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Blotto_Otter posted:In fairness, I think auditing is perhaps the accounting topic that is the hardest to get a feel for based on what you learn in the classroom. It's very much something you learn on the job, not from a textbook. Like most accounting courses, the auditing theory and concepts you learn in the classroom are important to know but are not something you think about as much when you're actually doing the work, and when you do think about them, it's more interesting when you're dealing with a real-world situation. I realize this is true for much of accounting and college education in general, but I think it's extra true for auditing, the disconnect between classroom learning and the actual work is even greater than in the other accounting topics IMO. Agreed on this, I don't think I ever actually understood what they were trying to teach in my Auditing class in college and only gained a little more understand when I studied for the Auditing part of the CPA test. I learned enough to pass the test but I also still wouldn't say I understand auditing.
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Feb 23, 2021 21:05
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In my auditing class we watched a lot of videos about poo poo like Crazy Eddie's and were told a lot of funny stories about people who should have been caught a lot sooner but the auditors hosed up. And we did a fake audit project. But mostly it felt like the day the science teacher shows a Bill Nye video, for the entire class. Unfortunately whoever designed the fake audit project didn't make it so that students could discover an embezzlement scheme and just made it full of normal boring errors instead.
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Feb 23, 2021 22:46
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You learn about auditing during your internship, not in a classroom
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Feb 23, 2021 23:03
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I posted here a few weeks ago, and realized I wasn’t really being specific enough. How do I find an accountant who actually wants to try to find me deductions and not just push standard deduction? I feel my first experience outside of TurboTax has been going poorly and I’m not really following how I would find someone incentivized to NOT take the easiest route. I have been exclusively in a home office position for years, and it would seem that opens the door to plenty of deductions and write-offs.
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Feb 23, 2021 23:46
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Flowers for QAnon posted:I posted here a few weeks ago, and realized I wasn’t really being specific enough. How do I find an accountant who actually wants to try to find me deductions and not just push standard deduction? I feel my first experience outside of TurboTax has been going poorly and I’m not really following how I would find someone incentivized to NOT take the easiest route. What kind of home office expenses are you talking here? If you only have a couple grand of home office expenses, then the standard deduction might still make more sense than itemizing if you don’t have other itemized deductions. That said, you’ve got to give the accountant something to work with. If you come to an accountant with just home office expenses and no other itemized deductions, they’re going to correctly conclude that the standard deduction is the best option. If you show your prospective accountant that you’ve got X itemized expenses over the standard deduction, then they should play ball.
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Feb 24, 2021 00:07
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If youre working in a home office and getting a W2 you dont have anything to write off If you dont pay a ton in mortgage interest, give a ton to charity, or have huge out of pocket medical expenses then ya youre prob gonna take the standard deduction Do the above thingies describe you goonsir?
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Feb 24, 2021 00:11
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Isn’t the home offer deduction like $5 per sq foot up to a max of 300ft plus some expenses and that room needs to be exclusively used for your business? I’m going from memory so I may be off but I definitely remember it being both lame and a hassle Standard deduction is $12400. So yeah
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Feb 24, 2021 00:26
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Good Citizen posted:Isn’t the home offer deduction like $5 per sq foot up to a max of 300ft plus some expenses and that room needs to be exclusively used for your business? I’m going from memory so I may be off but I definitely remember it being both lame and a hassle That’s the simplified method. The full method can be higher (or lower) than that but if you own the home it includes depreciation which is its own can of worms. However, as said before, if you are a W-2 employee you cannot deduct home office expenses, or any work-related expenses at all. TCJA rules, from 2018-2025.
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Feb 24, 2021 00:36
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Ya if dude is self employed thats a whole dif thing or i guess if hes in the military
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Feb 24, 2021 00:46
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black.lion posted:If youre working in a home office and getting a W2 you dont have anything to write off Thank you everyone for the responses. I give about 2-3k in charity, had to pay my max-out-of-pocket for heathcare (~5k), and claimed 12% of my space for home office on 3.6k per month rent.
