As tax season approaches, practitioners race to get ready.
How’s Tax Season 2018 Shaping Up?
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TODAY’S BONUS QUESTION:
How will the new Tax Law affect your Busy Season this year?
Demand for new hires softens as college talent pipeline sets record.
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines
The next generation of accountants in the collegiate pipeline set a record last year and remains at that level this year, even as firms appear to be backing off on expanding headcounts with new graduates, according to new research.
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Is the end in sight for the talent shortage?
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines
New signs are emerging that the profession may be approaching a long-awaited inflection point: Productivity gains from new technologies are finally showing up in reductions in hiring plans. That’s good news for some; not so much for others.
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Are we on the verge of a CPA glut? Are we going to see lines of unemployed accountants at the entrance of industrial parks holding signs that say, “Will do tax prep for food”?
Benchmarks for firms large and small provide roadmaps for strategic success.
By Rick Telberg
Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey
Every day in the United States, more than half of all accounting firm owners are thinking about a merger, an acquisition or both. M&A is now as routine to the day-to-day operations of running a tax and accounting practice as turning on the lights in the morning and taking out the garbage at night.
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Fortunately, a new survey provides a one-of-a-kind roadmap for growth-minded professionals seeking the hard-boiled data essential to making smarter strategic decisions. With thousands of key metrics for firms of every size, you can compare your firm against similar firms. Better yet: You can compare where your firm is today, to where it will be tomorrow.
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Non-CPA tax and accounting firms hit the gas pedal.
Which Pricing Strategy Works Best Today?
Join the Survey. Get the Answers.
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines Research
Under pressure by an increasingly competitive and uncertain business environment, CPA firms are pressing the brakes on new price increases, according to new data obtained by CPA Trendlines
Drilling into firm technology and operations provides a roadmap for strategic success
By Rick Telberg
Every day in the United States, more than half of all accounting firm owners are thinking about a merger, an acquisition or both. M&A is now as routine to the day-to-day operations of running a tax and accounting practice as turning on the lights in the morning and taking out the garbage at night.
Fortunately, the new Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey by the research team of Randy Johnston and Leslie Garrett provides a one-of-a-kind roadmap for growth-minded professionals seeking the hard-boiled data essential to making smarter strategic decisions. With thousands of key metrics for firms of every size, you can compare your firm against similar firms. Better yet: You can compare where your firm is today to where you want it to be tomorrow.
In the war for talent, “local” CPA firms face new threats from distant, bigger rivals – worldwide
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines
The traditional business model of the so-called “local” CPA firm is being challenged anew by the emergence of a single, unified coast-to-coast talent market that’s undermining the pay differences between big-city and small-town firms.
That’s bad news for traditional firms trying to control staffing costs. But great news for a new generation of top talent.
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The study shows that salaries are increasing faster than inflation throughout the American market, and they aren’t always limited by the local cost of living. The average salary for a tax professional in New York City, for example, has risen to $77,660 this year, up from $75,400 last year. Importantly, the numbers ($77,660 this year, up from $75,400) are the same in Des Moines, Iowa, where the cost of living is substantially lower – along with the pricing sensitivity of Des Moines clients. This augurs new pressures on billing rates and profitability across the nation.
Let clients know you’re on their side.
Tax Season 2017: What’s Working. What’s Not
Join the conversation. Get the answers.
By Rick Telberg
CPA Trendlines Research
Internal Revenue Service workers may be chronically understaffed, but they’re not stupid. They’ve been in the tax collection business since the Civil War, and the IRS has been harvesting income tax since 1913. It has processed billions of tax returns, and it knows the tricks that taxpayers often try. It also knows the tricks that wanna-be cheats use to exploit the tax system, effectively robbing the honest people who pay what they owe.
For the last three years, the IRS has given a name to the most common schemes to swindle either taxpayers or the nation’s treasury. It calls them “The Dirty Dozen.” This year, half the dozen are scams by third parties that attempt to rip off taxpayers. The other half are taxpayer attempts to effectively rip off their government.
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Sleazy tax tactics don’t do a practicing accountant any good. The slime taints the tax pro, and the pro may be put in the very uncomfortable position of having to defend the taxpayer before an IRS agent. This is not the light tax preparers look for at the end of the busy season tunnel. They’re thinking “Bahamas,” not “IRS office.”
Clients who know about the Dirty Half-Dozen will be disinclined to try a trick the IRS is expecting. Sharing the list will go far to ward off problems. READ MORE →