June 20, 2010

“He’s a CPA!” The Damned Don’t Cry…But CPAs Do.

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: "He's a CPA!" The damned don't cry...but cpas do — William Brighenti @ 11:33 pm

Why are CPAs always portrayed so unfavorably in the movies? Watch the film clip from “The Damned Don’t Cry” and see for yourself. Imagine a sexy, hot woman (Ethel Whitehead portrayed by Joan Crawford) tramping into your office with curves out of a Rubenesque painting wearing only a slip, blowing out the match you lit for her cigarette while making bedroom eyes at you, and then leaning over your desk in an obvious boudoir pose, revealing a decolletage as low as her navel, conveying that she is ready and willing for the asking ….And in this movie, how does Martin Blankford, the CPA (played by Kent Smith), respond to this blatant seductive invitation that any normal guy would jump over high hurdles for at the risk of strangulating a hernia? He gets all flustered, averts his eyes in embarrassment like a schoolboy, picks up his number 2 lead pencil, and goes back to work. No machismo here; in fact, if anything, his behavior is downright fruity. This CPA is even more obtuse than Ray Barone with women!

Later when they go out to dinner together (she asked him, no less), she orders squab with wild rice, asparagus with Hollondaise sauce, a mixed green salad with a touch of garlic, cherry jubilee for dessert, and a double martini to start things rolling. And what does he order? A chicken salad sandwich and a cup of coffee…a 30 cent meal back then in 1950. He not only looks at the prices on the menu (a definite no-no on any first date), but announces that the price of the meal equals a half of a day’s salary for him as a CPA! Now that’s the way to make an impression on a beautiful, hot, sexy woman who may have been interested in him for services other than those involving taxes. Do you think he just ruined his chances of scoring with her tonight? While watching this movie, I suddenly felt embarrassed that I,too, am a CPA. It was bad enough becoming a CPA and then having all of my friends ask me if I obtained my accounting degree from those correspondence schools that used to advertise “Be an Accountant” on the backs of matchbook covers. No wonder everyone makes fun of us.

But this is not the only movie portraying CPAs as “strange”. What about the film, “The Producers”? Gene Wilder plays a mousy CPA named Leo Bloom, who is auditing the books of Max Bialystock (played by Zero Mostel), a really normal guy who loves and appreciates life and women: recall the secretary he hires later on in the movie. In complete contrast, Bloom is portrayed as a pitiful creature, a very nervous accountant, prone to panic attacks, who keeps a security blanket to calm himself, like Linus of the comic strip, Peanuts. In Peanuts, Linus comes off as cute, since he’s a child; Bloom, on the other hand, appears as a certifiable nut case since he is an adult and it is no longer cute to carry a blanket around all of the time.

Don’t you just hate all of these negative stereotypes of CPAs?! Are we all this mousy and fruity with women? Do we all appear as maladjusted nerds to the public at large, unworthy of the respect bestowed upon other professionals, like attorneys and doctors? The media seems to think so. Truth may be stranger than fiction; however, fiction may just be the truth in this case. Don’t believe it? Try this the next time you go to the office (I say the office, because we never go to watering holes like normal business people): ask an attractive woman how CPAs appear to women, but first require her to be candid and truthful, assuring her that you won’t fire her if you are her superior. LOL! Be prepared for a reality check.

For all of those movie buffs, “The Damned Don’t Cry” is based on the story of Virginia Hill, Bugsy Siegel’s femme fatale. Like the film’s Ethel Whitehead, Hill worked as a sideshow dancer before hooking up with an accountant with mob connections, Joey Epstein. This led to an affair with New York gangster Joe Adonis before moving to the West Coast and meeting mobster Bugsy Siegel. Jerome Weidman was hired to write the script, but when he produced a 300 page screenplay, long enough for three films, it was compressed by the director and another writer, resulting in a less faithful portrayal of the events upon which the story is based. But if you are a fan of the film noir genre and of Joan Crawford, you will want to see this trashy film about a trashy tramp becoming a classy tramp.

By the way, I love the way Joan Crawford exclaims, “He’s a CPA!” Apparently, not many knew what the acronym CPA meant back in 1950. It’s hilarious watching a number of characters in the film pretending that they do know when, in fact, they haven’t a clue. I guess CPAs have come a long way since those days when correspondence schools were advertising “Be an Accountant” on matchbook covers!

This article is provided for informational purposes and is not intended to be construed as legal, accounting, or other professional advice. For further information, please consult appropriate professional advice from your attorney and certified public accountant.

Have a tax or an accounting question? Please feel free to submit it under “Comments” at Accounting, QuickBooks, and Taxes by the Barefoot Accountant. For information and assistance on any tax and accounting issue, please visit our website: Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC.

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June 16, 2010

Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act of 2010 Offers Tax Deductions and Incentives to Small Businesses

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: H.R. 5486, Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act of 2010 — William Brighenti @ 7:44 pm

The Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act of 2010, introduced and sponsored by Representative Sander Levin of Michigan, was passed on June 15, 2010, by the House of Representatives primarily along party lines by a recorded vote of 247 to 170. The bill is now on its way to the Senate where its fate is anyone’s guess, since an earlier bill passed in March by the House containing many of the same tax provisions as contained in this bill was subsequently defeated there.

Of particular note are two tax provisions encouraging the investment in small businesses and enhancing their cash flows in their critical formative years. First of all, the Small Business Jobs Tax Relief Act of 2010 would increase the exclusion from gross income from 50% to 100% of the gain from the sale or exchange of “qualified small business” stock acquired after March 15, 2010, and before January 1, 2012. In general, qualified small businesses are certain C corporations with aggregate gross assets not in excess of $50 million.

Secondly, the tax deduction for trade or business start-up expenditures would increase from $5,000 to $20,000 in the years 2010 and 2011.

