Catherine

The metric isn't "truthfully" but rather "proper presentation of taxable income and taxes" and it's not less-than-truthful when there is no proper provision for these infrequent cases on a one-size-fits-most form.

Three or four, assuming I have ALL the information. But there is almost always something missing! Then there is the long process of writing it up and chasing the client for all the answers NOT yet provided. Or the "wait, what about my second job?" when you think you're done and it turns out they never gave you the new W2. One year a client forgot to tell us about a new baby! Picked up the return, brought it home for signatures, called the next day "where's the baby?" when she never gave us any info at all. Between three of us, we do about 700 returns in a season (personal and corporations and entities). Except for *some* of the dependent kids with summer jobs, almost all are a long hard slog.

Sending IA requests in with tax returns goes through *eventually* but it can take several months (pre-craziness) before the first payment is taken. Might be best to set it up online. Perhaps others can chime in with how fast those kick in.

It's at the bottom of the first bag in the first trailer loaded?

Hooray!

Your kids must be extra-special. Plus they have a clue, having grown up around accounting and tax.

There is a new PPS number that goes directly to the ACS unit people. Just learned about it today. 800-829-7650.

@Lion EA mentioned my above (as did Judy) so here is what I learned: The error message is because the IRS instructions say to attach a copy of the court appointment. They do NOT specifically state that the court appointment paperwork can be attached as a pdf. Nor do they state that is not acceptable. So some software companies (Drake among them) refuse to allow e-filing with the court appointed person. What I did was to check Box C and attach the court appointment pdf. It sailed through. As Lion said, *anything* to keep it from spending a year in a trailer. This particular one was a big refund, too. And I'm explaining to all my older clients (and their POA kids, if any) why it's a good idea to always owe a little bit.

No, there's no solution, in general. They are still hand-processing millions of these returns with refunds. About the only thing you can do is ask the clients if they got ANY letters from the IRS about them. Some people won't open IRS letters, or don't understand them. I had one client where the service wanted him to call to verify identity, and he never read the letter through. Brought it to me saying "I don't know what they want" and once he called (and got through - another story) he was able to verify and they released the refund. That still took another six weeks.

Each year stands alone in terms of the choices made; you can choose what works best, overall, for your client for each tax year. The "drawback" is having to do multiple scenarios as to whether tax credits, tax deductions, or income exclusions give the best result. The taxpayer cannot double-dip; no taking deductions or credits for taxes paid on income excluded from US taxation. However, you don't have to exclude all the income, either (just not above total earned income, or above the annual maximum). So if, for example, the absolute best result was to exclude half the income, and take a tax credit (or deduction) for the other half, I believe that is allowed. A royal pain in the hindquarters to determine, though!

Mine changed! MA used to use our ssn's as our license numbers. When they stopped doing THAT, we all got new numbers. Since then, it has not changed.

details changed to protect the... whatever. lol.

And we have one whose personal email starts with "bi-markc" and I really don't need to know that about him (I had been able to guess from his affect, but I really did not need confirmation).

The trick, as Pacun alluded to, is to get the correct surname as the first one. Slavic and Hispanic naming conventions can throw you for a loop if you're not used to them. If you have John Smith-Jones he'll be in either with Smith *or* with Jones as the "official" IRS surname. Using the other will cause an error. If you have Constanza Vazquez de Blanca y Domingo then you have three choices. But only two choices if you are faced with Aleksey Ivanovitch Krasnaya or Marta Hofmann-Rahneva.

We made one of our clients call about it (we weren't going to spend the time!) and the IRS told her they'd eventually get to them all, but there were delays. Yeah, we've had the calls and emails from a bunch of people. I think from now on, I'm going to recommend using Direct Pay instead of setting up payments through the tax software. More t/p control, including lookup.

And sometimes it doesn't take much. I needed a break and went and pulled garlic mustard (invasive weed) for ten minutes. Out in the fresh air, listening to the birds, watching the puppy next door try to herd a flower pot, and getting rids of weeds before they flowered. I felt great afterwards, and was able to come back to my computer refreshed.

and ignore the fact that DLs only expire every 4-5 years, depending on the state. grrr.

THIS!!! STOP IT. STOP IT RIGHT NOW. If you don't take care of yourself, you will burn out and get stress illnesses. I came to this realization some years ago and stopped working one day a week. Usually, but not always, Sunday. Found out that if I took a day for myself I got more done the other six days than in uninterrupted seven without end. Any client who expects instant response any day or any time of day is a client who does not respect us and who is definitely under-paying us. For me, if you want 24/7 instant response, you had better be be a close family member. Anyone else gets me as I choose to respond. If they don't like that, they can go down the street to someone else, and (likely) pay more for poorer-quality work.

The IRS will take money from ANYONE - taxpayer, personal rep, executor, neighbor, friend, dog-catcher. All they need is a valid check (or bank account, for direct debit) and the tp's ssn in the memo field. As for refunds - even then, they'll send money to anyone who requests it with Form 1310 properly filled out. Even before court appointments, if you check the boxes promising to be good and give the money out in accordance with state law, they'll send it. But whether it be a check or a deposit, that will need an account, and that requires more hoops (estate ein, appointment of representative, etc).

I always refer to it as auto-UNcorrect. And yes, I've had some "corrections" that resulted in the same laugh-until-tears upon reading what it thought was better than what I wrote. No good examples off the top of my head, but there sure have been some doozies!

Me, too, but an amazing number have NOT. We got a lot of panicked calls and email on the 15th wanting to know what needed to be done for extensions...

One client called in a panic that her payment didn't go through (1040 pmt) and I had her call. They told her there were delays (no specifics got back to me, at least) but that they'd get them all eventually.

We've been using Verifyle for signatures and secure email. I get that free as an NAEA member. People generally find it easy to use, too, although getting sig's for married couples isn't nearly as easy as it was using Signature Flow (from CPAperless, now discontinued, doggone it).

We have a good couple hundred in the hopper (for many of which we have no documents whatsoever, yet - and we could have told you who those clients would be back on Jan 2nd). MA still has given us NO guidance on how to apply their cockamamie rules for the UI exclusion to blended households, dependents (either direction - include with parent, include parents with them), and other oddball situations. Clients for whom we can file need absolutely ludicrous amounts of explanation why X counted but Y did not, and more. I think I've approved THREE returns for e-file in the last TWO WEEKS. (Not counting a couple of extensions filed.) Three! It should be three before lunch, three after lunch, three between dinner and closing down for the night, rinse and repeat.

No major (retroactive!) tax law changes for them. No such excuse for estimates; without completed returns it's a total guesstimate instead of a calculation. They did not think. No surprise there.