Catherine

I looked it up, and the summary blurby said this: "Section 897 Dividends refers to any distributions made to the extent attributable to a Section 897 capital gain. This capital gain is defined as US Real Property Interests (USRPI) and is recognized by the recipient from the disposition of a USRPI." Good thing they added the bit about USRPI gain, because the first sentence all by itself is as useless as as a glass of water against a blast furnace's fire.

You're way ahead of me, @jasdlm because I haven't a clue what a Section 897 Dividend is and would have to look it up if I ever saw one. Thirty years of doing tax returns and not something I have ever run into.

I filed some papers, paid my electric bill and the personal payroll taxes, and downloaded a couple of personal bank statements while I was online paying the electric bill. Outside of that, I puttered, and poked around a little looking a kitchen rugs online to put in our new kitchen. Didn't have time to look before the season started up. Didn't see anything I liked. And I sat and enjoyed a truly lovely cup of tea and drank it hot without having to microwave it even once. I may celebrate such success by going to bed early.

Had a client some years ago with a truly lazy (and incompetent) bookkeeper. Could not be bothered to enter the credit card purchases, and "reconciled" the statement monthly by posting everything to "Reconciliation Discrepancies." Yep, you read that right. First year I looked at had over $76,000 in "reconciliation discrepancies!" That one was truly spectacular. It was a vet clinic, and those "discrepancies" were all the exam room supplies, all the office supplies, all the in-house meds, all the gloves and absorbent pads and disposables and sutures and syringes and everything else. Toner and paper and postage and coffee for the coffee room and waiting room supplies. It was epic.

Had a client years ago, business in operation for years. Had not reconciled (multiple) checking accounts in over four years. First thing I did was get those caught up. Another consulting client called me in to troubleshoot reports not giving good information. Two issues: COA had location coding but the codes were jumbled, and they had not closed monthly books in three years. That software only pulls report data from closed months.... You gotta wonder sometimes. First company I almost understand; they downloaded all bank info directly to QB, thinking that meant they had it all (nope!). But with the other the guy who called me in was CFO with a Master's in Accounting. I've never taken an accounting course (taught it in a junior college for a couple of semesters, but never took a class myself), and I saw the key problems as soon as I saw the COA. He never thought to look at it. Never looked at the help files for the tres-fancy and tres-expensive accounting system. Huh?

They've changed it hugely since I tried it back in 2004-ish, then. At that time it was the clunkiest and least-intuitive program I had ever tried to use. Hated it from the first and stuck it through for a couple of years helping a friend at his tax office with a couple of nasty returns that were beyond his ken.

For those who won't click links, it's cute but not the best ever.

Congratulations, friends and colleagues - we all lived to tell the tales and file another day. Take it easy today. I set up some payroll taxes and will dig out a couple of bills that probably need to be paid in the next week or so, and then I'm gonna play hookey for the rest of the day. Here's a congratulations gif that I couldn't figure out how to embed. Hooray!

Have a wonderful, wonderful visit with her!

My welcome letter, sent in January, states that every return not ready to be filed (i.e., just waiting for signature pages) will be put on extension as of April (I forget; something early, like the 3rd or the 8th). I'm still getting people emailing and calling asking if they are on extension. Each of their bills just went up for being nincompoops. Oh, and an early-season inquiry who now wants me to look at her self-done return. They owe a bundle, so it can't be right. I won't even answer her for a week. If then. One of the reasons I put in extensions early is it means I don't get cranked up about all the ninnies calling and emailing with lame, stupid, and wrong-time questions in the last few days as they all start to panic. If I was desperate to finish returns and extensions they'd annoy me far more. I expect to get a lot of returns finalized in this next week, because the interruptions will slow way down and I can chase down final details and do final reviews without undergoing constant interruption.

In Drake, you put "INHERIT" in the acquired field and it forces long term treatment.

Mail in the 7004 with a check. There could be any one of a number of errors floating around in the computers at the IRS, some of which may go away when they finally process other information sent to them. But it won't be done today or tomorrow.

If I have one of those and no debit payment, I send the coupon showing amount due to the client (securely, duh) and let them send it in with, or without, a check. I just ask them to let me know how much they paid.

We have a similar list - we don't put them on extension until we submit all extensions the first week of April. But we know who they are and that they'll call or email in a panic late tomorrow afternoon apologizing for being late and asking us to put them on extension. Same folks every blessed year.

There have been some nasty collapses in real estate market. If house was appraised in 2007 and then sold in 2009 or 2010, that would do it, easily.

8878 only with payment. MA retroactively nullified extensions if no payment was made, and tax was due - until they stopped bothering with extensions unless there was a payment made. IRS could make the whole thing moot by granting automatic extensions of time to file and giving the option to pay in April - and still add in penalties and interest is payment is made after the April deadline if tax turned out to be due. 'Course, that would make sense, so they won't.

The problem, @BrewOne, is all the clients for whom we have absolutely nothing *except* a request for an extension. If it's someone who always owes, it's one thing, and we can recommend some type of payment. If it's clients who see-saw back and forth between owing and getting a refund, not so much. We file extensions even with no information, if we don't have anything. What I won't do is use a dartboard to decide what people should pay, just to make it "legitimate" because as far as I'm concerned, a figure pulled from a dartboard (or ceiling) is just as accurate as zero.

You are assuming my/our clients have the sense God gave a goose and not email their own sensitive data. At which point, all we can do is save it to secure drives, delete the email *and* attachments, and instruct the client to do the same.

Drink the 18-year yourself and let the staff have the twelve-year.

The letter editor is one of the most difficult features of Drake for me. It's so customizable it's nearly opaque on how to do much of anything. One of these years I'll take one of the classes Drake runs on customizing the software.

You do what you have control over.

I had one where I thought that for sure - until the client sold a patent some years later. Wiped out the whole kit and caboodle of the loss!

They hide when I look for them. Somehow the key words I pick for searching never get me the pieces I need. Thanks!

I will look for that custom install dodge with any new app installations. Thank you!

Stock gets basis stepped up as of date of death (in normal cases). It's gifts where the basis travels to the new owner, @Pacun.