Slightly Easing Off on Tax Preparers – Interesting look at the “more likely than not” issue from the latest edition of Practical Accountant.

Taxes, Three Ways – Thanks to Ed Lyon from TaxCoach Software for the link to this interesting article comparing three different ways to have your tax return prepared.  It was featured in his latest weekly email bulletin, which anyone can subscribe to, even if you don’t subscribe to the full TaxCoach service. 

The gist of the article is just what I have always said.  Those of us in this profession who stay up to date on tax savings opportunities for our clients have absolutely nothing to fear from do it yourself software or the assembly line tax prep services. I have never considered either to be any kind of competition.

To be quite frank, anyone not savvy enough to understand the benefit of paying someone like me one or two thousand dollars in fees in order to reduce their annual tax bill by $10,000 to $20,000 from what it would be with the other kinds of tax returns isn’t really the kind of person I want to work with. Of course, those kinds of fees are more for timely advice and strategic planning assistance, while the assembly line firms’ fees are just for filling in forms, as it is for do it yourself software.