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Feb 24, 2021 00:57
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Do you get a W2 or are you a small business? Either way your home office doesnt come into play here, if you get a W2 your home office does nothing on yer return and if youre a small biz it happens on Sch C With 5k med expenses + 3k in charity youre 4k short from itemizing - if you rent theres no property tax or mort interest obvi, so unless u somehow pay 4k+ in prop tax on your car/helicopter/gundam youre not itemizing e: im assuming youre single? black.lion fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Feb 24, 2021 |
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Feb 24, 2021 01:06
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e: I do corporate reporting and haven't done real tax since passing the CPA so I should shut up on this topic
Good Citizen fucked around with this message at 04:12 on Feb 24, 2021 |
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Feb 24, 2021 01:09
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Neither student loan interest nor home office expense occurs on sch a what i mean is unless u have a hovercraft youre paying 4k+ in property tax on, yer standard deductin my man black.lion fucked around with this message at 01:48 on Feb 24, 2021 |
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Feb 24, 2021 01:20
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Thanks folks!
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Feb 24, 2021 01:54
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One of my favorite things about working in this kind of space is just grabbing at something wild like a hovercraft to describe the bottom line impact Tho sometimes it’s more grim, one quarter my VP and I were talking about large excess death claims on some policies and he was like “maybe a family got in a car crash” and I was like “yeah or a couple policy holders hit each other” and at that point in the year end we both cracked up
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Feb 24, 2021 02:53
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Good Citizen posted:
Aaaahhhhhhh that’s not how itemized deductions work please don’t do anyone else’s taxes and maybe not even your own. Also everyone is forgetting the medical deduction floor.
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Feb 24, 2021 04:03
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Epi Lepi posted:Aaaahhhhhhh that’s not how itemized deductions work please don’t do anyone else’s taxes and maybe not even your own. Good call. Edited it out and replaced with a disclaimer that I don't do tax. Glad I already passed the CPA because the substitute acronym of 'couldn't pass again' definitely applies to me and tax
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Feb 24, 2021 04:14
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Epi Lepi posted:Also everyone is forgetting the medical deduction floor. True but i was tipsy phone posting so thats my excuse, so i guess hed need more like 9k in spaceship property tax if his agi is in the neighborhood of 60k or up
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Feb 24, 2021 12:06
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I had to give myself a crash course in business valuation last night because my next online quiz covered it. Turns out even though I took two business finance college courses for the CPA exemption, they never covered it. Coincidentally, the first interview I had upon graduating was with a business valuation/litigation support firm that I botched.Everett False posted:In my auditing class we watched a lot of videos about poo poo like Crazy Eddie's and were told a lot of funny stories about people who should have been caught a lot sooner but the auditors hosed up. And we did a fake audit project. But mostly it felt like the day the science teacher shows a Bill Nye video, for the entire class. Unfortunately whoever designed the fake audit project didn't make it so that students could discover an embezzlement scheme and just made it full of normal boring errors instead. All of my auditing education was online videos and notes. The instructor in the video kept using an example company name called Joey Flip-Bats Inc. Couldn't stop thinking, "Gee, I wonder when this video was made and what baseball team he's a fan of," because that's a very specific reference.
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Feb 24, 2021 16:47
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My wife does bv-lit. She recently saw an old-but-not-that-old stat that there were only 5,000 bv-lit experts in the US, which was really surprising to her.
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Feb 24, 2021 17:32
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I probably won't go directly into accounting after graduating and instead continue with software developer but I'm vaguely excited about audit even if it is boring
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Feb 24, 2021 17:51
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After switching to an industry role and actually doing financial reporting processes, I’m certain I could go back and be a much better (and more empathetic) auditor. After switching to an industry role, I will never go back and be an auditor.
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Feb 24, 2021 17:55
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Democratic Pirate posted:After switching to an industry role and actually doing financial reporting processes, I’m certain I could go back and be a much better (and more empathetic) auditor. I went and did financial reporting (and other odd tasks) in industry for a while and then went back to auditing, and I can confirm your theory - I'm a far better auditor (more efficient, more effective, and more empathetic to the client) after learning exactly what goes in to making the financial statements that I'm auditing. