What's the best tax preparation outfit?

Question

Like H & R Block? Are they all the same for the most part?

Answer 1

Honestly, they are not all the same. I worked for Jackson Hewitt for several years and their software program is designed to pull out every possible legal deduction and credit available to you, another great thing about them is that where ever you move to, the JH work together so that you can start where you left off the prior year. If you need a copy of past tax returns they are free to customers. The bad thing is they (h&r, liberty, jbl) hire hundreds of people for tax season, it is the luck of the draw if you get a "good" preparer. In each firm they have everything from the beginner to CPA's, EA's etc. Another thing is the cost, but if your taxes are complicated it is money well spent.

good luck & blessing

ps - National Association of Tax Professionals (NATP) will give refferals of tax professionals who are registered with them and some are employees or owners of JH, H&R, JBL etc.

Answer 2

The best advice I can give you is come to your appointment prepared. Have all your paperwork together, know your situation, and you can even print off checklists of information that might be helpful to you from free websites to make sure you haven't missed any information.

As to the organization that you choose, you will hear horror stories and good things about all. It is up to you to interview your tax preparer at the same time they are interviewing you.

Ask yourself these questions: Does the preparer seem knowledgeable, are they asking you questions and discussing your options, are they giving you advice on what you can do in future years, are they willing to stop in the middle of an interview and ask for additional information from other sources or make phone calls or look up questions in reference materials, are the returns/refunds in line with what you have gotten in the past, and if there are differences can the preparer explain why they are different.

If you find a good preparer, stick with them. You might save yourself a couple of bucks preparing your own, however these people make it their business to continue their education and know the new laws and statutes, and knowledge is a powerful and comforting thing.

Answer 3

Unless your tax situation is extremely complicated, filing yourself is not as difficult as most people believe. Use your last year's return as a guide and check out the IRS.gov web site. They give you access to the forms and information you need. There are links to various free services.

I've used a free program from taxact.com for several years. You don't need to submit any information over the web unless you feel comfortable. You answer questions or fill out forms directly from the information you receive - W-2's, 1099's, etc.

For the first year, I checked the results against the forms prepared by our CPA. Exactly the same - even odd deductions like foreign tax paid by mutual funds were included. By the time you've collected all the forms and information needed to give to the tax preparer, you've essentially done all the work. The rest of it is easily done by a computer program.

Answer 4

incorrect. Any tax due is continually the taxpayer's duty. if you're previous adequate to retire and draw a pension, you want to comprehend that you'll pick a 1099-R for that pension earnings.

Answer 5

You yourself are the "best" tax prep outfit.

Among the storefront tax prep mills they are all pretty much equal as far as accuracy of the tax prep work. But on other fronts, they're worse than a used car salesman on a roll.

They use high pressure tactics to get you to take their "refund anticipation loans" at interest rates that would do a loan shark proud -- I've seen rates as high as 2,533% APR.

They also use high pressure tactics to pressure you into investing any refund in their in-house IRA plans. Interestingly their plans usually have the highest annual maintenance fees and are the worst performing IRAs going.

Answer 6

Use the services that are offered at the IRS website, Depending on your circumstances, you might qualify for Free File
http://www.irs.gov/efile/index.html

Answer 7

You are the best tax preparation outfit. No to what you asked.

www.IRS.GOV
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GOD bless us.
CPA-retired