LETTERS: ‘Keep up the good work!’

Rick,
I have been reading your ?At Large? articles on the AICPA CPA Insider and I have found them to be very informative and interesting. They are also just the right length to not get one bogged down too long from the tasks at hand. I work for a small local firm, and at a time when it seems most literature leaves ?us? out, yours seems to be applicable to what we do in many areas. Keep up the good work!
Thanks,
Jeb L. Rainey, CPA
Lamb & Braswell, LLC
Macon, Georgia Read more

Posted on June 28, 2006
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SMBs Worldwide to Spend $11 Billion on IT Security in ‘06

More than 75% of midsize businesses and 60% of small businesses cite IT security key to their growth

NEW YORK (AMI Partners) - Small and medium businesses (SMBs) worldwide are set to cross US$11.4 billion on beefing up their IT security and infrastructure this year in a bid to thwart increasing electronic threats. This spending trend will increase at double digit rates annually over the next several years, according to the latest study by New York-based Access Markets International (AMI) Partners Inc. Read more

Posted on June 26, 2006
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$1,500 for a 1040?

Rita Keller reports: Alkon & Levine, P.C. in Newton, MA is test-pricing 1040 preparation at $1,500. “That wasn’t a typo with one too many zeros!” Keller writes. “They bundle 1040 prep with a mandatory financial planning session, unlimited telephone calls during the year and response to IRS notices, etc… Just in case you are wondering, Renee’s firm is a small firm - so if a small firm can do it, maybe we all can!”

More at Keller’s CPAmanagement.

Read more

Posted on June 26, 2006
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Staff Shortage? Or Just Bad Management?

The best way to compete for talent begins with re-thinking your business.

by Rick Telberg
At Large

The battle for scarce accounting and finance talent is reaching unheard of proportions. Firms are turning away work. Finance departments are paralyzed. The profession’s leaders routinely inveigh solemnly about the future.

But if you’re looking at the scarcity as simply a labor-side supply-and-demand problem, you’re probably looking at it the wrong way.

It’s beginning to emerge among a widening group of forward-thinkers that the solution to the profession’s staffing issue lies in smart marketing and visionary management ? not simply waiting out global demographic trends.

If your organization ? an accounting firm, finance department or anyplace else where tax, accounting and finance work is done ? is facing a staffing shortage or high turnover, don’t blame the market. And don’t blame the recruiters. Read more

Posted on June 25, 2006
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Admininstrators: New Force in the Profession

So says Rita Keller reporting from Indianapolis…

“This week I am at the Association for Accounting Administration National Management Conference in Indianapolis. AAA now has nearly 700 members! There are about 225 paid attendees at this year’s Annual Conference. The sharing and learning that goes on at this conference blows me away. It is definitely very unique. With 700 members, I think AAA is becoming quite a force in the profession.”

You can get more of her AAA coverage at CPA Management.

Read more

Posted on June 23, 2006
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Do’s and Don’t’s of a Happy Office

Secret to Success: The art of giving and taking feedback.

by Rick Telberg
On Careers

We’ve been asking accountants and finance managers lately how well their offices use feedback to keep folks happy. It’s clear that a little do-and-don’t advice seems in order for some of the nation’s accounting firms and finance departments.

Our sources reported some pretty big problems on the Do side. Out of seven questions in a study launched in this space (join the study and get the report free), five showed that fewer than half the accounting and finance offices nationwide were doing what they should be doing all (or most) of the time.

Feedback offered on behavior rather than on personality, for example: Only eight percent of managers do it all the time, and only 37 percent do it frequently. A full fifth do it rarely or never.

Ouch! Whoever’s doing the feedback could use a little feedback themselves. Read more

Posted on June 22, 2006
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Financial Planners: Don’t Overlook Employee Benefits

CPAs looking to add a niche to their business consulting services would be wise to consider employee benefits retirement benefits planning.

Reports from the American workplace find that workers are frightened about not having enough saved for retirement and that businesses should be equally scared about whether they are offering the right retirement plans to keep their employees on board.

One survey, sponsored by the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies, finds that half of all workers employed by companies that do not offer retirement plans would leave for an employer that offers such benefits. Meanwhile, businesses may be underestimating how important retirement benefits are to keeping their workers on board. While 58 percent of workers surveyed said they would prefer better benefits over a higher salary, only 22 percent of employers said they feel their employees value benefits above pay.

