I owe, I owe

[susandennis]

See this arm? See this leg? They will soon both belong to the U.S. Government! Yep. I got my tax return in the mail today. Which was, honestly, a bit of a surprise. For one thing, I live across the street. Seems we could have saved a buck by just calling me and telling me it was ready for pickup. Which is what I asked for.

But, the bigger issue is where is the 'so... do you want to make a retirement contribution and lower your tax bill? If you contributed xxx then the bill would be xxx or if you contributed xxx your bill would be xxx'

What happened to that discussion? And filing electronically? We don't have that option? I sent an email.

I'm not expecting any huge miracle here but I was hoping for just a bit of a dialog. Instead I get a form letter that suggests, in addition to the $600 fee they are charging, they want to know if I want to pay them an additional $90 for up to $3,000 worth of audit support and an additional $60 for 2 letters they would write to the IRS if the IRS requests letters.

I'm not quite as excited about 'my CPA' as I was a couple of weeks ago.

$19,065 for 2004, 1st quarter of 2005 and CPA bill (not including the $150 of CPA 'insurance'). Holey crapoley.

Comments

[rivendweller.livejournal.com]

Holy shit. They were negligent for not calling you and asking about your retirement contribution. You should call them up and make them redo it for free. That's what I did for my clients when I made a mistake like that. And it IS their mistake. I don't care how big a hurry they were in. They should have asked. Did you have a profit on your Schedule C? Then it should have been automatic for them to consider how to lower your tax bill.

$600 seems high, but I've been out of the loop for a few years. They didn't even do a state tax return! Don't get that other crap they're selling. You can write your own letters, and it's pretty unlikely you'll be audited. Even if you are audited, you can probably handle it without them. Sounds like you're pretty well organized.

Sorry you had a disappointing experience with them.

[pheon.livejournal.com]

I agree with rivendweller: $600 seems high. I suspect your stuff is more complicated than mine, but I just paid my CPA $120 for both federal and state tax return. And no, they didn't recommend I put money into my IRA 'cause I can't. :-) [No earned income.]

[susandennis]

You are amazing! Thank you thank you thank you!

Just writing that entry made me feel better. And I am not all that disappointed in them. I'm much happier finding them than not. And, after thinking about it, I was not maybe as clear as I could have been. I did not ask for an estimate. I did not specifically ask about the process. And I even knew when I took it in that I probably wanted to make a retirement contribution and I didn't mention it.

And it is highly likely that I would not have even done the CPA thing had you not mentioned it so much so thank you - really.

BUT especially thank you for this comment - and the timing - do you read these things before I post them????

Yes there is a fat profit in the Schedule C. Now, thanks to you, I will know that I am on solid grounds with my request. And I'll be assertive on Monday when I talk to this guy. For sure.

Oh and thanks about the CPA insurance. I absolutely will not pay for that.

I am getting way into debt to you!

[rivendweller.livejournal.com]

Aw, shucks. I miss this work.

You should definitely make a retirement contribution, it will lower your taxes significantly. When you talk to them, just say you were surprised that no options were presented to you before the return was completed, that you really do want to do it. If they're worth their salt, they'll respect your responsible financial decision.

I should probably back up a little bit about them not charging you extra to calculate the retirement $$ options, however. It does involve a bit of work, but not a lot. The computer does most of it. What I'd do was plug in an amount for the retirement contribution (say, $5,000), hit the "reprocess" button, scroll to the tax results and write it down. Then do it again with several more likely options (maybe $10,000 and $15,000). Then I'd either call the client, fax or e-mail the options to them with the resulting tax liabilities with each scenario. Then I'd return their file to the "decision from client pending" stack and wait for them to inform me what they wanted to do. So it would be fair for them to charge you maybe another $100 to calculate your options and communicate with you. But they should not charge you for reprocessing. The information is already saved in their Lacerte tax software files. All they have to do is plug in a couple of new numbers. The software takes care of the rest. So if you get a song & dance about "woe is me I've worked for two days on this" don't believe it.

[susandennis]

Yeah I think you and I both had to get over the shock. I did. I sent him another email tonight saying that I should have asked before but I am now...

1. How much would it cost me to have you look at my return again and tell me how much I would save my making a retirement contribution?

2. Is there anything I can do - record keeping, reporting or anything this year to help with either the tax bill or your bill next year?

Thanks,

Susan

Live and learn... And next year I am all on point for those pesky quarterly estimated... Even have everything in place to file them automatically and electronically.

[geordie.livejournal.com]

Sounds like your CPA is much more effective at sucking you in than at doing his job.

[idajo.livejournal.com]

Good lord!! Okay . . we've got to think . . it's going to take more than selling your garage cage items on eBay to offset that amount. (That's a hint about not being too hasty to give stuff away in return for clearing out the cage . . I watch Antique Roadshow and there are TREASURES in there . . I'm positive!) Maybe charging a cover charge for the Open House?!?!?! Although, with that amount to pay it's not quite what your typical "rent party" can generate!

Ya know, maybe a "second opinion' might not be a bad idea . . what you save on the CPA "insurance" would probably pay for it!

i would expect that, for $600 ...

[henare.livejournal.com]

... they should stand behind their work WITHOUT an additional charge.

i bet they didn't suggest filing electronically because there is no advantage to you--since you owe money, it seems to make sense to pay it as late as possible ... which (in my book) means printing it off and snail-mailing it in on the 15apr2005.

of course, you can write off the $600 next year, but it still sucks.

Re: i would expect that, for $600 ...

[susandennis]

Yeah, that $600 tax deduction just occurred to me about 30 minutes ago. I'm good with that!!

You can file now - and pay electronically later. I can log onto the EFTPS system and set up any payment schedule I want. That's how I'm going to pay my quarterly estimated.