JohnH

We should have already bought the wide screen TV's with the tax money that was diverted in the first place. Sort of like getting the stimulus payment before anybody else. The penalties & interest are just the cost of getting the stimulus payment in advance.

Interesting...

Speaking of legal matters & lawyering, did you hear about the guy who barged into the lawyer's office to seek legal advice. He asked, "What are your rates?" As the lawyer began writing on something on his desk he replied "I charge $500 for 3 questions." The guy responded, "That's pretty high, isn't it?" The lawyer replied "Yes" while he continued to write. He then handed the guy a $500 invoice and said, "Now what's your third question?"

Now that I think about it, the IRS reducing stimulus payments for things like unpaid past liabilities and est tax penalties offers an opportunity. This is a chance to tell clients "This is a conversation we should have been having last year. Nothing can be done about it now." I use that line quite often anyhow, but the adjustment to the stimulus payment gets right in their face and ties a real number to the discussion.

One of my favorite lines from "The Life & Times of Judge Roy Bean" - when the judge (Paul Newman) is getting ready to set up court in the saloon. A couple of cowboys have been brought in on suspicion of cattle rustling and Judge Bean has poured them a drink. While they're finishing it up he says, "Well, you boys got anything to say for yourselves before we give ya a fair trial & hang ya?"

"How to Make a Small Fortune Investing" 1) Start with a large fortune 2) Sign up for classes on investing at $24K each 3) Stop taking classes when your fortune has shrunk enough to be called "small". Easy & simple.

All is not lost, however. Hopefully the client got a pretty good education on wise investing vs unwise investing the minute they wrote the $24K check.

Good strategy.

Booger: I waited until the last possible minute to buy the 2007 software - didn't actually purchase until Jan 10, 2008. At that point I had 30 days to test it under real circumstances and reject it if I wasn't happy. I found that it seemed to be OK so I stayed with it, but had TaxSlayer Pro already loaded & ready to go, plus I could have converted back to UltraTax by just rolling over a couple of years if I had decided that was the best thing to do. I don't efile, don't do any RAL's, and really don't get under way until early Feb so the delay was no big deal for me. I realize not everyone can work that way, especially when they get a lot of business in January. Why did I stay with ATX? I like the interface, it passed the last-minute test, and it saved me $. Purely a business decision. This year I'll evaluate Drake and take another peek at TaxSlayer Pro. For me, Ultra Tax is always an excellent option if the others disappoint me. I know how it works, I like it, and I trust it. The only problem is the price compared to what else is available. As for the 2008 season, I haven't made any decision yet and don't plan to do so until Jan 2009. I'll do the same thing I did last year - put off the decision until the last possible minute. If ATX passes again in the areas of functionality and price, I'll continue to stay with it. Otherwise I have a Plan B & Plan C. And if Mel gets going on his project & will allow me be to a part of it, I'll invest some $ into it just to have a plan D in future tax seasons. One never knows what the future holds. If I hadn't kept all my options open and my ear to the ground in the past, I'd find myself still using Ultra Tax and paying $3K - $5K more than I'm paying for ATX. IMO it's risky to make long-term decisions in the short term, especially when it only amounts to a couple of hundred dollars savings (at the most) against thousand of dollars in tax season revenue. Sometimes it works out, sometimes not, but long term it always pays to keep your powder dry. (Especially true as a company grows larger - trust is always the first thing to go out in the garbage)

---> Alot of people were willing to throw their money at him to produce one <---- The operative word in your post is "WERE". Speaking for myself and many others, we ARE willing to do so. Nothing has changed in that regard.

Yes

Gotta hand TaxSlayer credit for creativity. I got an email form them this morning suggesting that I use my rebate to buy their software. Let's see now, 1) Wide screen TV; 2) Tax software; 3) Vacation; 4) Pay down debt decisions, decisions....

Congratulations! (The secret's out)

Mike: If you ever find yourself offering the CPE in my area of the US, I want to know about it. There's no question in my mind it would be well worth attending. Glad to hear this one went well for you.

Good luck Julie. Most growth involves some risk, but I'm betting you will do fine.

Jack: I'd run the math a little differently, since not anywhere near all your clients will be calling. 3,000 clients, with 80% having their bank account number listed on ther return. So that means that 2,400 of them have already received their rebate via direct deposit. Allow for a 10% error rate by the IRS, so 240 of those haven't received their rebate and all of them call you. Half of the 600 who didn't have their bank account number on their return either don't have a clue about the rebate or don't qualify for it due to income limits. So that leaves about 300 calls from this group, for a total of 540 calls x 5 minutes (which is really all it should take), so that adds up to about 45 hours. And if you've trained some of those to inquire by email rather than by phone, you can cut the hours even more. I'd put that in the category of cultivating good customer relations any day.

A suggestion about the economic stimulus calls. I've had a few, and as I said before I always offer to email them the link to the "Where's My Stimulus Payment" page so they can do their own follow-up. https://sa2.www4.irs.gov/irfof/IRServlet?app=IRACTC However, for those who don't use email, who are easily confused, or those for whom for whatever reason I decide to follow up personally, I've found it's pretty easy to do a quick check. All that's needed is the primary SocSec#, filig status, and # of dependents. With dual monitors it's not even necessary to pull out their hard copy file since the IRS link can be open on one screen and the return open on the opposite screen. Even the link says that this is the same info available to IRS employees if the client calls them. Also, for any that I look up & discover the payment date & amount, I print off the page for insertion into their tax file for reference next year. I had originally speculated that I'd charge for doing this next year if it occupied much time or effort, but in actuality I'm finding it's no big deal to check it. In a few situations I've checked on it while the client & I were discussing a totally unrelated matter on the phone.

Interesting you should mention that. I increased my fees 20% this year (even put that info in the client mailer) and only lost a few clients - much less than I expected. Plus I picked up some new clients, and for them the increase wasn't a factor since they came on board at the new rates so an increase wasn't an issue for them. I did this partly because I was getting tired of some of them, and secondly because I'm anticipating having to switch vendors in the next year or so and wanted to position myself to go back to UltraTax or another product on that end of the cost scale (or perhaps dual products) if necessary. I've come to the conclusion that either my clients are very loyal or else I'm not charging nearly enough. Given my experience this year, I may tack on another 15-20% next tax season just to see if it has any more effect.

KC: OK

You may get all the info you need right here on our forum, but if you want to expand your search for info you might want to try this forum - I've found the advice given there to be solid and reliable. http://72t.net/Discussion/ViewPosts.aspx

Tom: I have permission to say it - look at our post counts.

By posting lots of short answers coupled with having too much time on your hands.

I heard something about IRS errors with some stimulus payments on the radio this morning. This announcer said about 15,000 refunds were affected. Given the number of payments being made and the speed with which this was done, I'm sure there will be glitches. But it remains to be seen if the number of foul-ups rises to the level of a major problem. My greater concern is con artists who will exploit the gullible & greedy because so many people seem to have a special place in their hearts for "free" money. If news of rebate payments mistakes becomes widespread, we can expect another rash of bogus emails and phone calls trying to sucker people into giving up confidential info.

Kerry: Congratulations on your new job. Thanks for all your help over the years. Best wishes to you and your family for the future, and do stay in touch with us.

May as well stay here - there's not much happening on their new board. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part the discusion over there is fairly lightweight.