Catherine

I switched to Drake after the 2012 season debacle and had no trouble transitioning. However, I will note that Drake does have different quirks from the ones ATX has. Their support is unbeatable; immediate answer from a human who understands tax AND software. When they have to research something and say they'll get back to you, they DO. (I am still waiting for a 48-72 hour promised callback from ATX from February of 2013 on one issue.) If you have lots of depreciation schedules, those may take a bit of time to re-tweak after importing info. I found I had to re-number assets and manually enter AMT depreciation figures. There may have been a way to get around those but I only had a couple of clients with more than one or two items, so for me it wasn't a big enough deal to research and ask for help - I just re-entered. They do have a pay per return service, as well -- and if you pay for enough individual returns, it reverts to an all-inclusive license.

Maybe also the desire to "help" even when a return is past your level of expertise. I had a kid working for me a couple of years ago who had worked for VITA. He had an MS in accounting. I wouldn't let him work on returns after one look at the work he did; kept him on document prep only. He was real good at printing returns out in the right order.

Very handy; thank you!

with a twist. really funny - especially the sauce. http://www.smosh.com/smosh-pit/photos/these-people-figured-out-how-tell-hilarious-stories-snapchat

Bumping.... only two comments. Please post your entry!

Me, too. I won't do a return from an organizer; I want originals. Lots of details hidden in them that clients don't realize I need or understand what they are.

Don't forget wiping the drool from their chins once they realize all the extra paperwork for them and us with this requirement!

A contest has just been posted in the Off Topic forum. Please go take a look! Catherine

You will still be able to buy new, registerable versions on ebay. After using the last of my licenses for my Office Small Business 2003 (yes, you read that correctly) I just bought a new, registerable to three computers version of Office 2007 Small Business, brand new/sealed, for $65 there. Installed perfectly on this machine and I still have two installations available. Also bought Quicken 2013 for about $30; one of my clients had upgraded so I needed the newer version.

There's another one of these with band names; The Who is on first, also The Band and The Guess Who. Really excellent. I'll dig it out and scan it.

Hey, BooBoo, let's go find a pic-a-nic basket!

The folks who believe that only the police & military should have firearms make the point FOR us: the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. They simply limit the definition of "good guy" to police and military. History shows, time and again over the millennia and as recently as the past decade, that the greatest number of civilian deaths in the world are at the hands of the peoples' OWN government. Always preceded by disarmament "for greater safety". Always. As a side story, the police are notoriously bad shooters. After watching the Cambridge MA cops use our (MIT's) range for practice one day, I used to tell people that if the Cambridge cops started shooting, go stand right in front of them as it was the ONLY safe place. Just watching them scared the dickens out of me and I was astounded that no one got hurt. My coach, who was retired from the Providence RI police force, had hours of hysterically funny, terrifying, stories about the Providence PD folks.

For that he (and we?) should be grateful - think of the mess he would have sent in!

Here in MA we've had health insurance non-coverage penalties for years. They are a ROYAL pita; charts up the wazoo by county, by income, by family size, all needing to be cross-correlated. Software doesn't do all those calculations very well (ATX didn't do them at ALL - I had to look up every piece separately on the MassDOR book that I downloaded; Drake at least is able to pull the county and income info over and you add in the family size since that can be [often is] different from the exemption number), so there is lots of do-it-by-hand nonsense. Folks most likely to be hit are low income or those who had jobs and lost them and decided not to pay for COBRA coverage. Plus in MA we also have a requirement for "minimum creditable coverage" so there are still folks who don't meet *that* criterion and get penalized. Some do it every year, as the insurance they have is sufficient for their needs and the penalty is less than the step-up in coverage. My recommendation is to buy your Motrin in the convenient 55 gallon drum package for next tax season. Perhaps install a dispenser like the ones for gumballs/Skittles/M&Ms you still see in stores.

Same reason elephants are wrinkly; they're filled by weight, not volume.

My "Latin" came from growing up speaking Italian, a stint in college doing medical transcription, and puzzling my way through Latin paragraphs a couple of times a year for several decades. But I do know the rules for masculine and feminine plurals! Also studied Russian in college; our textbook had a terrific story about Superman, all drawn in really poor stick figures by the author, that was just hysterically funny. I can still read and enjoy it, and recite the opening lines. Superman fighting for "Americanskii obraz zhizni" still makes me chuckle (the American way of life -- in Russian).

stylus --> styli standard Latin plural I do have the promo item expenses list. They really kept excellent track of everything - but I still had a three-page document of questions. Thanks!

Never would have thought Kickstarter had a tax help page. Thanks.

Client has a small business (Sch C). I see on his spreadsheet for 2013 a one-time, large (over $150K) receipt categorized as "Income" from Kickstarter. How does this get treated? It is not sales. Just "other income" -- or is there some other treatment I need to know about? I've never before seen crowdfunding sourced income and don't want to muck it up for lack of info. TIA, Catherine

Karl Denninger posted a beautiful picture that he took, last night. It's here: http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229481

Definitely! Why leave that mess on your nice floors?

Got the 8938; yes fortunately a checkbox as I don't know how long it would take to get account & balance details for calendar 2013 from Bermuda. Thanks to all for the help; there was mention in several places of exemptions for those with signature authority only in several cases but it took WAY longer to find the list of cases. All either banks or securities firms -- which seems to be even weirder, if they are looking for fraud, as folks with signature authority in those firms would have FAR more ability to hide fraud. Probably paid off several legis-vermin to get those written in...

Except no acks til Tuesday earliest -- and I for one will expect (/not be surprised by) a server crash Tuesday morning when the weekend backup hits.

That was _exactly_ the source of my confusion. Partial owner of a foreign asset which itself has a bank account (or accounts). NONE of those accounts are for personal use (that would be called embezzling, if I have the definition understood correctly); they are corporate accounts for corporate purposes. Yet he does have signature authority...

Odd one and I can't figure it out from IRS pubs. Client is part-owner of a hotel outside the country, with his brother. Brother lives there, runs the place, is subject to FBAR reporting etc. My client has signature authority over the *corporate* account - basically in case his brother gets sick or has to travel, so someone can sign checks. It is not his PERSONAL account; it is not titled in his name, etc. Since he is part owner of the company, he has to file the 8938 and also a 5471 (from which I get all the info from the corporate accountants). I sent him all the FBAR info to file online (hope he did; out of my hair though) -- but what do we put on the foreign accounts question? Again - NOT his name. Just signature authority. My thought is yes -- but as I was going to print, I am re-thinking myself. Thanks.