ironically, the chaos translates into expanded business.
by 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research
it was a pretty bad busy season for most of the nation’s tax preparers. covid-19 was on the wane, but congress was on the job, jiggering tax rules even as the season was underway.
and, now, with the prospects of a federal government shutdown and a multi-trillion-dollar spending bill, 2022 is shaping up to be deja vu all over again.
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to be sure, a good number of accountants are assuaged by more clients and more revenue. but the 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 business barometer finds preparers experiencing a long, tough slog.
in all, 53 percent say they had a busy season somewhat worse (27 percent) or much worse (26 percent) than last year.
for some, it seems like a good time to call it quits. “thank you for all the love and support,” says one firm’s auto-responder to incoming emails.
“as some of you may know, this past few tax seasons have been nothing short of chaotic, to say the least,” the three-office, north carolina tax shop tells callers. “but i have enjoyed being able to assist each and every one of my clients.”
of course, worse never looked so bad, given the fear and chaos of the previous year.
one anonymous preparer summed up the pandemic years well: “last year was pretty chaotic. this year has had its challenges, but nothing like last year.”
needy sheep
the most common comments by far griped about the frustration of new tax rules smack dab in the middle of the season.
“the various business and individual stimulus bills and payments and tax code changes have made everything much more complex,” said bette hochberger, founder of an eponymous boutique practice in fort lauderdale. “there are requests to assist with ppp and eidl. clients rushing to get taxes filed to get these funds. many back and forth with clients regarding individual stimulus payments.”
ralph wright, suffering a “much worse” year, laid similar blame.
“congressional changes in the midst of the tax season plus only one month additional this year as opposed to three months last year,” wright said. “additional work on covid-19 stimulus plus corporate/small business ppps etc. too much to handle in the midst of a tax season, particularly since the irs doesn’t have enough staff to handle even routine matters.”
lisa speed, head of a small firm, rated her year as “much worse,” as her firm goes through a particularly rough time changing the fundamental nature of her services.
“we are responsible for enacting/monitoring all the covid relief,” speed said. “clients have transitioned into needy, irresponsible, disrespectful and unaware sheep. deluge of new clients and no one to hire.”
note that she isn’t complaining about the disease itself but its legislative symptoms.
new stresses
or, as one frustrated, same-as-last-year preparer put it, “last year we had the stress of dealing with covid. this year our stresses are ppp loans, stimulus payments, tax law changes and the erc.”
the learning curve, not to mention the client-education curve, has been rough, but quite a few respondents are finding comfort in expanded business, much of it made possible by the complexities of pandemic relief.
roger lubiens wrapped up the season in three enviable words: “42 new clients.”
ron frazier, doing business out of tannersville, pa., also reported new clients.
susie beck, also ranking the season as “much better,” said, “i’ve made more money this year.”
we’re hearing a lot of complaints about frustrated clients, mostly because they need more assistance and a lot more explanation. but we aren’t getting too many reports of loss of clients because of bankruptcy. apparently, clients are struggling and relying on their accountants to help them stay in business.
the new pandemic
but albuquerque’s robert f. widmann has been hit hard.
“the pandemic has killed business in new mexico,” widman said. “our governor’s covid-19 restrictions are the toughest in the usa. i have lost over 50 percent of the practice in the last year.”
when business gets bad, the only way is up. hope is the new pandemic. fifty-five percent of our respondents say they expect business will be better for their firms over the next 12-18 months, and only 11 percent fear it will get somewhat or much worse.
6 responses to “busy season forecast: more chaos”
me, myself and i
“there is never such a thing as a bad client, but rather a bad client that you do not charge enough” – me
i know, i know! there is never enough money for some clients which can overcome their undesirableness. but the alternative is even more undesirable.
“never fire a client, just encourage them to move on due to their unwillingness to pay the asked price to stay on” – me
stephen schlichting ea
2020 has been another challenging year for all the reasons in the article.
the biggest issue not discussed in the article is the extreme challenges and delays that started at irs 3 years ago, from obsolete technology to 63 no integrated information systems to some staff working from home and some at the office but being short handed, under trained having dc dump projects on them that they were never intended…..to design, create and roll out….stimulus, mid year retroactive changes and even these issue are creating ripples that will fall on taxpayers and practitioners to fight to rectify for millions of taxpayers echoing over the next several years, add in advance child care credit, ppp forgiveness, and the potential mass overhaul of tax laws just 4 years after very significant changes a 3% chance of reaching acs or anyone via the practitioner line and 6 to 8 week processing time for poa’s via irs caf unit and that recipe i have seen lead too is that many many experienced practitioners have gotten burned out and willing to walk away from taxes altogether without passing their knowledge to the next generation, which a far smaller than what is and will be needed down the road.