The other provisions currently contained in the Bill going before the Senate include the following:

The penalty for failure to disclose a reportable transaction would be limited to 75% of the decrease in tax resulting from such transaction, thereby offering penalty relief to small businesses.
The bill would create a Small Business Borrower Assistance Program that would provide assistance to small businesses that are struggling to meet their obligations to creditors. The bill would exclude from gross income any amounts that are received under this program.
The bill would provide an exception to the “at-risk” rules for non-recourse loans that are guaranteed by the Small Business Administration (SBA).
Rules for valuing assets in grantor retained annuity trusts would be expanded to require that the right to receive fixed amounts from an annuity last for a term of not less than 10 years, that such fixed amounts would not decrease during the first 10 years of the annuity term, and that the remainder interest must have a value greater than zero when transferred.
Any processed fuel with significant acid numbers would be excluded from eligibility for any tax credit of alcohol used as fuel.
Estimated tax installments for certain large corporations in the third quarter of 2015 would increase by 7.75%.

The total estimated revenue effects to small businesses over the next ten years will be tax incentives totaling $3.6 billion, with nearly $2 billion resulting from the temporary exclusion of the 100% of gain from the sale of certain small business stock, $940 million resulting from treatment of certain nonrecourse small business investment company loans from the Small Business Administration as amounts at risk, and $500 million resulting from the increase in the amount allowed as a deduction for start-up expenditures.

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June 6, 2010

The 10 Commandments of CPAs

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: 10 Commandments of CPAs, ten commandments of cpas — William Brighenti @ 5:00 pm

The 10 Commandments of CPAs

(As told to the Prophet, the Barefoot Accountant, by the Lords of Public Accounting, after many years of sweat, slavery, and servitude at public accounting firms in the Valley of Tears of Hartford County, Connecticut)

I. Thou shalt always hire employees that show well.

Never hire nerdy looking accountants. Always hire attractive personnel, even if they are not the best accountants in the world. People are superficial, including clients, and will judge you more by appearances than a few errors committed by a curvaceous staff member. In addition, good-looking employees are so much more pleasing to gawk at, since you’ll be spending most of your time in the office with them, when they are not out in the field being gawked at by your clients.

II. Thou shalt not pay thy employees by the hour.

Never pay them by the hour: the over-time will kill you. Always pay them a salary so you can work them slavishly 80 hours per week during tax season without paying a shekel extra. Learn from the Pharoahs. Build your pyramid of success upon the sweat of slave labor.

III. Thou shalt always dangle a carrot to staff.

Always promise your employees the opportunity of partnership in order to pay them less and retain them longer. Of course, as most experienced staff have discovered only after many years of toil and thousands and thousands of hours of overtime without a dime to show for it, you can always find an excuse later not to deliver—or, at least, to delay— on your promises of partnership. As the most astute partners of public accounting firms have known and practiced for years with the dexterity of a politician promising the world to a gullible constituency, always discuss the far-off distant partnership opportunity in the most general terms, always hiding the sordid details, namely, that the aspiring staff member would be required to buy you out at a ridiculously exorbitant price, necessitating the mortgaging of his home, wife, and first born. And lest ye forget, promises cost nothing.

IV. Thou shalt always get a retainer.

If possible, try to get full payment up-front. If your clients are struggling paying taxes to keep their home and stay out of jail, what makes you think they will pay you upon completion of your services? And even if your clients do pay you, it may be years before you recover all of the monies, well after you have been driven into bankruptcy because of your trickling cash inflow. Consequently, never do any work on credit. Why work for the sake of working? Remember always you’re doing it for the money, not for love. (If you want love, get a dog.) It is always better to have no work than a ton of work for which you will receive no payment. Get the moolah ASAP.

V. Thou shalt not quote a fixed rate.

Never quote a job for a fixed rate. Avoid committing yourself to a fixed fee—or, for that matter, to anything in life—unless there is absolutely no alternative; however, if you rack your brain or someone else’s long enough, you are bound to find an alternative! If a client insists on a quotation—and only after you have run out of every known ruse employed by scoundrels since the beginning of time—give an “estimate”, allowing you to squirm out of that amount later and squeeze every remaining drop out of your client. Always remember that you are a professional, just like lawyers and doctors, who are experts in over-charging and gouging. Did you ever receive a fixed quotation for a triple by-pass procedure? Take heed. Learn from the pros.

VI. Thou shalt not answer thy telephone.

Clients call you so they won’t be charged for picking your brains. And no one enjoys being billed for telephone conversations: that’s why attorneys are despised by everyone, including their wives! Always have your receptionist screen your calls or hide behind voice mail, and if forced to return calls, pick the time when your clients are least likely to be available, e.g., at 7:00 AM in the morning. And end your message with the ever-effective deterrents, “I haven’t received your retainer yet” or “when can I expect you to drop off a check for your overdue balance”. That’ll stop their persistent, annoying, and mooching calls for sure.

VII. Thou shalt charge as much as thou can.

Never compete on price. If you charge less than your competitors, your clients will think they are getting less. Clients believe that idiotic saying, “You get what you pay for” (I prefer the much wiser saying, “A fool and his money are soon parted”). So if you save them a ton of money, they will, of course, think they are getting less. Furthermore, when you get more money for your services, you will feel better, and your spouse will say nicer things about you and appreciate you much more at the end of the day: frankly, isn’t this ultimately why we work as slaves all day?

VIII. Thou shalt not jeopardize thy license to practice public accounting.

Never let a client con you into jeopardizing your license. Be vigilant for fraud when preparing tax returns and audit reports. Your clients won’t respect nor appreciate what you’ve done for them, even when you are carted off to jail. If they insist on being crooked, let them go to jail rather than you…unless you secretly desire Buster as a cell-mate. If you do, seek professional help quickly. I pity you.

