Accountant issue - what would you do?

[digimon7068]

Why do you cost less than h&r blok? Not that i ever checked their prices but from a "get what you pay for" view it doesnt make sense. Of course from the supply and demand view it might be different.

i don't have a clue. . .here is a typical example though. . .got a client this year, husband and wife, two kids, two w-2's, home mortgage interest, real estate taxes, charitable contributions, some schedule b stuff, some schedule d stuff. . .compared the 2009 info to 2008 to see if anything was missing, prepped the return, kept my time at $160 per hour to the tenth of an hour (i.e., at 6 minute intervals). . .my bill for 2009 $192. . .h&r block's bill for 2008 $320. . .no rapid refund or any of that bullshit in 2008. . .makes no sense to me at all. . .they must just charge by the form. . .so much for 1040, so much for schedule a, so much for schedule b, so much for schedule d, so much for electronic filing, etc. . .me?? i just charge by the hour. . .period. . .and $160 per hour is pretty dang good. . .for me. . .and for my clients

 

[digimon7068]

i don't have a clue. . .here is a typical example though. . .got a client this year, husband and wife, two kids, two w-2's, home mortgage interest, real estate taxes, charitable contributions, some schedule b stuff, some schedule d stuff. . .compared the 2009 info to 2008 to see if anything was missing, prepped the return, kept my time at $160 per hour to the tenth of an hour (i.e., at 6 minute intervals). . .my bill for 2009 $192. . .h&r block's bill for 2008 $320. . .no rapid refund or any of that bullshit in 2008. . .makes no sense to me at all. . .they must just charge by the form. . .so much for 1040, so much for schedule a, so much for schedule b, so much for schedule d, so much for electronic filing, etc. . .me?? i just charge by the hour. . .period. . .and $160 per hour is pretty dang good. . .for me. . .and for my clients

oh. . .and for 2010, it will probably be even less for the above client as there is always at least .2 to .5 hours of time the first year setting a new client on my software and making sure i capture all the carryforward data and prior year drivers (e.g., prior year agi, prior year tax, etc. to satisfy the safe harbor requirements).

 

[-SD-]

Im going to go to h&r blok next year just so i can see why it would cost more than a cpa with 22 years experience.

 

[digimon7068]

Im going to go to h&r blok next year just so i can see why it would cost more than a cpa with 22 years experience.

they charge as much as they think they can get away with while maximizing profit. . .i'm sure they have a formula after so many years in business, where by they make the most money that they possibly can from january 1 to april 15. . .will their fee structure turn some people away? yes. of course. but they don't care. . .they have a formula that they use to maximize profit. . .and, judging by the amount of money they spend on advertising, i'd say they must be doing a pretty good job at maximization. . .plus they have "the" name. . .if you did a word association game with people and one of the words was "taxes", i'll bet an astonishing number of people would reply "h&r block" (not "the irs" or "death and" or "suck"). . .and that's ok. . .most of their clients wouldn't be happy with a guy like me anyway. . .i won't do their return in 15 minutes while they are sitting their watching me. . .my clients drop their data off or i go their office and pick it up and then i prioritize them. . .then, when i start working on them, i actually "think" about them while i'm doing their return. . .and i think about their prior returns and i think about their future returns, and i think about past, present and future changes in the tax laws and, where possible, i make recommendations on how they can make changes in the way that they do business or conduct their lives so that they can maximize their own personal cash flow (taxes being just one small part of the whole picture). . .and my bigger clients, i meet with them monthly or quarterly and we go through that same analysis each time, as their cash flow planning is more "perpetual" than "periodic".

you know the really funny thing? when people ask "how much do you charge to do a tax return?" (a fair, but utterly ridiculous question) i tell them i charge by the hour, and they ask my hourly rate, and i tell them $160, and a lot of them turn white or red or they laugh at me and tell me "that's very expensive, don't you think?". . .meanwhile, i end up being like half the price of h&r block. . .you know what's really expensive?? ignorance

 

[nimbus]

Im going to go to h&r blok next year just so i can see why it would cost more than a cpa with 22 years experience.

if a large company fucks up you probably have a lot more recourse than you would if some dude you hired fucks up. also h&r block has to pay for real estate and advertising.

sure we all trust digi, but why would some random stranger who finds him in the phonebook trust him?

 

[digimon7068]

if a large company fucks up you probably have a lot more recourse than you would if some dude you hired fucks up. also h&r block has to pay for real estate and advertising.

sure we all trust digi, but why would some random stranger who finds him in the phonebook trust him?

exactly. . .100% of my business is via referral.

oh and, i have pretty expensive insurance, so you probably have more recourse with me than with h&r block.

 

[ortiz34]

Same thing in my business vs Home Depot. People go there because "they thought they would be cheaper"
apples to apples on custom ordering stuff, I blow them out of the water

american consumer=teh stoopid