Blog Archives
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IRS Alerts Tax Preparers to EITC Filing Errors
By Jim Buttonow, CPA; CoFounder and VP New River Innovation - Tuesday July 31, 2012Practitioners are receiving letters now, penalties later Tax practitioners are increasingly finding that tough economic times have qualified more of their clients for the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), a refundable credit for low-income taxpayers. Many practitioners are helping their clients claim this credit for the first time. For tax year 2010, the IRS received 142 million individual tax returns, 26.8 million of which claimed the EITC, a 14% increase since 2005. Traditionally, the IRS has seen high error rates among EITC claims. To maintain oversight on EITC errors and abuse, the IRS implemented new due diligence requirements for 2011 individual tax returns. The most significant requirement is to file Form 8867, Paid... -
Have You Accessed the Crowd?
By Jim Boomer, CPA.CITP; CIO, Boomer Consulting - Tuesday July 31, 2012Branding and design can be the most intimidating and resource draining areas of business development. Projects such as these have a tendency become delayed and over budget. Branding and design effects lead generation and is vitally important to the image of the firm so this area can’t be ignored. No longer do firms need to employ a full-time graphic designer or pay a premium for a contracted graphic designer. With advances in technology, accessing the “crowd” has never been easier and is perfect for getting branding and design work done in a timely and cost-effective manner. This method is known as “crowdsourcing”. “Crowdsourcing” is commonly defined as “the act of taking tasks traditionally performed by an employee or... -
Preventing Summer Burnout
By Sandra Wiley, COO, Boomer Consulting - Tuesday July 31, 2012Summer is a time that for some people equates to less hours and a little more personal time. However, as I have talked to firms in recent years, I have noticed that there is less down time and more “busy season” all year round. This constant state of busy creates the one thing that can slow down productivity, create turnover and ultimately is the cause of depression among individuals throughout our firms - it is called burnout. Below are 10 simple strategies for preventing burnout in your life: Breathe deeply - Have you ever noticed your breathing when you are feeling stressed or moving at warp speed? It is probably shallow and tight. Borrow a tip from professional athletes, and take a few slow, deep breaths to relax and collect... -
Reviews, Star Ratings & Comments from Vendors & Professionals... Thank You for the Criticism.
By Isaac M. O'Bannon, Editor - Tuesday July 31, 2012
From our blogs , a note from CPA Practice Advisor 's Editor, Isaac M. O'Bannon: Although I'll admit to being a cynic, I'm generally an optimistic one. :) But I don't usually think of myself as a professional critic, although I guess I am, since a major part of my career has involved reviewing and assigning subjective ratings to various technologies. Over the past 10 years at CPA Practice Advisor, where I am the chief editor of a publication reaching more than 45,000 accounting firms, and more than 100,000 unique online users per month, I've had more than occasional complaints from technology companies who felt they deserved a better rating. Sometimes they were right, and were able to convince me. Usually, they are wrong. The most... -
Stepping up to Lead: 10 Strategies for Professionals
By Sandra Wiley, COO, Boomer Consulting - Tuesday July 17, 2012Anyone can lead! Leadership is not a title, or a part of a job description, it is the actions that professionals can take every day when they walk through the doors at their firm. Here are 10 strategies that you can use to initiate those actions: Allocate Talent Develop Your Firm 5 Dials Training and Learning Process Improvement Develop a Written Plan Hang Onto Your Genius Following the Rules of Standardization Client Experience Business Development for Everyone Internal Client Relationships As you might guess, you could write a full article on any one of these items, however the overriding theory here is that a leader must look at the firm with a broader and longer term view. Anyone who is leading should think and... -
The Future of the Internet
By Dave McClure, Contributing Writer/Columnist - Friday July 13, 2012Those who were around in the early days of live television were treated to a cultural bonanza unlike anything seen before or since. The new medium attracted the finest writers, directors, producers and actors from around the world to present amazing and entertaining shows night after night. You wouldn’t know that now, when the world of television consists of phony reality shows cobbled together as a cheap paste for the 24 minutes out of every hour devoted to advertising. The talent has fled, and what is left is as satisfying as a bowl of stone soup. The Internet is rapidly following the same path. I know, because I was one of the pioneers in the early days, when Internet Service Providers banded together to fight for consumers and... -
Did the Recession Kill Training & Learning in CPA Firms?
By Jim Boomer, CPA.CITP; CIO, Boomer Consulting - Friday July 13, 2012We recently held our spring meetings for the Boomer Technology Circles program and I heard some alarming discussions related to training & learning in CPA firms. And, I heard it enough to worry that we might be facing a not so positive trend. Firms were discussing a topic that we were attacking 5-7-10 years ago before firms really started to get serious about training and learning. That topic – who is responsible for training? Is it IT? Is it the accountants? The reason these questions were once again coming up is because the recession of the last couple years took a toll on the area of training and learning in many firms across the country. Many firms that had invested in a dedicated resource to focus on training, decided to cut back... -
Supreme Court Health Care Ruling and the IRS?
By Jim Buttonow, CPA; CoFounder and VP New River Innovation - Tuesday July 10, 2012The Supreme Court recently settled a divisive debate when it ruled that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) individual mandate is constitutional and that the "shared responsibility payment" is a tax. What does this mean for tax practitioners and their clients? Background Starting in 2014, the PPACA will require individuals, with few exceptions, to carry minimum health care coverage for themselves and their dependents, or pay a fee, referred to as a "shared responsibility payment." Prior to the Supreme Court decision, the original PPACA defined the shared responsibility payment as a "penalty" for individuals who decline to purchase health insurance under the required mandate. However, the Court concluded that... -
Celebrating Women in the Profession
By Dave McClure, Contributing Writer/Columnist - Thursday July 5, 2012
It is no surprise that women now dominate the accounting profession in terms of sheer numbers, just as they do the advertising, law and many other service professions. And while they are still under-represented at the partnership level, it is clear that this dominance by women will both continue and will fundamentally change how the profession conducts itself. Updating its Quick Take on Women in Accounting for 2012, women’s advocate organization Catalyst notes that: Women are 61.3% of all accountants and auditors in the United States. In a 2011 study, women were half of newly hired accounting graduates at CPA firms, and 40% of all CPAs. Women are 21% of all partners at firms, although they are 45% of all accounting employees... -
Transitioning from Technician to Business Leader: The First Step in Becoming a Next Generation Accounting Firm
By M. Darren Root, CPA.CITP; Executive Editor - Wednesday June 27, 2012This is a topic I wished someone had presented to me before I launched my own practice. Working as a technician means you are only capable of working ‘in’ your firm. As a true business leader, you master the ability to work ‘on’ your firm at a higher level—growing the business and managing people effectively. I began my career as a technician, but learned that this mode of working would never allow for any balance between my professional and my personal lives. When I started my small firm, I knew how to execute tax returns and financial statements, and believed that this was all it took to run a profitable firm. Over the next few years, I grew my practice to include more than 20 employees, yet found myself often working seven...