IX. Thou shalt not volunteer thy services.

Never volunteer to be the treasurer of an organization. Nonprofit organizations often attract board members unable to secure full-time employment and, consequently, have nothing better to do with their time than spout crazy and impractical courses of action for the organization, driving you completely mad with all of their nutty ideas. If these individuals were practical, they would be gainfully employed and not wasting their time serving on boards of nonprofits. More importantly, you’ll end up working for free, and you won’t obtain any business from doing so, especially from the organization itself. Furthermore, if you attempt to straighten out the finances of the organization, you may generate a bad press for yourself from the very members causing the mess from their repeated dippings into its till. Charity begins at home and at your public accounting firm. So never volunter. Read my article, “1,001 Excuses to Give to Nonprofit Organizations Asking You to be their Treasurer” to weazle out of their repeated requests. And stop feeling like Mother Theresa of the Missionaries of Charity, unless you want to practice public accounting in Calcutta.

X. Thou shalt not pay for promises.

Don’t pay for any marketing services promising you fantastic results. Marketers (now more commonly referred to as “spammers”) typically promise the world, guaranteeing everything but delivering nothing but a big bill, typically charged to your credit card or withdrawn directly out of your business checking account. That’s their job! And that’s why they make so much more money than CPAs! Marketers are experts at selling, conning you out of every remaining shekel in your pocket. They promise, even guarantee, to obtain you leads and new clients, only to make 1,001 excuses later, always passing the blame onto you for their failures. Learn from them! And do unto others as they do unto you: turn the con back onto the con artist by promising—better yet, guaranteeing—to pay these marketers a commission on any clients obtained from their efforts, but only after those clients have paid you. This reverse-con ploy has been found to be the most effective spam killer yet, especially from all of those marketers from India and the Philippines, who have yet to have been provided a suitable script in English in order to reply persuasively. Enjoy the moment of frustrating the hell out of them, listening to their rote, repetitive, non sequitur ”pwomises” and “gwuaranteeeeeeeeees”.

If and only to the extent that this publication contains contributions from tax professionals who are subject to the rules of professional conduct set forth in Circular 230, as promulgated by the United States Department of the Treasury, the publisher, on behalf of those contributors, hereby states that any U.S. federal tax advice that is contained in such contributions was not intended or written to be used by any taxpayer for the purpose of avoiding penalties that may be imposed on the taxpayer by the Internal Revenue Service, and it cannot be used by any taxpayer for such purpose. The above tax advice was written to support the promotion or marketing of the accounting practice of the publisher and any transaction described herein. The taxpayer recipients of this offering memorandum should seek tax advice based on their particular circumstances from an independent tax advisor.

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June 1, 2010

The speedy, quickie way to attract new clients

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: host a speed dating event to attract new clients, how to obtain more clients for your public accounting firm — William Brighenti @ 7:18 pm

Do you want to drum up more traffic at your public accounting office? Have you considered hosting a “speed dating” event in your office? It’s the trendy thing to do, and it has been around for over ten years, appearing in episodes on the popular television show, “Sex and the City”.

Some grocers have been using it as a marketing tool in an attempt to drive in traffic to their stores. The concept is very basic, to say the least. It particularly appeals to those between the ages of 35 to 55, though the geriatric jet set would also be a viable target market for your firm as well. Let’s face it: sex is used in every other commercial industry, so why not use it in accounting to lure in the fish.

Speed dating is rapidly becoming much more popular than internet dating. Since sex appeal and money are the main criteria used by individuals in that age group—if not every age group—to select a spouse, individuals prefer physically meeting and talking to prospective mates in the flesh rather than picking a pig in a poke. Who can fault them for being so crass? Let thee who is not so superficial cast the first stone.

A public accounting firm’s office would be an ideal place to host a speed dating event. Think how convenient it would be for a dubious female to request to see a braggart male’s tax returns for the past five years, including all W-2s and 1099s, and to verify how much alimony and child support he may be paying to his first wife, second wife, third wife, et al. It would save so much time and anguish on her part. In addition, a list of potential candidates to invite to the event would be readily available to you, since you already have on hand your clients’ marital status. Simply invite all singles to the event, and ask them to bring a friend for free admission. Better yet, include all those who have been filing separately even though married, since it is very possible—if not likely—that they, too, may be in the market for a new partner very soon. As we all know, women are notorious shoppers, always shopping and never stopping.

The benefits to you would be innumerable. Think of the new clients flogging to these speed dating events, once word gets out. And these are the types of clients you desire: those in the 35 to 55 age group, who are in their most productive financial years of their lives, with many tax return years remaining in their lives; unlike seniors, who are notorious penny pinchers, begrudging you the few shekels on preparing their tax returns, with even fewer years remaining for tax services. Moreover, you will likely be able to retain these newly found clients mostly out of gratitude for finding them a mate, unless they kick off prematurely, you screw up their tax returns or gouge them unnecessarily with your exorbitant fees—on which you should always proceed with caution—or if they decide to dump this new partner as well in the near future. Consequently, it is highly recommended that you host this event at least annually.

If they are divorcees (or soon to be divorcees), they may require extra financial advice on how to afford the additional expense of supporting a stable of ex-s. And for those financially conservative and astute women, you should see an increase in the demand for taxable income projections as a married couple before they risk jumping into another disappointing marriage with a deadbeat. And with the increase in demand for services resulting from divorces, innocent spouse relief, alimony, child support, etc., you should see significant financial rewards in the first year of hosting the event.

In addition to tapping your list of present clients, you will need to place an ad in Craigslist or some other social network medium to recruit enough participants to the speed dating event. It is advisable to require formal and professional attire on the part of all guests as well as require all males not presently clients to bring their most recent tax returns. This will screen out undesirables from the affair. Schedule the event for some weekend evening when your staff is out of the office so their desks or cubicles can be employed for the rapid fire, five minute rendezvous. Get a stopwatch and time the chats in musical chair fashion, to limit the interviews, and to minimize interludes from becoming rapturous moments of being totally carried away, which might prove embarrassing to those in attendance more circumspect and capable of exercising a modicum of restraint. Candles, soft music, a little wine and cheese would all contribute to a relaxed and romantic atmosphere. However, avoid having a justice of the peace or minister on hand, since your guests might regard such as a bit gauche.

