Isaac M. O'Bannon is the managing editor and digital content manager for CPA Practice Advisor (www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com), drawing on two decades of experience covering the areas of professional accounting, taxation, business productivity and consumer technologies. Prior to CPA Practice Advisor, O'Bannon was a consultant at firms in San Francisco, Denver and Tulsa, serving clients that included Logitech, Polycom, Hilti, Microsoft, the Stanford Research Institute, the University of Oklahoma's College of Engineering and other technology leaders. He is a U.S. Navy veteran. Email: isaac.obannon - @ - cpapracticeadvisor.com
July 23, 2010
What do you think of payroll? Does your firm consider payroll services as a significant component of your offerings? For professional accounting firms, payroll services have been somewhat of a roller coaster ride over the past couple of decades, and many firms are eagerly diving back into the client service. Why? Because this core need...…
July 7, 2010
Looking for some guidance in getting your clients to use web-based programs- and finding the best ones out there? The Sleeter Group is offering a seminar at several cities across the country (Starting in the Bay Area on July 20) specifically geared toward helping accounting firms find the best technologies, how to implement them, security...…
June 29, 2010
The nomination period for The CPA Technology Advisor’s 40 Under 40 recognitions is nearing its end. Be sure to nominate a colleague or even yourself, if you are a technologically savvy professional in the accounting space or are a vendor serving the profession. Honorees do not have to possess any credential, but should be directly...…
June 25, 2010
Technology and business experts have long been proclaiming the benefits of “the cloud” – getting business online can help with productivity and efficiency, and also help control costs. From the professional accountant’s perspective, having clients that use web-based programs and collaboration tools can also greatly streamline in-firm workflow processes and help the practice be more...…
June 16, 2010
Thousands of U.S. businesses faced a Wednesday without access to Intuit, QuickBooks and other online programs and services, as almost all of the technology vendor’s SaaS (web-based) programs and other websites remained offline. Intuit’s websites were first reported down around 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, June 15. The offline websites included QuickBooks, QuickBooksOnline, Quicken, Lacerte Software,...…
June 8, 2010
Mobile professional payroll applications, online document storage, SaaS-based accounting and practice management tools and an in-practice knowledge sharing system were among the technologies honored at the 7th Annual Tax and Accounting Technology Innovation Awards.
May 18, 2010
As promised yesterday, here is a list of the various award winners that Sage introduced to their partner peers during yesterday’s keynote at the 2010 Sage Insights Conference in Denver. Most of the announcements were actually released previously, but this was the first time the winners had been presented to the community of Sage partners....…
April 28, 2010
As a result of the recently passed healthcare legislation, effective March 30, 2010, health benefits provided to an employee’s child up to 27 years of age is tax free for most taxpayers. The adult child does not need to be a dependent of the employee taxpayer. The IRS announced on April 27 (www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=222193,00.html) that the...…
April 16, 2010
Congrats on making it through another tax season! I ran into this funny, but pretty intelligent little video on YouTube about automated online backup for accounting professionals. It’s worth three minutes to watch. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LJcAy_gfDQ I also wrote about online professional backup systems in our April issue, which just went live today- you can read it...…
April 6, 2010
As technologically reliant as modern tax and accounting professionals are, it is astounding, at least to me, that about half of practices in the U.S. don’t even bother to have a website. Yet, that’s what our annual reader surveys and Productivity Survey continues to show, and both correspond with measurements made by the AICPA and...…
March 4, 2010
For years, many communities in Alaska have laid claim to the highest sales tax rates in the nation. But no longer, according to a report by Vertex, Inc., a provider of sales tax research data and compliance solutions for enterprise businesses. But no longer.
February 20, 2010
Okay, just a little humor as professionals start to really dig into the tax season. Despite the ongoing movement by tax and accounting practices toward paperless processes as a part of modern workflow, print is, of course, still ocassionally necessary. So, let’s try a couple of new terms when referring to the occasional paper functions...…
