away. She has a brother that won't be stepping up to that plate. It all makes me very sad.

No! Rejected? What was the cause for *all* to be rejected? ETA - I typed too soon. I just checked and that final PA return was just ACK'ed as *accepted*.

I was just going to post about this. I have one remaining from PA, filed on the 10th. I figured the delay was because it's a PA resident with TP and SP both working in DE with the credits. Plus the states couldn't pick up returns or send ACKS through with the MeF being down for a period of time yesterday. That's been resolved and I received DE ACKs, so it's a definitely a holdup with PA.

^ Until this year, it was a bunny hop for me.

Yes, I had a couple that filed separate returns one year and the wife filed her return first through some free service claiming the standard deduction. Husband came to me with Sch A deductions. House is in only his name alone with the mortgage and r.e. taxes that are paid out of a checking account with his name only, and funded solely by him. Wife did not want to listen when I told her to file an amended return. She did get the letter from the IRS. I've been preparing a joint return ever since.

Nothing is showing up on line 10 of the form 1116? Have you filled in the other information on page 1 in the deductions section? ATX isn't the easiest program to use for the 1116, but I seem to remember that the program would allow the full credit in the current year but wouldn't have the information to really calculate it correctly including those carryovers if this deduction section isn't completed.

If a person has a HDHP and is not enrolled in Medicare, then it is possible for that person to continue to contribute to an HSA. Starting with the month that the person is enrolled in Medicare is when the person becomes ineligible.

Don't forget the mileage for her to drive to the post office to mail the package. Ha ha!

Well said, Ron.

That was my reaction too. With up to 6 people on payroll and if they are paid weekly, plus the deposits and filings? That's a lot of work for the little you are charging!

They are lifelong Delaware residents, never ever were NC residents. Back in the mid '80s they purchased a lot in NC and built a vacation house. Because of some financial difficulties, they decided to turn the vacation home into a rental last year. This rental income is the only NC income they have, and the gross rental is below the filing threshold. I'm only concerned that if they split up in a future year, or decide to file separately in future, that they *might* have high enough rental income to require a NC return and that NC would then see that the home was rented in prior years because of the date placed in service and depreciation taken. That is really my concern whether or not to file this 2012 return. The property is being managed for them by a realty company. Would NC have received copies of the 1099miscs that were filed?

You are not alone. I have at least 3 of these little old ladies. One is a new client and a recent widow, her husband died in Jan 2013 and she'd never had to deal with any of the financies. What a struggle it was to get all of the information. She has no children and no relatives that live close by. When she finally came for the appointment, she brought a 5 inch stack of bank statements from a variety of banks all mixed together with the 1099s. The 1099s from SSA were missing. She found them later in an end table drawer after she requested duplicates from SSA. Then she didn't want to spend the cost of the first class stamp to mail me the 2 forms! The topper was when she said she'd like her original documents returned to her in their envelopes. Arrrrrgh! She's a nice lady and I think she will ultimately be a good client, but she surely did test my patience.

One of my Delaware couples own a house in North Carolina that they turned into a rental starting in July, 2012. It is short-term vacation type of rental. The house is in joint names but the management company issued each of them a 1099-misc for $3427. They've had a rocky relationship in the past and is most likely the reason for splitting the income onto 2 1099s. I believe they will file a joint federal return and would not have to file a NC return if filing on a joint basis because the filing threshold is $11,000 (but is $2,500 if filing separate returns). Is there any reason why I should consider filing a NC return? If they separate or file separately in the future, would it be better to file the return to document the activity and the depreciation even though they wouldn't own anything for 2012? Would you start out with the property split onto 2 columns of the Sch E because of the 2 1099s or add them together?

I charge by the hour for bookkeeping. The monthly fees are pretty consistent from month to month for any given client, but every so often there will be additional amounts for worker comp audits, bonus calculations, whatever else a client without a bookkeeper might come up with that he/she doesn't want to do. I don't offer to process payroll because it would be hard to compete on price, and I don't want to be tied to a client every single week or two weeks. Unless you have staff that would handle the payroll processing, then you must be available when the client calls in hours and earnings. And then you have to be available when that client has made mistakes calling those in after the payroll is run and delivered and needs to be corrected. How would you handle your vacations or other times that might make you unavailable? Most of my clients have outside payroll processing with availability of direct deposit, cafeteria and retirement plans where the deduction/contribution is managed by ADP or Paychex.

I'm a night owl too and have been since I was a little child. It was always a struggle for my mom to get me up for school each morning, always running late for the bus. Now my husband says good night twice, the second time is after he gets up in the night for cookies and milk. I sometimes work up until about 2am and that's my limit. This was the first morning that I didn't have early morning appts with clients, I slept in until 9am and it was wonderful.

Someone here or on another forum had this when the SS database had the incorrect DOD. Also, the SS database takes some time to update, so if the person died near the end of 2012 that could be causing problems as well.

Aren't parts of OH getting horribly strong storms tonight with tornado watches? It was very warm here today, supposed to be 80 tomorrow and then cooling back down. It was almost too hot, and last week with the cold and the strong winds I couldn't get warm.

The IRS is processing the current submissions before the backlog from yesterday. The Quick Alert I received this evening from IRS says this: The IRS continues to prioritize creation of the acknowledgements for Sunday's submissions. Although we anticipated completing that task by midnight on Monday, the process is taking longer than expected. We will continue to work them throughout the night and will provide a status by 8:00 am, Eastern on Tuesday, April 9th. As federal submissions are accepted, the linked state submissions will be Made Available for state retrieval. Thank you for your patience and support.

Same with me. One return sent yesterday and still no ack, but today's acks came back within minutes. What's also odd about yesterday's filing is that I've received the PA ack, so the fed did put that through even though the fed return itself hasn't been processed yet.

John, the thing I found in converting the business returns was that the net income tied in but the line entries for some of the individual line items (mostly in the other expenses) would be on the wrong lines when Drake tried to convert the detail of the the other expenses (ex: line 26 for the corp returns). An example might be that accounting & legal entered in ATX ended up on the bank charges line in Drake. I corrected the 2011 converted returns in Drake prior to rolling over to 2012. Some entries on the partnership returns didn't convert exactly correctly either. I can't recall now what it was, but might have been the cash distributions entered on Sch K, but they weren't showing on M-2? FWIW, every single asset and its depreciation for regular and AMT methods converted perfectly. Even though the net income was correct, I did fix those entries that were showing up on the wrong lines because it was affecting the comparision schedule that my clients like and that I used as part of my review process.

I don't see where I, or anyone else, said exactly that ^. To be very specific then, I'll state it as this: NJ does not have a separate form for part-year residents. The resident form is used to report the NJ sourced income for the period of residency, and the nonresident return is needed to report the sale of the house that occurred after the taxpayer left NJ and moved to CA. I think the link that I provided made that clear. So when Joan wrote "...so I prepare both the resident and nonresident returns..." and because she had another post about this same taxpayer where she indicated that she'd read about the proper use of the resident form in this regard, I believe Joan to be capable of completing the resident form for the period of part-year NJ residency accurately and with the proration of credits, exclusions, exemptions and deductions.

You can't. It's a function of the forum based on the number of posts you've made. The answer to your question - stay with us here on this forum and keep posting!

Dog hair is an accessory!

It is possible that a taxpayer would be required to file both, just as Joan says. I don't remember the specifics related to her client, but here is a link that describes when both types of returns are required: http://www.state.nj.us/treasury/taxation/njit26.shtml I'm sorry, Joan, I don't have an answer to the efiling question.