For further advice on how to plan your speed dating event at your firm, please visit us at Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC or submit your questions to the Barefoot Accountant.

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Are you aware of the possible $7,621 in tax benefits available under the HIRE Act for each newly hired employee?

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: HIRE Act payroll tax exemption, HIRE Act tax benefits, HIRE Act tax credit — William Brighenti @ 6:24 pm

Thinking of hiring new employees? The HIRE Act enacted on March 18, 2010 allows employers to be exempt from their share of social security taxes on wages paid from then until the end of the years as well as to take a tax credit of as much as $1,000 for each qualified employee retained for a year.

To find out the details of the HIRE Act and the claiming of these two tax benefits, please see the article, “The HIRE ACT: Obtain $1,000 + 6.2% of Wages for New Employees Hired“.

William Brighenti, CPA

Accountants CPA Hartford, LLC

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May 31, 2010

Why isn’t the Internal Revenue Code written in English? Have you read IRC Section 45R yet on the health care tax credit?

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: affordable care act tax credit, health care tax credit, Internal Revenue Code Section 45R — William Brighenti @ 12:10 am

IRC Section 45d - as clear as mud Why does the Internal Revenue Code read as clear as mud? It must be deliberate. I’m not complaining, because it’s good for my business as a Certified Public Accountant. Let’s face it, if the average person could understand the tax code, why would they pay us $150/hour to do their taxes and resolve their tax issues?

But the FASBs, GASBs, APBs, SEC pronouncements, etc., don’t read any better. Leave it to attorneys and others on the FASB, AICPA, SEC, and in the Department of Treasury to muddy the waters always. Like Delphic oracles of antiquity, these supreme bodies of accounting and taxation have a reputation for issuing statements veiled in ambiguity and incomprehensibility to the uninitiated, keeping tax attorneys and certified public accountants—the high priestesses of the accounting and tax mysteries—gainfully employed. At times I feel that one has to be a biblical exegesis scholar in order to be able to interpret some of their esoteric pronouncements.

Need an example? Have you read Section 45R of the Code on the new health care tax credit enacted into law on March 23, 2010?

(a) General rule. For purposes of section 38 , in the case of an eligible small employer, the small employer health insurance credit determined under this section for any taxable year in the credit period is the amount determined under subsection (b) .
(b) Health insurance credit amount. Subject to subsection (c) , the amount determined under this subsection with respect to any eligible small employer is equal to 50 percent (35 percent in the case of a tax-exempt eligible small employer) of the lesser
of—
(1) the aggregate amount of nonelective contributions the employer made on behalf of its employees during the taxable year under the arrangement described in subsection (d)(4) for premiums for qualified health plans offered by the employer to its employees through an Exchange, or
(2) the aggregate amount of nonelective contributions which the employer would have made during the taxable year under the arrangement if each employee taken into account under paragraph (1) had enrolled in a qualified health plan which had a premium equal to the average premium (as determined by the Secretary of Health and Human Services) for the small group market in the
rating area in which the employee enrolls for coverage.
(c) Phaseout of credit amount based on number of employees and average wages. The amount of the credit determined under subsection (b) without regard to this subsection shall be reduced (but not below zero) by the sum of the following amounts:
(1) Such amount multiplied by a fraction the numerator of which is the total number of full-time equivalent employees of the employer in excess of 10 and the denominator of which is 15.
(2) Such amount multiplied by a fraction the numerator of which is the average annual wages of the employer in excess of the dollar amount in effect under subsection (d)(3)(B) and the denominator of which is such dollar amount.

Don’t you just love it when these pronouncements fail to complete a thought without referring the reader to another section (or subsection, or sub-subsection) to understand what it is saying? First the reader is informed that the credit is the amount determined under subsection (b). Then in (b), the reader discovers that it is subject to subsection (c). And then in (c), it is referred to subsection (d)(3)(B). I feel as a reader that I can never catch up to what the pronouncement is attempting to say. Perhaps it would make more sense by reading the Code from the end of the particular Section and working one’s way backwards.

My mother used to scold me in this fashion, always reprimanding me while referring to an earlier incident, and to another one before that one, and the one before the one before the earlier incident, and so on, until I had no idea why she was scolding me in the first place! Don’t you just hate that?!

Incidentally, for anyone interested in understanding Section 45R on the health care tax credit—which is why I ruined my Memorial Day weekend in the first place—please see my article, How to Calculate the Health Care Tax Credit, so you don’t ruin your Memorial Day weekend, too.

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May 26, 2010

Ann “Curvy” Curry should have eaten her wheaties before delivering a commencement address at Wheaton College

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: Ann Curry Wheaton College — William Brighenti @ 11:25 am

Ann “Curvy” Curry may have been “wearing a very fabulous blue and white outfit” underneath her robe, as she mentioned in her commencement address at Wheaton College the other day, but one can only wonder what was underneath her graduation cap.

As you all must know by now, in her commencement address to more than 400 graduates of Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts, in a feeble attempt to connect with the graduating students, she mentioned famous alumni of Wheaton College, including Billy Graham, Wes Craven, Todd Beamer, and Dennis Hastert. Oh, Oh, Ann. Oops, major faux pas! ”Holy Crap!”, as Frank Barrone would say. None of these gentlemen graduated nor even attended that College. They attended the private Evangelical Protestant, coeducational, liberal arts college in Wheaton, Illinois, also named Wheaton College. Would someone please show Annie how to google! Has she been hanging out with Sarah Palin?

