There is only about a month before tax season closes. A majority of people hire professional tax services to prepare and submit their tax returns because it saves time or because their taxes are too complicated to handle by themselves. Some of these services may be rather pricey, so if you wish to engage a professional tax preparer, here are some things you should do.
1. Choose the right tax preparer
You are going to want to hire someone competent and qualified. Fortunately, the IRS has enabled you to do so by conducting a regulation exercise in which all professional tax preparers are issued with a Preparer Tax Identification Number (PTIN) and made it compulsory for them to pass competency tests each year. So ask to see your prospective tax preparer’s PTIN and ask about his track record.
2. Be completely honest and open
Once you have chosen a competent tax preparer, be prepared to be completely honest and open with him or her regarding your finances and certain life events that may affect how much taxes your pay, such as marriage, divorce or your children’s college education. You
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Start Fresh Today to Sponsor Annual NACBA Conference in San Antonio
Start Fresh Today is excited to announce that we will be in San Antonio, Texas from April 26- April 29, 2012 for the 20th Annual NACBA Conference at the Marriott Rivercenter. During the conference, bankruptcy attorneys from around the country will visit with exhibitors and attend a number of seminars including:
- The latest legislative news, updates on the Rules Committee, and recent work of the National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center
- Protecting retirement and business assets
- Understanding tax claims in bankruptcy
- Moving forward with reverse mortgages
- Fair Debt Collection Practices Act
- Securitization
- And much more!
Certificates of Attendance for Continuing Legal Education (CLE) will also be available for attendees and most states grant at least 13 hours of CLE credit. <
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This is a guest blog post by attorney Alec Segarich. Alec practices employment law and also handles general business matters. The post is very timely since we recently recorded a podcast about why you shouldnt cut your own hair or use LegalZoom. Stay tuned for the podcast.
You have seen the ads: your small business can be incorporated with just a few clicks, at incredibly low costs. But does this service really work? As lawyers who have helped many small businesses, we say “no way.”
Here are ten key reasons we believe LegalZoom and similar online business formation sites will never match the value a real attorney-client relationship provides.
- LegalZoom is slow. The company’s normal turnaround is 20-35 business days, unless you spend hundreds of additional dollars for a “rush” 7-10 business day service. Many of our co
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A Westport, Connecticut, man has been sentenced to 30 months in jail for bankruptcy fraud crimes of nearly $1 million. Following his time behind bars, Daniel Steinberg will remain under the court’s supervision for three years, according to the Westport Patch.
Here’s a look at Steinberg’s crime and how fraud works in bankruptcy court.
Unauthorized Transfers
The fraud reportedly involved the business bankruptcy case of Reservoir Corporate Group, LLC, which filed a Chapter 11 case in 2009. Over the course of a year during the company’s bankruptcy, it seems that Steinberg transferred more than $700,000 from the company’s coffers to his own.
That money was apparently used to fund personal expenses as well as those of other businesses that Steinberg had a financial stake in. Because p
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Listen up globetrotters; Chase kicked off its Hyatt Credit Card with EMV chip and signature technology. With the addition of EMV chip technology, you are incurred no foreign transaction fees while earning 3 Hyatt Gold Passport Points for every $1 spent at Hyatt destinations worldwide, among many other first-class features. The Hyatt Credit Card’s EMV chip technology features a microchip as well as a traditional magnetic strip to accommodate merchants in the United States. The embedded and encrypted microchip makes the Card more secure and enables safer processing and storage of data. Benefits for a $75 annual fee include 2 Award Nights at Hyatt properties worldwide after first purchase; 1 Hyatt Gold Passport Point for every $1 spent everywhere else; Automatic Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum membership – and maintain Platinum status as long as a cardmember; and no limits on points earned. So
The Shell credit card, formally known as the Shell Drive for Five card, offers very little in the way of rewards. In fact, it only offers one financial reward, which we will discuss shortly.
Like most other station-specific gas rewards cards, the Shell Drive for Five card comes with no upfront rewards. You won’t get a dime for signing up with this card, but you may get a nickel for each gallon of gas! For each gallon of gas that you purchase, you may get 5 cents back. So, if you purchase 50 gallons of gas each month, you’ll get $2.50 back. You can get a few bags of potato chips and a pack of gum with that, but that’s about it.
This card does not offer much at all other than the mentioned 5 cents per gallon. Shell advertises “Pay at the pump convenience”, but you could do that with just about any other credit or debit card.
There are really no other rewards than the 5 cents per gallon. Well, you
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