TAX

You Train Your Clients, Whether You Mean To or Not

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If you schedule it, they will come. So … stop that now.

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

As we all know, there is a definite cost involved in not training clients. Let’s look at the training that’s occurring, whether you know it or not. It actually all boils down to timing.

MORE: Train Your Clients Before They Train You | Why Time Tracking Still Matters | Business Owners Face One of Three Exits | Make Fewer Mistakes, Increase Revenue and Capacity | How Small Firms Can Win the Talent Wars | Six Ways to Create a Millennial-Friendly Firm | Do You Know Your Turnaround Time?
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Here is an example of my stupidity.

I met with a client who was a software company executive. He had been a client for a dozen years, and people don’t get much smarter than he is. He drove from Alexandria, Virginia, to Chantilly, Virginia, every year. The drive is 20 miles and might seem like a 30-minute trip, but in northern Virginia, it’s more like an hour.
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Train Your Clients Before They Train You

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Taking unscheduled phone calls and meetings wrecks your bottom line and theirs.

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

Many of the behaviors you rationalize as good client service are just desperate measures to avoid losing bad clients.

MORE: Why Time Tracking Still Matters | Business Owners Face One of Three Exits | How Small Firms Can Win the Talent Wars | Six Ways to Create a Millennial-Friendly Firm | Do You Know Your Turnaround Time?
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However, clients are trainable – at least as trainable as Jack Russell Terriers. That is to say they’re somewhat trainable. However, like Jack Russell Terriers, you train clients or they’ll train you. Somebody’s getting trained. Here’s an example of how that works.
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Time Management Rule #1 for Accountants

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The “one big thing” you can do to take back control.

By Seth Fineberg
At Large

Accountants are constantly being told about “the one thing” they need to do to improve their professional lives, and in my view, the simplest and most powerful is to firmly adhere to deadlines that you determine for your clients. Not the IRS’s deadlines, not any governing body… You!

MORE SETH FINEBERG:  Plan to Go ‘Live’ Post Tax Season |  Why VC Is a Bigger Threat Than AI  |   What Does Taking Control of Your Firm Mean? | Accountants Need Each Other More Than Ever | Marchternity: Just Say ‘No’ | Some Thoughts on In-Person Events | So You Think You Know Accountants? | What Bogs Down Accountants

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The one change tax pros need to consider making going forward is setting their own deadlines – for themselves, for their firms, and, especially, for their clients.

All signs seem to indicate this year’s tax season was, comparatively, the most “normal” over the past three years. But tons of tax pros continue to stress, struggle, and even reconsider staying with tax work at all. While it may seem like a huge step, you would be surprised that by just having clients adhere to your deadlines, and no other due date, the level of stress will be reduced exponentially. This may not be a new tactic, but firms I’ve spoken to who decided to engage in telling clients about their deadline, and not the IRS’s, experienced a sense of relief not felt in years, if ever.

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Questions for After Tax Season

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Question marksEleven ideas that warrant following up.

By Ed Mendlowitz
How to Build a Stronger Tax Practice

Many times we have important preliminary discussions when we obtain a client’s tax information.

MORE ON MARKETING: Help Heirs with Tax Issues | Seven Questions to Suggest Estate Planning | 28 Data Points for a Financial Planning Discussion | Every Client Can Use Financial Planning | Four Reasons to Perform Tax Projections | Four Additional Services to Suggest
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Skilled interviewing, or effective follow-up techniques, can make these into an additional engagement.
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