What should have been so obvious about her gaffe, making it even more embarrassing, was that when Graham and Hastert were students, Wheaton College was strictly a female college. Oh boy! She not only confused the two colleges, but apparently she may not even have known that Wheaton College had been a leading college for women and only became co-educational in 1988. Is it conceivable that the female recipient of an honorary doctorate from Wheaton, a leading woman in journalism, was oblivious to these facts before making a commencement address to this very prestigious College, formerly regarded as one of the top liberal arts colleges for women?! Maybe Annie should have paid more attention to the content of her speech and less to that fabulous blue and white outfit underneath her robe. Did I mention that her eyeliner and makeup were flawless at the commencement?

What makes this incident funnier is that Annie gave an almost identical commencement speech a week before in Providence, Rhode Island, where she was awarded yet another honorary degree for her success in journalism, using the same mommie-dearest jokes, etc.; here, however, she did have enough smarts not to confuse this college with Wheaton, appropriately substituting the name “Providence” for “Wheaton” in perfect mail merge synchronicity, and instead of wearing a blue and white outfit underneath her robe, she wore a black and white dress underneath her gown in stylish color coordination to the school’s colors. Always the woman of Vogue! Did I mention that her eyeliner and makeup were flawless at this commencement as well?

Equally as amusing as Annie’s gaffe was the fact that all of the graduates appeared oblivious to her faux pas: there was not an “ah” or “oops” or “snicker” audible after her litany of the Illinois college alumni. One can only wonder if they had all sobered up for commencement?! So much for the $200,000 price tag for a college education at Wheaton.

Finally, crescendoing this entire commencement address into a hilarious farce was Wheaton College’s subsequent attempt of a Curry-Gate cover up, editing the video and text of Annie’s commencement address by removing the gaffe and scrubbing it off the internet (it can be found, by the way, at http://www1.whdh.com/video/player/?clipId=4809762). Now let me ask you, is that intellectual honesty? Is that journalism at its best, reporting what truthfully occurred, after awarding this television icon in journalism an honorary doctorate for her achievements in that field? LOL! The irony is precious. I couldn’t make this stuff up! I would have awarded her an honorary doctorate in flawless eyeliner and makeup techniques, for sure.

NBC hired an attractive, very leggy news woman, currently paying her a reported $3,000,000 per year salary. I’m fat and balding, and AccountingWEB doesn’t pay me a shekel. Maybe if I had her legs…?

I did enjoy her speech, though. There were memorable phrases as, “The key is to be ready”….yeah, Ann, as you were the other day!

And let us not forget the unforgettable boast, bursting with bravado: “And to everyone who says to you along the way that you cannot do something…, the thing you should have in your mind is, ‘Oh, yeah? Watch me.’” We watched you, Ann. And you sure did it!

I also relish these lines: “More than luck, talent, or even brainpower, determination is the trait…And the best part is that unlike talent and luck and brainpower, determination is what you can choose to have.” But doesn’t brainpower help, Ann. It certainly would have helped you the other day. You quoted your mother as saying, ”college is stupid”. No, Annie, college is not stupid; people are stupid. Hello?

And last but not least, here are lines that I will take with me to my grave: “To you I say, it is only with adversity that we even have a chance at greatness. Adversity is your opportunity.” Did you mean “controversy” here instead of “adversity”, Annie? They do sound similar, and they rhyme! Hmmm. Perhaps Wheaton edited this line, too.

And if, as you claim, Annie, “adversity is your opportunity”, you certainly have plenty of opportunities ahead. Perhaps you could return to being a cocktail waitress? Or marry a rich guy, as your mother advised you. You do have great legs, Ann. (As if we haven’t noticed by now, Annie.)

If you really want to turn all of this adversity about Wheaton into an opportunity, here’s a suggestion (better do it before Tina Fey beats you to it!): call up your sister show, SNL – Saturday Night Live, appear on the show as Ann Curvy Curry, wear a micro mini, or–better yet–a fabulous blue and white outfit purchased at Victoria’s Secret, apply the “racoonish” eyeliner your mommie accused you of wearing, and give the commencement speech all over again, but this time include, among its famous alumni, Alvin and the Chipmunks, and Rin Tin Tin….Please don’t be mortified….I screw up everyday, Annie. But I just laugh it off. It’s all about recognizing that we are only human, not gods and goddesses, Annie.

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May 16, 2010

How to Stand Out from the Herd of Other CPAs: Are You a Ram Ahead of the Herd or a Ewe Behind?

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford — Tags: How to Stand Out from the Herd of Other Chartered Accountants: Are You a Ram Ahead of the Herd or a Ewe Behind?, how to stand out from the herd of other CPAs, marketing cpa firm — William Brighenti @ 10:11 pm

Do you ever wonder why clients are not beating down your doors for your accounting, auditing, and tax services? Have you even tried lowering your fees with little, if any, success? Perhaps you need to develop a new marketing plan, assuming you ever had one in the first place, like most CPAs.

We accountants are good at bean counting but, quite frankly, we are deplorable when it comes to marketing. Marketing is the most critical function of any public accounting firm. You can be the most astute tax accountant in the entire Milky Way, but unless you develop a significant client base, you’ll be closing your doors and returning to work as a grunt slave for another public accounting firm before you can say, “Bialystock & Bloom”.

Many partners who are convivial and born raconteurs, who have a great sense of humor, and who love to guzzle and gobble, ironically dread wining and dining potential clients even though such entertainment is tax deductible. Go figure. They prefer crunching the numbers and banging out the tax returns and the financials. Does our aversion to marketing stem from all of those detestable case studies we were obligated to write in those required marketing courses that we struggled through in college? Or does it originate from our myopic belief that marketing is essentially selling, which we equate erroneously to bsing. We all know that accountants hate bsing. Accountants prefer dealing in the Platonic realm of numbers: that is, we are more comfortable with facts—dollars and cents—than words or talk.

