2012 Readers’ Choice Awards

Insight: Tax planning can be one of the most beneficial engagements for a 1040 client, not only giving them knowledge of what to expect come April 15, but when done early enough, it can allow for strategic action to lessen their income tax liabilities at the federal and state levels. Planning is essential for self-employed clients, as well as those with multiple business interests and capital gains exposure, yet nearly half of the professionals voting in these awards claimed not to use a dedicated tax planning system. Of those who did, Drake’s Tax Planner, which is included with the all-inclusive compliance package, was the run-away winner again this year, followed by the Intuit Lacerte Tax Planner, BNA’s Income Tax Planner, Planner CS from Thomson Reuters and CCH’s ProSystem fx Planning. Others receiving votes included PPC, TaxWorks, Tax Coach and the Sawheny Group’s ExecPlan system.

Check out our 2011 review of Tax Planning systems at: www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10415621.

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Tax & Accounting Research Systems

Insight: No professional could possibly know the entire tax code, and even the most savvy pros can be challenged to keep up with the frequent major changes that potentially affect clients. The key, of course, is knowing what you don’t know and having the resources to find out that information. As long as the tax code is complex, the market for tax research will always be hot and offer many options, and it was one of the first to move to a nearly exclusively web-delivered format. This year’s leaders among tax research systems were Thomson Reuters’ Checkpoint, with 20% of the vote, followed by the same vendor’s QuickFinder system, which received 13%. Next up were The Tax Book by Tax Materials, Inc., IntelliConnect from CCH, Intuit ProLine Research, PPC’s Federal Tax Compliance library and BNA’s Tax & Accounting Center.

Check out our 2011 review of Tax Research systems at: www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10446841.

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Estate Planning Systems

Insight: Particularly for high net worth clients, estate planning is an essential component for minimizing tax exposure during generational wealth transition. This is a smaller specialty service in the accounting profession (and only about 18% of our readers cited using such a system), but one for which there are tools and technologies that can help retain client relationships instead of referring them to a potentially competing tax attorney. This year’s top vote receivers were the ONESOURCE Trust & Estate Administration system from Thomson Reuters, receiving nearly 25% of the vote of those who cited use of an estate planning program. Following were programs from BNA, CCH, BrentMark, Financial Profiles Inc., Leimberg & LeClair, Thomson-West and ePlans, Inc.

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1099/W-2 Compliance

Insight: On its surface, most non-professionals would think that year-end reporting doesn’t seem too complicated. Print out a few W-2s or 1099s and all’s good. But payroll compliance experts know that it’s a potential minefield, with penalties for non-compliance or late reporting both to the individuals and to the IRS and SSA, as well as with the various state taxing authorities. With recent withholding tax breaks and other issues, it gets even more challenging, which is why the market for stand-alone W-2/1099 systems is booming, with dozens of offerings. AMS Inc. continues to lead this category for the fourth straight year, with its users eager to voice their support. Rounding out the top eight were EG Systems, CFS Tax Software, 1099 Express, 1099 Pro, Greatland, CCH Small Firm Services and Tenenz.

See our 2011 review of W2/1099 Compliance Programs at: www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10351550.

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Sales & Use Tax

Insight: Whether you call them SALT (state and local taxes) or SUT (sales and use tax), they are increasingly in the focus of state revenue agencies, who are stepping up efforts to collect and penalize small businesses who are not in compliance. This market is split between a handful of technology companies who make solutions that cover all states and integrate with a business’ financial programs to automatically find and post appropriate sales taxes to transactions, as compared to other systems that are focused more on rate lookup and forms compliance, generally for a few specific states. Of course, just about every state with a sales tax now has online submission forms, but for businesses with sales tax obligations in multiple states, a program devoted to compliance can dramatically help ease the processes and avoid penalties. State filing websites led the list this year, followed by perennial favorite eFileSalesTax.com, AvaTax, Trustfile, CFS and ONESource.