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Accounting. Audit and Tax
 CPAnet Forum : Accounting. Audit and Tax
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Inspired
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Posted: 12 Mar 2010 at 09:53 | IP Logged  

Is this the end of tax services? I did it for the 1st time yesterday it was so easy a caveman can do it

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careermindedmom
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Posted: 12 Mar 2010 at 10:02 | IP Logged  

No, I don't think so

Its easy to do, but also easy to screw up if someone doesn't know the
right terms or what applies and what doesn't. You'll be amazed what
people try to deduct.

I remember doing a return for a Navy sailor who was trying to deduct her
"Sunshine fund" contributions for work (I.e., the stuff people contribute
to in order to pay for flowers when someone has a baby, experiences a
loss, etc).

I may think TT is easy, but if you talk to the average Joe out there... they
still hate to do their taxes and will pay someone else to deal with it so
they don't have to.

Me, personally, I don't see the big deal with taxes & why people hate it so
much. I don't even understand why people think its that complicated (I'm
referring to most situations I've encountered, not the genuinely more
complicated ones that I need to start looking at the tax rules again)... but
then again, I'm sure my IT friends feel that way about programming.

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stochastic
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Posted: 12 Mar 2010 at 11:14 | IP Logged  

TT is easy in the fact you put numbers in and it should calculate everything properly, including phase-outs,
scale-downs, certain optimizations, and so on. What it doesn't teach you though is what is properly
deductible/excludable/includable etc. I work with expats and some of the lower-level ones have prepared prior
return with TT that were blatantly wrong, especially in the area of employee business expenses and depreciable
assets, most commonly. They try to claim everything under the sun for these two categories, but when we are
authorized to prepare their returns through their company we have to tell them that (usually) 80% of those
shouldn't be deductible given their facts and circumstances. It's also really weak on state sourcing and
dealing with certain scenarios such as foreign earned income, foreign tax credits, and stock option
income.

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allegro-cpa
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Posted: 12 Mar 2010 at 11:22 | IP Logged  

i use Tax Act.  Just plug in the numbers, your gross income, etc.  Then it lets you know how much you expect to get back or owe.  Pretty easy stuff.  http://www.taxact.com/

Though I probably need a tax professional to tell me the little nuances that I could have done to add more money in my pocket.
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cflas08
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Posted: 12 Mar 2010 at 13:45 | IP Logged  

careermindedmom wrote:
No, I don't think so

Its easy to do, but also easy to screw up if someone doesn't know the
right terms or what applies and what doesn't. You'll be amazed what
people try to deduct.

I remember doing a return for a Navy sailor who was trying to deduct her
"Sunshine fund" contributions for work (I.e., the stuff people contribute
to in order to pay for flowers when someone has a baby, experiences a
loss, etc).

I may think TT is easy, but if you talk to the average Joe out there... they
still hate to do their taxes and will pay someone else to deal with it so
they don't have to.

Me, personally, I don't see the big deal with taxes & why people hate it so
much. I don't even understand why people think its that complicated (I'm
referring to most situations I've encountered, not the genuinely more
complicated ones that I need to start looking at the tax rules again)... but
then again, I'm sure my IT friends feel that way about programming.

I'm having last year customers calling me to do their taxes but I can't due to me studying. But, they are aware of TT but just don't want to deal with it. They would prefer to be at Disney World or something.



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