But for a moment let’s be real: individuals who enjoy numbers are as common as the Javan rhino. Most people hate working with numbers and would rather undergo the primitive puberty rites of Mandan hook hanging than crunch numbers all day. It’s sad, but we accountants are an unappreciative lot, only sought after when every shekel in our client’s bank account has been seized by the IRS and the worse is yet to come, looming on the horizon. Consequently, we are associated with lots of negative imagery; feelings of pain, panic, and angst; and thoughts of revenge, murder, and suicide; and it is quite understandable that we are not as liked or appreciated as much as physicians, teachers, or chefs. Let’s face it, we’ll never live to see the day when there’s a cable show featuring “Iron Accountants”, where three accountants square off and duel an up-and-coming guest accountant specializing in trust taxation. Who would sponsor such a show? Better yet, who in their right mind would watch it?

Is there anything that we as public accountants can do to change the negative and distasteful impression that the entire population on our planet has about us in general? Quite frankly, yes; however, it will require drastic action on the part of a public accounting firm to stand out and define itself apart from the herd of sheepish certified public accountants and establish a uniquely positive identity and persona. And it will require a bold marketing strategy. And here are some ideas to get you started today!

For instance, why do accountants insist on dressing like morticians? Doesn’t that suggest something grave in and of itself? We have not come to bury Caesar but merely to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. So doff the grim reaper attire for something more gay and delightful!

We all know that accounting is an ancient language, as dead as latin, but why make it even deadlier than it need be. Perhaps we could attach dignity to the profession of accounting by sporting attire associating, if not even capitalizing on, its origins in antiquity: for instance, perhaps instead of having your accounting staff dressing in conventional suits, they could instead wear Roman togas! Why not! Think how fetching some of your new male and female recruits would appear dressed (er, undressed, depending on how you look at it…a glass half empty or half filled) in Roman togas, and how regal and august the partners would look, topped off with laurel leaf crowns. Such classical garb would add just the right touch of class to your firm. Needless to say, this clothing would certainly set you apart from all of those other drearily dressed certified public accountants whose attire would be better suited for characters in an Edgar Allan Poe poem for evermore. And on up-and-coming female staff members, those togas might lead to a surge in your services, particularly among your contractor clients. However, it may be advisable to increase your policy coverage on sexual harassment insurance; please contact your insurance agent for details.

And instead of publishing the same old looking audit, review, and compilation reports that every other certified public accountant publishes, why not print your report—representing the fruits of all of your labors—in a new, novel, different, unique, eye-catching format: for example, why not print them on parchment in latin! That would certainly capture the attention of the readers. Can you imagine the reaction of your client opening up the financial statements and seeing your audit report reading as follows:

Tabula of Presul, Proprietas , quod / vel Procuratio
Roman Res publica
I Pelagus Via
Rome , Romanorum Empire

Nos have celebratio accompanying pondera ovis of Romanorum Res publica ( “Republic” ) ut of December XXXI, MMX, quod commemoro editio of reditus retained earnings , quod cash flows pro annus tunc nisus. Illa financial editio es officium of Res publica procuratio.

Nostrum officium est ut effor an sententia in illa financial editio substructio in nostrum audit.We se gero nostrum celebratio in conveniens per auditing vexillum universe recipero in Romanorum Empire. Illud vexillum postulo ut nos intentio quod tractare celebratio usurpo oportet fides super utrum financial editio es solvo of materia misstatement. An celebratio comprehendo probatur , in a expertus basis , testimonium suscipio amounts quod disclosures in financial editio. An celebratio quoque comprehendo censeo ratio potissimus adsuesco assuesco quod significant censeo no per procuratio , pariter ut censeo super financial editio presentation.

Nos puto ut nostrum celebratio suggero a oportet basis pro nostrum sententia nostrum sententia , financial editio relatum ut supremus tendo iuste , in totus materia veneratio , financial positus of Res publica ut of December XXXI, MMX, quod praecessi of suus operations quod suus cash flows pro annus tunc nisus in conveniens per ratio potissimus universe recipero in Romanorum Empire.

Guido, Meretricis, et Mafooch
Licentia Publicus Occurro

I bet he or she would do more than give it a cursory glance. In fact, they may even attempt to read it for a change. And if they request a translation, you can charge them extra for that service.

Does FASB prohibit your audit, review, or compilation reports in latin on parchment? Of course not. Neither the pronouncements of the AICPA nor those of FASB prohibit such a classical rendition to your financial reporting. Grant you, these are bold marketing techniques, but they are guaranteed to set your firm apart from all other firms and to have people banging down your doors.

Here’s another novel idea that might be especially appealing during tax season for you to consider. Since you are living in the electronic age of laptops, cell phones, and wireless internet, if you are located in a temperate climate, why not consider hosting your office in a sensuously appealing environment instead of on the conventional 26th floor of a high rise building or in that stuffy, damp home office, which was previously your garage? For instance, why not have an office largely outdoors, with your staff basking in sunlight and cultivating a healthy and invigorating tan, surrounded by landscape grounds, fountains, palm trees, or in a thatched-roof hut at the end of a wooden pier extending out into the ocean. Think of the savings on electricity and utilities alone. And your clients and staff would certainly appreciate its decor, particularly your clients in the fishing, ranching, landscaping, farming, and veterinary industries. Of course, togas could still be worn; however, bikinis and wetsuits would even be more appealing to your clientele, particularly your contractor clients. Imagine allowing your clients the luxury of a bit of fishing, snorkeling, scuba diving, and kitesurfing, followed by a slew of pina coladas before getting down to business and presenting them with your nice, exorbitant tab.

Or perhaps you could open an office in a casino complex, where many of your clients spend their leisure time anyway. You could stylishly accent your office with slot machines, roulette wheels, and blackjack tables, and your staff could don the conventional and attractive attire of a blackjack dealer or a roulette wheeler. Imagine the fun. And let us not overlook the many, many possible benefits of wheeling and dealing in a gambling casino: if your clients hit the jackpot on route to an office visit to you, think how more likely it would be for you to collect on all of those receivables that they have owed you over the years but have been reluctant and unable to settle up with you on. Contrary to what one is led to believe from the writings of Aristotle, Plato, and Arthur Andersen, people are much more likely to find their wallet for entertainment than for tax liabilities and related tax services.

