Catherine

Hope you have a VERY :bday:

Hope you have a VERY :bday:

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY

Was just in a seminar today that addressed this. For CONTRIBUTIONS, start date of the 5-year period is 1/1 of the year FOR which the FIRST contribution was made. So 1st contribution made 4/1/10 for tax year 2009 would have a contribution date of 1/1/2009. For CONVERSIONS, EACH conversion has its' OWN start-of-the-five-year date, also considered to be 1/1 of the tax year of the conversion. So a conversion on 4/1/10 would have a conversion date of 1/1/10. So your taxpayer should NOT over-withdraw into his less-than-five-years-old conversions. Catherine

Hope you have a VERY

Hope you have a VERY

US citizens are required to report (& pay tax on) their worldwide income every year. Lots of expats get caught on this when they want to come home and realize they owe umpty gazillion $ in back taxes (and decide at that point to drop US citizenship and stay wherever they are, permanently). Your TP will file a 1040, but it will have to be submitted on paper (see just below). The dependents need ITIN's; submit a W-7 for each of them with corroborating documentation. The whole kit & caboodle goes to the ITIN unit, which will assign ITIN's, add those to the paper 1040, and then submit the 1040 for processing. Read the instructions for F 2555 closely, and don't forget the housing exclusion/deduction sections. As for currency - you are supposed to use rate as of date paid. Easier for a person paid monthly than one paid weekly. I use www.x-rates.com for historical currency conversion rates. IF (and that can be a big if) the rate didn't vary too much during the year, an annual average will suffice. However, there are some currencies that have big swings against the dollar; for those doing an annual won't help and you might have to cleave it finer than that. Don't forget the F-bar form either, for reporting foreign bank accounts! Catherine

Hi folks -- I've looked and can't find the answer - someone here must know. Client has an IRA that contains some non-deductible contributions (basis known), AND money from a Keogh that was converted. Client is considering converting at least some of this to Roth IRA. Question is, to get the percentage of non-deductible money, is the original Keogh contribution used, OR the value when they were rolled into the IRA? TIA, Catherine

Yes, software is needed for that but if you have good backup software now that might do it. I use Acronis True Image and it does cold metal restore. I've heard good things about Symantec Enterprise Ghost Solution Suite 2.0 and something from Maxtor, as well.

I looked at the Sony Reader, Kindle, and Nook (and color Nook, too) (available at the Sony store, Staples, and B&N, in order). A friend highly recommended the Sony - but his need was to be able to put approach maps on the reader (he's a pilot) easily. I was underwhelmed. The e-ink "flashes" with every page turn - and it's a good long flash. I found it annoying - and I found the Sony controls annoying (but don't recall details). The Nook had the same flash issue but not as badly, and the controls, though not intuitive, were OK once I got the quickie tutorial in the store. I really liked the color Nook (with a "live" screen there was no flash), but I didn't like the steep price upgrade or the MUCH shorter battery life (8 hours versus 4 weeks for B&W). I surprised myself by liking the Kindle very much. The e-ink "flash" was more subdued and MUCH faster, the controls more intuitive to my mind. So I have a Kindle on my Christmas list -- and a couple of dozen free e-books ready and waiting (Jane Austen, Sir Walter Scott, William Blake, Bill the Bard, all kinds of good stuff out there for free).

I thought I was getting all the email announcements from ATX (heaven knows my email box gets clogged with them from both ATX & CCH!) but none of these sound/look familiar at all. Perhaps they have a separate list for folks who have used bank products, or you answered an interest email at some point in the deep and distant past (or I answered an opt-out one equally long ago). Interesting.

With most online backup services, you choose the folders and data you want backed up when you set up the back up. You may choose, for example, to not pay for the space to have your music backed up at work when you have it all at home too. Once you choose the backup set, that set will get backed up every day. I have all my client files backed up daily, and the data folders with all the .atx files as well. Online backups do NOT, generally, include executable (program) files. Data only. So it's still a good idea to have a local backup that will do what is called a "cold metal restore" -- that is, able to restore to a brand-new machine with all your program files as well as data. So if you come in one morning to find your machine stone-dead (or hit by a meteorite & there's just a blob of metal where it used to be), you get the basic machine ready to go from the local restore, then your data up to yesterday's automatic backup time from the online source. That's the theory, anyway, and I know of at least one tax office that used something very similar to that kind of system to very good effect in mid-tax-season a few years ago. May none of us ever need to test the theory!! Catherine

Someone recommended printing Form 9325 for each client as proof of e-filing (ATX adds info if it's open in the return), but that only gives Federal. I've been printing the ack history as a pdf - gives total history Fed & all states. I put the pdf in the client folder on my computer. I hope I don't need another copy of everyone's under a heading of "2009 ack histories" - what a pain.

I've never mentioned it because I've never heard of it. In your copious free time (hah - hah) tell us about it (or where we can find more info ourselves). Thanks!

Hope you have a VERY

Eric - hope you have a VERY And THANK YOU for everything you do for us.

YES -- but I think you will qualify for the under-10 free registration, as you are paid only for five. I do about 2 NY returns a year and so have to do the free registration nonsense. Need to go look up my login information so I can go online and do that. Caterine

Hope you have a VERY

The day I don't learn something new is the day to bury me, LOL. Margaret, you are NOT officially old. You've just crossed an artificial threshold. There was (still IS, for all I know) a wonderful gentlemen on a tax forum I used to frequent (but pretty much don't anymore) who was still going strong and working at 102, bless him. He'd think of you as a young whippersnapper. Catherine

You do need to have the pictures on the computer -- but if you have USB, you can put pictures from the camera on the computer. If you use film (I still do sometime), you can get a CD with all the pictures. Once the files are on the computer, when posting go to the "Attachments" under the place where you type. Click on "Choose File" and choose the picture's file name, then click "Attach This File" -- wait until it tells you it's done. Finish the post. Done. This procedure works for ANY file you want to attach - spreadsheet, document, picture, pdf. The one limit is how big the picture file is. Some cameras make really BIG files. You can usually make them much smaller just by reducing the number of colors through whatever picture-editing software you have available. Catherine

Thanks to everyone for all the nice words, but.... how to do what?

Adorable!!

I've attached a couple of the formal portraits from the wedding ball on November 6th. Hope folks like them! Catherine