What atmosphere are you creating?
By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide
If you have staff, have happy cheerful helpful people.
Exclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.Don’t surround yourself with downers and naysayers. Also have team players.
Some of these you may want to keep year round.
By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms
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Sometimes “quick and easy” isn’t, but it’s still worthwhile.
By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide
I keep a few of the one-volume tax guides in my office so I could look up a quick answer when I need to. Recently a golf buddy emailed me a question that I thought I could answer quickly. He wanted to know that if he was in the “zero” percent capital gains tax bracket, did that apply to an unlimited amount of capital gains? Sounds like a simple question.
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Well I looked it up online and then in three one-volume tax guides. Only one source had thorough coverage of the issue. I ended up spending an hour on this “simple” question including my emailed response. Nothing is simple anymore.
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Downsizing and backlogs become national policy.
By CPA Trendlines Research
The Internal Revenue Service is heading into the 2026 filing season with fewer employees, more complex tax law changes, and less capacity to resolve problems when returns go wrong — a combination federal watchdogs say will leave tax professionals managing the fallout even as headline service metrics appear stable.
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National Taxpayer Advocate Erin M. Collins says most taxpayers with straightforward, electronically filed returns should see few disruptions. But she warned that the true test of the filing season will be how the IRS handles the millions of returns that require human intervention — at a time when the agency’s workforce has been cut by more than a quarter.
Why Tax Pros Are Imposing Standards on Themselves.
By CPA Trendlines Research
As the 2026 filing season begins, the National Association of Tax Professionals is launching a formal credentialing program for taxpayer representation.
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The NATP is stepping into a regulatory void left by years of congressional inaction, leaving more than 500,000 paid preparers operating without national standards, even as IRS and GAO data show higher error rates on paid-prepared returns than on do-it-yourself filings, and Congress is delaying action.
Less capacity, more obligation.
By CPA Trendlines Research
Identity theft is becoming one of the biggest time drains for tax professionals this filing season, and the IRS may be less equipped than ever to handle it.
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According to the IRS Advisory Council—the body representing tax professionals—identity-theft refund cases now take nearly two years to resolve, as staffing cuts and system limits slow IRS response.
But identity theft is only one of a long list of problems that can only get worse this year. Tax professionals are bracing for prolonged client disputes and frustrating follow-ups with an understaffed, ill-equipped IRS.
The personal touch goes a long way toward client retention.
By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide
Clients are not numbers on a list that needs to be reduced. They are all individuals and consider themselves very important people and want professionals who treat them accordingly.
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It is attitudinal and accountants must adopt that mindset and transmit that through to their culture. So you need to know when it’s essential to pick up the phone.
Why is the busy season better for CAS accountants?
By CPA Trendlines Research
With busy season 2026, accountants specializing in client accounting services are reaping the benefits of a year’s worth of hard work, in a smoother path to April 15, more compliant clients, and higher fees, according to the CPA Trendlines Busy Season Barometer.
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The Busy Season Barometer marks the 2026 tax season as the breakthrough moment when CAS crosses from merely an aspirational experiment to a routine part of the service mix for small and midsize firms.
Holding Steady, Tuning Workflow, and Testing AI.
By CPA Trendlines Research
With the 2026 filing season approaching, most accounting firms are not racing to rip and replace their technology stacks. Instead, they are making selective adjustments, tightening workflows, and cautiously experimenting with artificial intelligence — all while keeping a close eye on staffing limits, client behavior, and return on investment.
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That restrained approach comes through clearly in CPA Trendlines’ Busy Season Barometer, which shows a profession that is less focused on transformation than on execution. The dominant theme across survey waves is not disruption, but discipline.
Revenues and client rosters outpace profit gains as firms battle cost pressures.
By CPA Trendlines
CPA firms heading into the 2026 tax season expect revenue gains driven primarily by higher prices, not by adding clients, even as a majority anticipate another heavy extension season.
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According to the CPA Trendlines Busy Season Barometer, about 6 in 10 firms expect total revenue to increase this year, while roughly one-third expect revenue to hold steady. Profit expectations trail revenue slightly, a pattern that points to continued cost pressure even as clients and would-be clients clamor for more, and more high-end, services