The possibilities are endless, awaiting the imaginative entrepreneur to seize the opportunity to distinguish oneself from the rest of the sheepish herd. Let’s face it: we certified public accountants all do the same old thing day after day after day…we audit, review, compile, prepare tax returns, and add, and foot, and cross-foot, and vouch and tick and cross tick. For you to distinguish yourself from the other bean counters you must create a unique image, labeling yourself as truly distinctive, different, and likeable. If you truly want clients beating down your public accounting doors, try appealing to their senses, their humanity, their depravity. You have everything to gain and nothing to lose. Go for it before your competitors do. And besides, your staff will love you for it, since they probably feel as negatively about you as your clients presently do.

And in the immortal words of John “Bluto” Blutarsky….

Toga! Toga!! TOGA!!!

Have a tax or an accounting question? Please feel free to submit it to William Brighenti, Certified Public Accountant, Hartford CPA Accountants. For information and assistance on any tax and accounting issue, please visit our website: Accountants CPA Hartford.

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May 7, 2010

Monty Python on Auditors, Accountants, and Embezzlement

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford — Tags: Monty Python on Certified Public Accountants and Auditors — William Brighenti @ 8:08 pm

If you love John Cleese, Michael Palin, and the rest of the gang from Monty Python as I do, and you are a Certified Public Accountant, Chartered Accountant, auditor, controller, accounting manager, or bookkeeper, then you will love this video and especially appreciate the amusing exchanges between the board of directors, which includes a member of the clergy, no less. LOL! In case you have difficulty understanding “British”, I include the script below:

(A small board meeting. An Accountant stands up and reads…)
Accountant: Lady Chairman, sir, shareholders, ladies and gentlemen. I have great pleasure in announcing that owing to a cutback on surplus expenditure of twelve million Canadian dollars, plus a refund of seven and a half million Deutschmarks from the Swiss branch, and in addition adding the debenture preference stock of the three and three quarter million to the directors’ reserve currency account of seven and a half million, plus an upward expenditure margin of eleven and a half thousand lira, due to a rise in capital investment of ten million pounds, this firm last year made a complete profit of a shilling.

Chairman: A shilling Wilkins?

Accountant: Er, roughly, yes sir.

Chairman: Wilkins, I am the Chairman of a multi-million pound corporation and you are a very new chartered Accountant. Isn’t it possible there may have been some mistake?

Accountant: Well that’s very kind of you sir, but I don’t think I’m ready to be Chairman yet.

Board Member: Wilkins, Wilkins. This shilling, is it net or gross?

Accountant: It’s British sir.

Chairman: Yes, has tax been paid on it?

Accountant: Yes, this is after tax. Owing to the rigorous bite of the income tax five pence of a further sixpence was swallowed up in tax.

Board Member: Five pence of a further sixpence?

Accountant: (eagerly) Yes sir.

Chairman: Five pence of a further sixpence?

Accountant: That’s right sir.

Chairman: Then where is the other penny?

Accountant: … Er.

Board Member: That makes you a penny short Wilkins. Where is it?

Accountant: … Erm.

Chairman: Wilkins?

Accountant: (in tears) I embezzled it sir.

Chairman: What all of it?

Accountant: Yes all of it.

Board Member: You naughty person.

Accountant: It’s my first. Please be gentle with me.

Chairman: I’m afraid it’s my unpleasant duty to inform you that you’re fired.

Accountant: Oh please, please.

Chairman: No, out!

Accountant: (crying) Oh … (he leaves)

Chairman: Yes, there’s no place for sentiment in big business.

I love it! But do we CPAs understand the British math here? Recall the English coinage system from the days of public accounting before the American Revolution:

Crown=5 pounds
20 shillings/pound
12 pence/shilling
6 pence=1/40th of a pound
5 pence=shilling
penny=1/100th of a pound

What makes this somewhat confusing is that a 5 pence was for a time equal in value to a shilling, even though a shilling was worth 12 pence and a penny is not equivalent to a pence. Leave it to the English to make coinage more complicated than it need be, even though they have been known to write simple songs and nursery rhymes, as “Sing a Song of Sixpence”. Imagine sitting for the CPA exam where all the questions are stated in English coinage.

Monty Python spoofs to the nth degree of absurdity the obsessive compulsiveness of accountants to detail, of which we as public accountants are so often guilty, in addition to everything else in life. What is so delightful about their sketches is that nothing is sacred from their satire. (Do you remember “The Life of Brian”?) So for at least one nano second of your life, be a free spirit, lighten up, laugh at yourself, and remove those myopic glasses that we customarily wear in order to see the forest from the trees! And for God’s sake never steal pennies! If you must be a crook and are determined to steal from your clients, company, family members, or the not-for-profit organization for which you serve as treasurer, then for heaven’s sake, don’t be a moron on top of being a scoundrel….Make it worth your while and steal big!

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May 3, 2010

Do you remember the accounting days of old?

Filed under: Accountants CPA Hartford, Articles — Tags: accounting days of old, do you remember the accounting days of old, history of public accounting — William Brighenti @ 6:00 am

I started my career in public accounting in the 1970s. Our profession then was virtually non-electronic. I can remember paying $300 for my first pocket calculator, which today would sell for $1.

One-write systems were the norm. QuickBooks had not yet been born. Not too many of our clients utilized the NCR 4400 workhorse, capable of producing a so-called “trial balance”. Seventeen column worksheets were used to summarize cash disbursements and cash receipts in order to compile an adjusted trial balance. There was endless footing and cross-footing to arrive at correct totals. We cranked out numbers all day long.

