fired from my public accounting position yesterday -- how to handle this

Boss said I was generally pretty accurate with my work, just a bit too slow. I do feel I was kind of slow -- I found it hard to focus on what really is fairly tedious work that a first-year preparer does at a smaller- to medium- sized firm.

Anyway, I guess the point is they kept me during the whole tax season and had me do tax returns the whole tax season... but let me go when things slowed down. I had really no work to do in the last week.

How would you handle this situation in interviews? I suppose I should emphasize the fact that I was kept until there was basically no work to do, which is true.

Reply to
xyzer
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It sounds as though the boss was attempting to imply that lack of speed was the main reason for your being let go. From where I stand that makes him/her a bit of an ass for sending you on your way with that notion.

Accuracy and speed don't necessarily always go together because attempting to be fast can induce errors. Focus on accuracy FIRST, the speed will come along naturally later as you accumulate more experience.

Before leaving the office, I would have asked about references...

1) Will they provide them? 2) If not, then exactly what will be said if someone calls? 3) If they will, then exactly what will be said? 4) What will be the official documented reason for having been let go?

They have let you go, there is no reason for them to further cause you grief with the continuance of your career.

I think your first step here needs to be a confirmation of exactly what they will or won't say during a reference check. If they are going to insist on saying you were slow and you have reason to somewhat agree with that, then you need to develop a story about this. By "story" I don't mean something false... but along the lines of what you previously said... that you found it difficult to focus on the tedious work. You also need to explain exactly what you were doing in an attempt to overcome that. Employers like to hear about weaknesses AND what you are doing to compensate or overcome for them. You also need to mention the lack of work prior to being let go... this is an important point.

Reply to
Joe Canuck

"Joe Canuck" wrote

I agree. While I do care how long it takes, It's always better to have the work done right the first time.

If you were, or get stuck on something, the boss's door should have been open for you to ask.

Reply to
Paul Thomas

Boss told me that if someone calls, they will tell the person that they do not give provide that kind of information. He said he didn't mind giving a personal reference, because I always did show up for work (never missed a day) and would work late when needed, but the speed issue I guess is what hampers him from giving a professional reference.

As far as the speed issue goes, it's true that I could have been more organized at my cubicle, even though it was sometimes hard to be efficient with such a small desk area to spread papers out on. On top of that, this firm was a little different in that one of the partners did not really like people staying that late usually. Once it got to be around 8:00 or 9:00 PM, he would usually kick you out or you would get the sense that it was time to go. Of course, that doesn't so much matter anyway, because the boss was concerned about the time spent on the return period. Even if you stayed until 11:00 PM, spending too much time on a return was spending too much time. So, there was really nothing I could do except stay later when I was told to stay later or try to get faster. I manage to get faster, but then as tax season wore on, I seemed to get slower because I think mostly I got worn out mentally.

But, I did probably around 90-100 returns during the entire tax season. We started getting returns in around the second week of February, so I guess that averages out to somewhere around a 70 day tax season. So, I did around 1.4 returns per day. Of course, there was a lot more than just inputting the tax return that went into "doing" a return. On almost every return, you had to call the client, because there would be missing information, copy documents, input the data by hand into a paper organizer, then input it into the system, and finally check back off from the return output back to the organizer.

The average price of a return I did was probably around $200, so I brought in around $20,000 and was getting paid $30,000 anually.

Reply to
xyzer

Actually, I forgot to exclude Sundays and half of Saturdays, so I actually did more like 100/55 returns per day, which is of course closer to 2 per day. Most first years in small firms do maybe 3-5 a day? I have no idea really because they didn't tell me.

Reply to
xyzer

from what i've seen over the last three decades:

they all say that. it is a cover (more of an ego defense mechanism), usually because they don't want people to know how low there work load is and how they only hired you for the tax season. they also have a vain hope of getting unemployment claims disallowed.

ignore it and press on.

Reply to
Ron Todd

....

tricky question. face to face with the client, non complex returns, depending on the documentation efficiency of the firm, and if they actually have anyone who can manage, run an hour to an hour and a half. drop off returns (without the client sitting across from you) suck if the firm doesn't have there pro forma system down pat and can really eat the hours.

FWIW, two hundred dollar returns are in the B3STP (Big 3 Store Front Tax Preparers) market (they average around $150/return), not the level of fee you would expect from a successful public accounting firm. that kind of firm is justified in doing tax work (rather than drumming up more audit work) because of its higher level of expertise that is needed for handling the more complex tax situations of wealthier and more successful individuals.

Reply to
Ron Todd

Virtually all of the returns had Schedule A and/or D, and there were many multi-state returns, and many many Schedule C/E returns -- at least half if not more.

For example, a typical example of what slowed me down oftentimes was trying to figure out basis information, figure out what a client was trying to communicate to me for Schedule A info, and one time a person with rental property simply wrote down "$10,000 -- Repairs." I obviously knew that some of that most likely had to be capitalized, and we had a hell of a time figuring that crap out.

But, like I said, I got my speed down initially, but then as the season wore on, I just got mentally fatigued I guess. I never really liked doing the returns that much, because it just seemed so tedious and I had to drag stuff out of people. I was always better at financial accounting anyway. Hopefully, I can find something in industry to better suite my skills.

Reply to
xyzer

The average price might have been closer to $250-$300ish range, but there was a fairly wide range in price in the returns I did. Rarely did an invoice go below $150, and rarely did it go above $600, but there was a lot in between. We weren't in an area that has a very high standard of living either -- about average.

Reply to
xyzer

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