The issue may be especially acute at smaller companies of less than 500 employees. While 60 percent of workers at large companies offering retirement bennies said they felt their employers were providing adequate information about the plans available to them, less than half their counterparts at smaller companies felt the same way. Read more

Posted on June 21, 2006
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SEC Names Fed Governor Olson as PCAOB Chief

Ex-Ernst (non-CPA) Partner Succeeds McDonough

Washington, D.C., (SEC)- SEC Chairman Christopher Cox announced today that Federal Reserve Board Governor Mark W. Olson has been appointed Chairman of the five-member Public Company Accounting Oversight Board until 2010. Read more

Posted on June 20, 2006
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Delivering Tax Returns on a Platter

… On a CD platter, that is. One St. Louis CPA takes his clients a step closer to paperless.

by Rick Telberg
At Large

Every year after tax season, Joe Eckelkamp convenes a full-day off-site “debriefing day” with the staff of his St. Louis CPA firm. “We discuss what we did right, did wrong, want to change or want to keep the same,” he says.

At last year’s meeting, they decided to reduce the paper processed in the office and to enhance the client’s tax-return package with paperless alternatives. Indeed, all but five of the firms were e-filing.

Eckelkamp’s tax prep package, one of the market leaders, already provided more than enough paperless capability. But he wanted to move slowly, adopting a three-year plan to go paperless with clients, whether that meant online, e-mail, PDF, CD or some new media yet to be discovered.

This year, for the 2006 filing season, Phase 1 was launched. Read more

Posted on June 19, 2006
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MARCUS: Language as a Virus

All this fuss about English as an official national language is hilarious…

by Bruce Marcus

…particularly when there are a remarkable number of native Americans who speak it poorly, and write it as if it were a second language.

Lawyers are notoriously bad about writing, particularly those who think a simple communication must be written as if it were a delicate legal document. I once rewrote a brief that had been written in pure legalese. I did it in English. We won. The judge understood and appreciated it.

Continued at The Marcus Perspective… Read more

Posted on June 15, 2006
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VERBATIM: IRS Chief Talks Compliance Crackdown

Everson

IRS Commissioner Testifies before Senate Committee on Finance on Compliance Concerns Relative to Large and Mid-Size Businesses

Written Testimony of Commissioner of Internal Revenue Mark Everson
June 13, 2006

Good morning, Mr. Chairman, ranking Member Baucus and members of the Senate Committee on finance. It is my pleasure to be with you this morning to discuss compliance issues relative to large and mid-size businesses. These types of issues are handled by our Large and Mid-Size Business Division (LMSB), one of four operating divisions at the IRS.

I want to thank you and all of the Members of the Committee for your interest in the issues I am going to talk about today. I also want to thank you for the support you have demonstrated in the past for our work to rebalance the IRS? enforcement efforts with our service improvements, including some very helpful provisions that were contained in the American Jobs Creation Act. A number of these provisions are directly relevant to LMSB?s taxpayer base and to programs which are administered by LMSB, such as the tax shelter work performed by the Office of Tax Shelter Analysis.

LMSB?s taxpayer base, though small in number relative to the overall taxpayer population, consists of the largest businesses in the United States, including corporations, sub-chapter S corporations, and partnerships with assets greater than $10 million, including over 6,100 publicly traded companies. LMSB taxpayers most recently filed approximately 176,000 income tax returns, and while the overall large business population base remains relatively stable in number, we continue to see an increase in complex business structures and pass-through return filings.

LMSB taxpayers are sophisticated, well-capitalized, well-organized, and adept at planning. Particularly in the case of public companies, they are driven to show high after-tax profitability to shareholders in a very competitive and complex economic environment. They have the resources and willingness to aggressively defend and contest tax positions. Read more

Posted on June 14, 2006
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PHOTO OP: AICPA CEO Address Local Firms

… At Practitioners Symposium 2006

AICPA CEO Barry Melancon talks about credentialing during a wide-ranging state-of-the-world report with 2005-2006 Chair Leslie Murphy at Practitioners Symposium in Las Vegas.

Here’s a tidbit worth re-citing: three times as many CPAs are retiring these days as are entering the profession. Retirement attrition stands at 16.5%. Growth from new entrants: 5.5%.

Read more

Posted on June 13, 2006
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CPAs Hangin’ Ten on Marketing’s New Wave

Blogs may be the talk of the nation, but it’s all the “little things” that count.

by Rick Telberg
At Large

Not too long ago, the accounting profession was actually debating whether CPA firms could or should “do” marketing.

It was a silly debate. Every business — even a CPA business — starts with a sale. No sale: No business. So marketing was always part of the profession. Many just didn’t want to deal with the fact — or know how to.

Today, some still don’t want to deal with marketing. Don’t worry about them. They’ll be out of business soon enough.

But there’s a new cadre of CPA firms who do understand what marketing means. And these are the ones you need to watch. Read more

Posted on June 11, 2006
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