In the late 70s we witnessed major innovations in electronic equipment for accountants. Texas Instruments introduced the TI-58 and TI-59, allowing us to program calculations on a hand-held calculator. The TI-58 sold for ~$100; the TI-59 sold for ~$200. For the life of me, I cannot recall the difference between the two except for the price. I was gooney enough to part with the $100 for the TI-58. At about the same time appeared Tandy’s Z-80 computer, featuring a RAM of 4k for the ~$800 model, and 12k for the ~$1,200 model, utilizing a small casette recorder for storing written programs and data. Of course, you had to write programs in Basic to have the computer process anything at all. Back in the 1970s, many of us were required to take classes in Basic, Fortran, and COBOL in anticipation of the emergence of computer processing in the small business environment. Needless to say, that was a waste of time and money.

Then in the 1980s appeared the IBM-PCs and clones, selling for between $3,000 to $5,500, offering wordprocessing and spreadsheet applications, including Lotus and WordPerfect. Cut-and-pasting, thank God, was virtually eliminated by these innovations. Prior to their advent, all financials were typed. Drafts for the current year were prepared by penciling in the changes on copies of last year’s financials. White, sticky, adhesive, rolled strips were typically used to make final revisions on the typed financials after proofing in order to avoid endless re-typings of entire pages. For major changes, an amended paragraph or section of a footnote or a table was typed on a clean sheet, cut out, and then superimposed with transparent tape over the applicable section of the modified page, after which a “xerox” was made, producing a nearly perfect result: hence, the term, cut-and-paste. Since Xerox was the predominant maker of copiers for small businesses back then, we substituted the term “xerox” for a copy produced by a copier.

We still, however, processed all tax returns manually, computing all tax return schedules and worksheets in pencil, then “xeroxing” our finished work for submission to the tax authorities. Other tax accountants used an outside computer processing service to generate the finished tax returns; however, that was a luxury many small practitioners could not afford.

Soon we all learned DOS (“Disk Operating System”), and read every book ever written by Peter Norton, trying to master its commands. I lost track after DOS 5 or DOS 6 of the number of sequential versions of DOS. In any event, Windows ultimately followed, changing the landscape of the accounting office entirely and ushering in the present generation of computers and users.

It is my understanding that women were not allowed in the Big Eight public accounting world prior to the 1960s; and that certain nationalities, races, and creeds (including Italians) were not employed by them until the 1950s, if not later. I was informed by my professors that phone books had been distributed to them when they were students of accounting in order to hone their skills in adding long columns of numbers since portable calculators were non-existent.

A lot has changed over my lifetime in accounting. I welcome, embrace, and love the technology. But I respect those old timers in accounting. They did it all without Excel, Word, QuickBooks, ProSeries, Lacerte, ProSystems, etc. And they did it very well, indeed. For instance, I worked for a gentleman named James Q. Rice (the “Q” standing for Quackenbush) of Rhodes, Rice and Company, on Lewis Street in Hartford, Connecticut. Lewis Street was the original financial center in Hartford, Connecticut back in the early 1800s. In one building where I had worked on Lewis Street, there was still a glass roof, where the “scribes” worked under natural sunlight, there being, of course, no electric lighting then. I couldn’t imagine working under sunlight from glass above, no less without air conditioning.

Jim Rice was a perfect gentleman, sporting a bow tie to work everyday. He was very kind and respectful to all members of his staff. I shall always remember him smiling with a twinkle in his eye, making accounting as fun as it could be. Jim taught me how to audit, prepare tax returns, compile and review financial statements, and conduct industry analyses for our many small business clients using annual comparatives from Robert Morris Associates. At the end of each review or audit, Jim had me sitting down with the many owners of these businesses, comparing the results of their operations with those of their competitors in the same industry. They all appreciated this service; it was a fantastic marketing tool. Those old time, New England Yankees were always sharp businessmen!

Jim was an avid sailor; in fact, during World War II, he served on a large wooden sailboat in the Coast Guard, patrolling the New England coastline, where he would often hear German submarines going directly underneath his boat. His first love, I suspect, was not accounting but sailing; and his maritime stories filled many a boring, number-crunching afternoon with adventures I only had read about in Melville novels as a youth. Naturally, our accounting firm had an auxilliary office down by the shore in Essex, Connecticut, an old sailing town retaining its Federal era architecture. Every year I had the honor of sending receivable confirmations to noted celebrities belonging to the Essex Yacht Club. What a thrill it was addressing the confirms and receiving replies to and from an assortment of famous people.

I owe much to Jim, and I thank him heartily. I also wish to thank Jim’s two children–Jamie and Prudence–for sending me the above photograph of Jim, taken a number of years after his retirement from public accounting. Jim’s wife, Norma, worked in the office alongside of him as the office manager and was an invaluable member of the firm.

When I became a public accountant, there were three vacancies for every applicant. Consequently, our beginning salaries were twice that of teachers. So I left academia to rake in the shekels. Alas, what a fool I was. I could have spent my forty years drawing Cartesian planes on chalk-dust blackboards to half-asleep high school students, working 183 days per year, leaving tire marks in the parking lot at 2:30 PM every afternoon, while earning a livable salary of $80,000 plus (in today’s dollars) and generous benefits, including the best full medical insurance plan for an entire family, and days off for every possible holiday, and then some.

I guess I am now an old timer, too. And it is almost time for me to pass the baton onto the next generation. But I sometimes wonder what future our country holds for our accounting youth. Will much of our tax and public accounting work be outsourced to India, China, or the Philippines with remote access, VPN, webconference rooms, Skype, computer imaging and processing, and the like? Will there be another breakthrough in technology further reducing the need for human involvement in accounting or, at least, changing the nature of its involvement? But, perhaps, you are in a better position to answer these questions than I am, since you are the present and the future in accounting and I, the past.

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