The Radical CPA: Tax Communicating is the Next Tax Planning

For whatever reason, CPAs don’t do the best job communicating.

So it never fails that most CPAs are shocked when their customers are angry with them when they have a huge payment or overpayment due.

And let’s be real: it’s the CPA’s fault.

Not that they owe the tax, but that they failed to communicate to their customers before April.

But yet, when you offer the suggestion to CPAs that every small business client and every significant 1040 client get a tax planning meeting included with their regular bundled service fee they look at you like you are nuts.

At New Vision, we communicate with our small business owners all year long or we won’t take on their compliance work.

Why? Because I am not going to clog up my firm in March and April for a taxpayer that is not interested in proactively looking at their tax situation. It’s a mindset. And it’s part of our firm’s value proposition as well as our culture to be proactive with customers.

You can only do this if you charge for it and make it a requirement.

And guess what?

Our customers love it, pay for it, and start calling us at the end of October to get a jump on it.

I love it, too, because we work with our customers all year, they are on it!

Now, for some of our customers, we do detail multi-scenario tax projections. But for most, it really is a quick and dirty calculation of where they will be if we filed that tax return now. The calculation takes only a few minutes, but the hour talking through the handful of options they have between now and April is priceless to the customer and to our firm.

It also fundamentally transforms the relationship with that taxpayer.

No longer are they freaked out about filing their tax returns on time – although most of them already do.

They now have insight into their tax position.

This is not complex tax planning, although we do have an opportunity to uncover a tax savings and to make changes before year-end. It is just giving our business owners a heads up to the amount of taxes they can pay now through payroll or save in April so they are not freaking out.

Most CPAs make the mistake of waiting for their customer to ask for this service.

Hello!? Customers don’t even know they have this option and certainly won’t pay extra for this because they don’t understand the value.

That’s why we bundle this in our regular service offering.

I know my customers appreciate it or they wouldn’t start scheduling their appointments in October.

Remember: you are the professional. Tell your customer what they need.

Get this post straight to your inbox. Sign up for The Radical CPA newsletter here. Or buy the book.