Why We Are Different
At Pines Accounting Services, we believe your accountant should be a year-round resource that helps you achieve your financial goals. Many accountants meet with their clients once a year in the Spring. At Pines Accounting Services, all of our clients receive a package consisting of three sessions throughout the year.
Preparation Session
In the preparation session, your annual tax returns and financial statements are prepared by Pines Accounting Services. This normally happens between January and April. If your business receives monthly accounting and/or financial statements, preparation is a year-round process.
All clients receive at least one in-person meeting or phone call before their tax returns and financial statements are finalized. This helps us make sure that all relevant information is included and the product is as accurate as possible. It helps us more fully understand your financial situation and helps clients have more confidence that their financial reporting is accurate and complete.
Our busiest time of the year is February through April. Our normal turnaround time for completing work is one to two weeks. However, from February through April clients should expect us to complete work between two and four weeks after all information is received.
Review Session
After the tax returns and financial statements are prepared, we offer all of our clients an in-person or virtual meeting to review your financial information. This is normally done between May and July.
During this meeting, we cover the most important parts of the statements and answer any questions. At this point, we would make any recommendations for changes to your accounting process or business process that may benefit you and your company. We strongly believe that it is our job to not only prepare accurate financial information but help our clients more clearly understand their financial situation. We believe our experience can help our clients make decisions that will increase their business revenue, decrease their business expenses, and decrease their tax liability. It is during the review process that we help you do this.
Planning Session
In November and December, we like to meet with all of our clients to discuss the year and prepare them for their annual income tax bill or refund. The amount of tax you pay changes from year-to-year. Often times, a business will have drastically different income from one year to the next which results very different tax situations. Normally by November or December, we can reasonably predict the amount of tax you will owe for the year.
We will review your business accounting year-to-date and ask you questions to help predict the rest of your taxable income for the year. We will then make a recommendation of the amount of tax to pay for the year, or if no additional tax is due. We will also give you strategies to lower your tax liability for the year.
We believe most clients prefer for their accountants to inform them of any additional tax bills sooner rather than later. Our tax planning session gives our clients an estimated tax liability as well as tax saving strategies.