i have a couple cpa’s that just want to refer their business over to me…no strings other than they fell confident we will treat their clients like our own.
i offered to have them semi-retire, work 2 or 3 days a week, help oversee the client conversion and pass their knowledge and wisdom on to the staffers….a couple have just said they want to be done.
as our firm does representation too, i am having cpa firms refer clients that are several years out of compliance simply because they don’t want to take on clients that aren’t completely and entirely on top of their tax situation.
practitioners frustration as clients get letters from irs that make little to no sense, or sent without regard to prior correspondence replying to irs.
taxpayers are looking at us about where is their stimulus, where is their refund, why are they getting letters and on and on which takes time to research and respond… irs isn’t picking up the bill for that time, and historically helping taxpayers with things like that were no charge events as 99% of the time responding to irs and back was somewhat timely….now its 6 months +/- if at all? it takes quite a bit of time to submit a case to the advocates office to simply get them to refer the case over to the irs section who was supposed to handle the issue months ago and has not and reaching out to the advocate via a 911 because the taxpayer received their 1058 letter certified and is under threat of collections before too long.
whatever happened to the taxpayer bill of rights lauded by dc after its passage? it’s almost laughable to read… if dc is going to pass laws they should be laws they understand and will do whats necessary to support it.
irs is failing at is principle mandate which is to administer and collect taxes and until the staffing, training and technology get caught up, the pending plan to add 10billion to the irs collections department would be catastrophic until the other irs departments get caught back up and on solid footing.
commissioner rettig please hold dc to upholding the taxpayer bill of rights, provide funds for training that is severely lacking and technology to assist taxpayers and practitioners in communicating or resolving issues with irs.
remind dc that 30% of irs is within 5 years of retirement and counting their days….they need to be training and passing their knowledge off to the next generation.
for us practitioners that stick through all of this is lots of opportunity as there are more irs issues being created every day, the hard part is it is far harder to get through to irs and get a case through resolution which will mean higher fees, practitioners will be scarcer, higher fees which is not bad but that also ends up those without the means will have trouble finding good capable representation. litcs or low income taxpayer clinics are few and far between and have very limited capacity where they do exist.
vita has the same challenges.
for now we are carrying the brunt of taxpayers frustration, blame and at times contempt as we spend our time and resources to fight for their cases as they slowly meander through irs “processing” or unassigned for months after months and the only real access is acs which is great if everything is ready to set a streamline or full pay etc but ppia or cnc….is outside their delegation but can streamline up to 1m over the life of the statute, while a ro in the field is limited to 100k or less streamline? for ours and our clients sanity we need to get the word out that next year appears to be more of the same or worse.
they should be prepared and more organized than they ever have been before, so they can protect their position should irs disagree and don’t expect refunds very quickly.
me and my crew are here, tired and beaten down but we continue the fight and will continue to do so.
i applaud all the others that continue to fight with us.
we need to find a way for the gifted who are retiring after 30-40 yrs or more to please leave time to pass your knowledge to the next next generation, everyone will benefit and be better for it.
steven ellis
the last two years have been very unusual and demanding. i like most struggled to meet the demands and deadlines with reduced staff and not being able to hire. my lesson from all this is it forced me to look into the way i handled my interoffice procedures. i have come to realize with how so much is becoming digitalized that i have to change to better accounting software and become more demanding that my clients be forced to use the software i implement that allow bank feeds and give them portals to do certain basic entry things. i also will be raising my fees along with these changes and will be informing my small business owner clients the day of bringing in a years worth are over. i feel my firm as well as myself and staff must adopt these changes to streamline client information or the chaos will continue.
hitendra r. patil
steven, thanks for sharing your thoughts. precisely what i have seen working for several firms. taking a better control of your firm’s technology and processes, and helping clients recognize the benefits of such “standardized customization” can deliver great enhancements to your firm as well as clients. process evaluation to identify data available somewhere else to be in your accounting software without re-entering it will help a lot. would love to hear periodic updates from you.
jonathon wendorf
couldn’t agree with this more: “clients have transitioned into needy, irresponsible, disrespectful and unaware sheep”
something has been changing within our society and client base over the years and the pandemic seemed to accelerate it.
don’t know what it is, but i guess i am now an old practitioner longing for the good ole days when clients valued our services, knowledge and treated us with respect and as people.
hitendra r. patil
interesting experience and perspective, jonathan! thanks for sharing! i wonder is it because the “information” that mostly
only professionals had in prior years is now readily available to clients (because of technological advances) and hence the “value” of professional “knowledge” as perceived by clients is gradually reducing? if yes, it that the reason “advisory” services is more valuable now – because even today, it is the professionals who can really “connect the dots” – which clients can miss?