Corduroy Frog Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 I have been with Drake for years and years, but a couple years ago, Phil Drake cashed in his chips and sold the business.  Since then, there have been changes, most prodigious change is a whopping price increase. A recent post from another member advised simply to cover software increases with our fee structure next year, e. g. changing to an unknown product is risky. Good advice, but I am going to look around if their are other recommendations. I will need invidual returns, all entity returns, and all state returns that work. Years ago I had TaxSlayer, which had excellent, excellent customer services, but was weak on state returns once you left SCarolina and Georgia. If there is nothing better to look at, I might be best advised to take the gentleman's advise - don't risk changing and build the increase into next year's fee structure.  1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcb39 Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 I have been with ATX MAX since its birth and will never change. That is a lot of years since 2005. It ofers everything I would ever need and then some. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrewOne Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 IMO, changing software should only be done as a necessity (i.e. the program being discontinued) unless you are prepared to put in a large amount of work. Drake just looked around and saw what others were charging for what they offered. A robust program is going to be fairly pricey but you'll need it for recreating returns and when you get into the weeds. Less expensive (like OLT) will work great for 85-90% of your clients but...the other 10-15% are probably your best paying clients. I also found when I tried them that they don't reproduce returns from other programs, just creates a basic framework with name, social, etc. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artp Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 7 hours ago, Corduroy Frog said: I have been with Drake for years and years, but a couple years ago, Phil Drake cashed in his chips and sold the business.  Since then, there have been changes, most prodigious change is a whopping price increase. A recent post from another member advised simply to cover software increases with our fee structure next year, e. g. changing to an unknown product is risky. Good advice, but I am going to look around if their are other recommendations. I will need invidual returns, all entity returns, and all state returns that work. Years ago I had TaxSlayer, which had excellent, excellent customer services, but was weak on state returns once you left SCarolina and Georgia. If there is nothing better to look at, I might be best advised to take the gentleman's advise - don't risk changing and build the increase into next year's fee structure.  If price is your concern you might want to take a look at Sigma Tax Pro. They are a reseller of Drake as well as other major tax software providers. Current pricing for Drake for 2024 is $999. You may want to look at postings under the Drake Forum for more comments. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcbreck Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 5 minutes ago, artp said: If price is your concern you might want to take a look at Sigma Tax Pro. They are a reseller of Drake as well as other major tax software providers. Current pricing for Drake for 2024 is $999. You may want to look at postings under the Drake Forum for more comments. If you are a Drake customer, can move to a reseller like that? I don't know how Drake does it but ATX flagged your EFIN and wouldn't allow it years ago. You could go from the reseller to working directly with ATX but you couldn't go the other way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrewOne Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 I wonder if dentists and veterinarians have these kind of discussions? They don't hesitate to raise their prices--maybe they don't hear the kind of feedback we get from our clients? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcbreck Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 36 minutes ago, BrewOne said: I wonder if dentists and veterinarians have these kind of discussions? They don't hesitate to raise their prices--maybe they don't hear the kind of feedback we get from our clients? Personally, I'm a very cheap person. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee B Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 Changing to Sigma Tax Pro to save $400 isn't worth it to me. I can make that up with one tax return. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Medlin Software, Dennis Posted May 2 Report Share Posted May 2 3 hours ago, BrewOne said: IMO, changing software should only be done as a necessity (i.e. the program being discontinued) unless you are prepared to put in a large amount of work. I can save a few hundred per year by changing charge card processors, but the work on my end would be weeks of time/$. I am facing porting code to a different compiler, and it will take a couple of years to complete, but it has to be done at some point to keep value in the company when I am gone (to something more people use, rather than a specialized compiler not many use). One should always be prepared for their tools of income to disappear at a moments notice, including a plan in place to recover. This also includes a threshold/plan/budget/timeline for changing tools. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corduroy Frog Posted May 3 Author Report Share Posted May 3 On 5/2/2024 at 9:51 AM, artp said: If price is your concern you might want to take a look at Sigma Tax Pro. They are a reseller of Drake as well as other major tax software providers. Current pricing for Drake for 2024 is $999. You may want to look at postings under the Drake Forum for more comments. artp, is the price really $999? My renewal notice says $1895 plus tax... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Catherine Posted May 3 Report Share Posted May 3 Look at Drake single-user full license. Not worth any small price "saving" to me if I'm going to spend dozens of hours learning a new software, converting returns, checking every single bleeping depreciation item (those are most likely to get mucked up in conversions), every single carry-forward amount, etc. I have easier ways to hurt myself, and easier ways to save a couple hundred bucks. YMMV. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corduroy Frog Posted May 3 Author Report Share Posted May 3 Sigma Tax apparently is a software company, and if they are reselling Drake, it appears as though they are cloning it. Guess I had better bite the bullet and pay up. Thanks for the discussion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee B Posted May 4 Report Share Posted May 4 No, they're not cloning it. They paid Drake for a license to use it and resell it. Â 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
artp Posted May 6 Report Share Posted May 6 On 5/3/2024 at 2:13 PM, Corduroy Frog said: artp, is the price really $999? My renewal notice says $1895 plus tax... The price of $999 is thru Sigma Tax Pro who is a reseller of several software providers including Drake. This price is for a single user as I have no employees. I got a "demo" of their " DR" software desk top version (Drake) from them and it is exactly the same as my regular version of Drake and appears to work the same. I was able to register with them for the 2024 tax software for $49.99 payment now and will not have to pay the balance until the software is released late in Nov. This will be my 1st year with them so I will update my post as next season progresses. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee B Posted May 6 Report Share Posted May 6 1 hour ago, artp said: The price of $999 is thru Sigma Tax Pro who is a reseller of several software providers including Drake. This price is for a single user as I have no employees. I got a "demo" of their " DR" software desk top version (Drake) from them and it is exactly the same as my regular version of Drake and appears to work the same. I was able to register with them for the 2024 tax software for $49.99 payment now and will not have to pay the balance until the software is released late in Nov. This will be my 1st year with them so I will update my post as next season progresses. Well that's very user friendly 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Medlin Software, Dennis Posted May 6 Report Share Posted May 6 Reseller programs can be a savings, but there is a reason. The support may be offloaded to the reseller, or some fee per use from the developer (assuming the reseller pays the developer and reports your sale to the developer). At one point in the 90's, our product was available from a reseller or two. One sold many licenses, but never paid us, or reported the customer information. As inevitable, the customer contacted us (at the time, via phone) for help, and we were in a Catch-22. Help them for free, supporting the thief/reseller, or explain the theft which made us look like the bad guy. So for us, it quickly became a lose-lose and was ended shortly after starting. Unfortunately, back then, the reseller was able to keep going the about a year, as it was just a matter of copying the software onto another floppy to sell. IIRC, either the same or a different reseller was supposed to handle their own support, but they did not, or when the customer found out how to reach us, they did, making the agreement a money loser in that manner. The reseller, once we went to a different license method, resold their own license over and over too. We eventually noticed (for the same reason, via support inquires) and came up with a way to prevent that type of theft too. We still get issues when someone orders for another, sometimes collecting more from the customer, then the customer complains to us. Happened last week. For me, I avoid resellers for anything major. My current computer is a new model, in short supply. Resellers had some inventory, but I figured out when the manufacturer updated inventory, and was able to order in the few minutes/seconds when they had stock. Why? The return policy was cleaner, and they give a longer warranty option (which for a new device, for me, is important). 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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