What is a reasonable fee for 2006 tax prep in California?

In small-town north west Alabama that would have cost you $250. (But then we don't have a StarBucks in town; although we do have a McD which according to Consumer's Reports has better coffee)

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It seems high to me.

My fee would have been very close to $200.

Christopher Mewhort, EA, CGA mewhorttax.com

I'll just say that if I could do simple returns like that for exorbitant fees like that (and be able to get repeat business) I'd quit my job and do about 100 such returns every year. Then I would spend the other 350 days in the year salving my conscience in comfort.

So, you say you had a straightforward return, did you?

I don't see how that could be the case, since you have such a straightforward return with so few transactions.

I'm sure you could have gotten a contract clerical person through a temp agency much cheaper, if all you needed was a typist. Or were you really hoping to hire a trained professional who understood the tax law and your situation, and could appropriately apply one to the other, because your situation wasn't in fact straightforward, but was rather complex enough that you, the person with the most knowledge of your individual situation, weren't sure you could arrive at the correct answer?

Gah. I'm not sure why clients think that stapled and collated copies are easier to work with than loose originals in random order, but at least for me, that's not the case.

Unless it was one question per page, I'm guessing what you filled out is what I'd call and organizer. So now you've given this poor guy a giant stack of stapled photocopies and summaries of the same information, which he now has to compare to figure out which pieces are redundant and which are included one place, but not the other. Because even if you had no discrepancies, 99% of clients do. Plus it looks like he probably had to do a lot of initial setup work related to depreciation and AMT, not all of which may have been easily obtainable from the information you provided.

I'm in Oklahoma, a much lower-rent state, and you could easily have paid that much for us to do the return, billing by the hour. Personally I think the fee by form schedule isn't necessarily a good match for the effort directly related to each form, but in total, I wouldn't call it an unconscionable fee. Phoebe :)

You got tremendously overcharged. This is way in excess of the normal bill. He saw you coming.

I do not know if that is out of range in CA, but in IL it is way out of range. Mine would have been @ $150-200. And my questionaire (check list) is one page with large type. Missy Doyle

I love that final tack-on cost, especially when you consider what the person doing the "assembly" was probably paid and that your actual return was probably e-filed. You have to remember that the first year you go to any shop is going to entail a lot more overhead than a returning client. I don't agree however that you should have to spend a lot of time filling out paper data sheets, that is very lame and exactly one of the conveniences I think many want to pay for. Your income is probably too high to qualify for "free" tax prep, and just yesterday I saw a new client's 2005 return that was done by a community volunteer and cost the client hundreds of dollars in un-owed taxes due to incorrect inclusion of non-taxable scholarship income and failure to take any education-related benefits. At the other extreme, at the price you paid, I would expect to get the principal CPA's home and personal cell phone number, an invite to a hosted-bar event at the firm's office on April 18th, and a free tax planning session in November

2007 for next year! The national chains are easy targets to knock, but in California (indicated as your residence) ALL paid preparers are required to be certified by the state, and it's not uncommon to find Enrolled Agents or those with many years experience working in the chain offices, especially in the areas with higher financial demographics. You probably would have paid significantly less for the same return.

-Mark Bole

Both you and I live in "middle" America. It seems to me that the fringes of this country, mostly the west fringe and the east fringe, have different standards. I'm pretty sure it costs a heck of a lot more to live in California than in Michigan or Georgia. Given that, I predict that my fees in CA would be quite a bit higher than they are in GA, mostly out of necessity. Also, based on conversations with the OP in another group, she has rental property, and there may be other factors not disclosed. And we don't have a clue as to the condition of her records and source documents.

-- Paul Thomas, CPA snipped-for-privacy@bellsouth.net

I'd concur with Jim

Off the cuff no higher than $500 but more likely a $250-$300 return. Rgs,

Mark

If you are a high school teacher and "$ 100 Assembly fee" means that's what your preparer charged to visit your school and give a 45 minute tax preparation presentation to the assembled student body, it seems reasonable. If that is what he charged you to stack and staple the forms, yikes!

Seeing as how you did most of the work by filling out the 25 page questionaire you should have charged your accountant

1100 dollars that would have made the overall fee about right.

Yup, fee seems excessive to me.

My charge would probably have been around $300-$400.

Rudy

Disclaimer: The posted answer is for educational purposes only and Lizcano Tax Services, LLC and/or Rodolfo Lizcano have not been engaged to render any tax, accounting, legal, or other professional services.

I just priced your return out on my Schedule of Minimum Charges. $350 and that comes with a house call, the recommendation of the NOLO Press book Landlording, a Salvation Army Guideline sheet for donated stuff, and financial advice and alerts all year. I'm in Los Angeles County, too. Linda Dorfmont E.A., CFP, CSA

Whoa! My guy wanted $250 for the personal stuff, and that included a property rental. However, he wanted $750 for the S Corp and $500 for my LLC. I opted instead for $200 on TurboTax for Biz and TaxCut Deluxe for Personal. Piece of cake.