Practice management

The Internal Revenue Service has reduced the 2009 optional standard mileage rates used to calculate the deductible costs of operating an automobile, citing lower gas prices.

CPA firm Cottrill Arbutina Professional Services has acquired an eight-person tax and audit group from S.R. Snodgrass, expanding its reach in Western Pennsylvania and its auto dealership client base.

Got a new marketing superstar in your firm you want to recognize? Are they the type to push up their sleeves and get down in the trenches? Have their achievements caused heads to turn? If so, he/she could be the next Association for Accounting Marketing’s Annual Rookie of the Year.

Got a new marketing superstar in your firm you want to recognize? Are they the type to push up their sleeves and get down in the trenches? Have their achievements caused heads to turn? If so, he/she could be the next Association for Accounting Marketing’s Annual Rookie of the Year.

A new report on President-elect Barack Obama's tax policies sees his mantle of change perhaps leading him to change some of his tax proposals as he works with Congress next year.

The American Institute of CPAs' business subsidiary CPA2Biz has signed a deal with Google to offer Google AdWords as a way for accounting firms to market and promote their services via local paid search ads.

An IRS revenue agent was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport after he was indicted a few days earlier by a grand jury on charges of tax fraud and obstructing an investigation into his tax return.

Rand & Associates has launched a program aimed at helping small businesses weather the financial crisis.

An Internal Revenue Service advisory group has released a report detailing a wide-ranging set of 70 recommendations, including new requirements for tax preparers.

Reilly, Penner & Benton said it has merged with another Wisconsin accounting firm, Ragsdale, Spitz & Reuschlein.

President-elect Barack Obama plans to shift tax incentives to encourage more use of renewable energy sources, according to one tax expert.

Accounting firm I.A. Rozen & Associates is searching for the "The Last Baby Born in 2008" as a way to call attention to year-end tax deductions for families.

The House Small Business Committee convened a hearing on the financial rescue program and found that $1.6 trillion in bailout funds have provided little assistance to small businesses so far.

With tax season coming up, the IRS is reaching out to tax-exempt organizations and preparers to spread the word about the revised Form 990 and the extra information it will require.

Prosecutors have indicted John B. Ohle III, a former member of a bank's tax shelter promotion group, on charges of conspiring with lawyers at the law firm of Jenkens & Gilchrist and others to defraud the U.S. Treasury of an estimated $100 million in the sale of a tax shelter known as "HOMER."

A new career in income tax preparation could be a safety net for some of the thousands of bank and financial services employees who are losing their jobs due to the current economic crisis. Many of those being laid off are older employees who would not be able to find another comparable full-time job, but are not ready to retire.Tax professionals need many of the same qualifications that bankers and financial professionals possess. A tax preparer must be able to conduct a thorough interview to extract financial and personal information from their client and hold that information in complete confidence. Preparing income tax returns requires similar skills as completing banking, mortgage or investment documents.

INFLATION ADJUSTMENTS WIDEN TAX BRACKETSWashington, D.C. - The Internal Revenue Service said that personal exemptions and standard deductions would rise in 2009 to keep pace with inflation, providing more than three dozen tax benefits.

While the driving force behind the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 may have been the need to find an immediate solution to the current financial crisis, the new law added energy tax provisions at the eleventh hour that might be viewed - in retrospect, if not at the time of passage - as an integral part of a longer-term national solution. The energy title of the new law, the Energy Improvement and Extension Act of 2008, provides a host of tax incentives for alternative energy use and development, as well as for general energy conservation.Some sections of the energy title to the EESA are extensions of existing provisions, while others provide new opportunities. Together, they present a plan to strengthen the economy by minimizing foreign oil dependency. Viewed by its parts, the act adds to the matrix of ways that individuals and businesses alike can lower their net costs of energy consumption.

Change is scary. There's no doubt about it. I often tell my clients that whenever I am facing a major change, I feel like I am at the edge of a diving board and just can't jump into the water.I guess I'm no different than any of you when it comes to change. Sometimes I have been forced into it, and other times I have led it.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., has selected the accounting firm Watkins, Meegan, Drury & Co. to do forensic accounting on his tax returns and congressional disclosure forms.