Janitor Bob

client's father dies in 2016 and client and 9 other family-members equally inherit farmland valued at 200,000 (per appraisal). siblings rent the farmland for rental income in 2016 and 2017 via a farm LLC...final 2017 LLC return filed (by another preparer). January 2018, siblings sell farmland for $880,000 and split proceeds 10 ways (my client's portion per 1099-S is $88,000)....so I am assuming this would be a gain for my client of $68,000 (88,000 less 20,000). but would this be business gain/loss since farm was rented in 2016 and 2017 or would it be non-business since farm was NOT rented in 2018?

all side and rear windows were covered in plastic and duct tape...I could not see in and I doubt they could see out....

Client (mom and adult daughter) have appointment at 5:30pm. At 5:20, I look out window and see car parked outside. I assume it the mom or daughter waiting for the other....time goes by and I'm busy doing taxes until my 6pm appointment arrives. I let her in and she asks "do you know 2 people are just sitting in a car outside?". As I finish with 6pm client at 6:20, 5:30pm clients ANGRILY come to my door and yell at me because they's been sitting outside in their car for an hour. Why were you sitting in your car...your appointment was for 5:30pm? "Well we did not know if you were home!" "Of course I was home...that is why I scheduled you for 5:30...but if you were unsure, you could have just called me." "Yeah, well we do not have one of those fancy smart phones!" what is wrong with people?

I just looked at daughter's W-2 and she made $13,126...so she will certainly claim herself and AOC.

client's 26-year old daughter moved from parent/client in OH to PA to attend college in 2017 and has not returned home since...full-time student in 2018 with a part-time job. received no support from parents. lived with boyfriend's parents all of 2018. Parent/clients were hoping to claim her on their return to get AOC, but I told them that either daughter should file on her own and claim herself and AOC or boyfriend's parents should claim her as dependent and claim AOC...as I suspect value of housing/utilities are more than 50% of daughter's total support. Am I correct in my thinking? Boyfriend's parents already filed and did not claim daughter as a dependent...so daughter should claim herself and AOC...correct?

I was printing to pdf just fine until the most recent program update. Now, when I try to print to pdf, the program just closes...printing to printer is just fine.

same issues here

Just be aware that more and more I have clients living in RITA municipalities and working in (and having tax withheld for) non RITA municipalities. Some RITA municipalities do not reciprocate...so client must pay RITA even though they already had local tax withheld for the work city. As much as I hate the RITA form, it is good at pointing out when this is the case.

This occurs when you try to claim the Earned Income Credit (EIC) for a child on your return, but someone else has already claimed the EIC for that child on a different return.

It went through last year just fine...and this is the only error...strictly EIC related...nothing on the 1040

I received the e-file reject below...using same client dependent info as always...verified that name and SSN are correct. Could this error happen if client's ex already filed claiming this child for EIC? 2/9/2019 12:15:01 PM 0 SEIC-F1040-501-02 Each 'QualifyingChildNameControlTxt' that has a value on Schedule EIC(Form 1040A or 1040), Line 1, and 'QualifyingChildSSN' that has a value on Line 2, must match that in the e-File database. /efile:Return/efile:ReturnData/efile:IRS1040ScheduleEIC[1]/efile:QualifyingChildInformation[1]/efile:QualifyingChildSSN

Dammit! Not having MFS/MFJ Comparison and OH RITA-37 is really making my life more difficult right now. I would like somebody to fix the situation. I'm paying $1,800 for software so I can manually check MFS vs MFJ the "old" way (by duplicating the joint and modifying it into two MFS returns) and filling out RITA-37 returns via the RITA web site. It really grinds my gears. Rant Over

client has no insurance for 2018. Gross income $12,160.00...just barely over the 12,000 limit for exemption from ACA. Penalty is calculating at $695...seems high for someone with income that low...am I missing something on the 8965 or does that penalty seem normal?

I only have 150 clients...that is all I can do as a part-time preparer. Since I will likely only need a secure portal for roughly 20 of those clients, cost is a factor, I am doing a trial of Citrix Fileshare, and will like pay for that when trial is over. It does not integrate with ATX, but the cost of ATX Client Portal, is simply not justified at my quantity.

I want to start a secure portal so I can exchange documents with clients. suggestions? Which one integrates best with ATX?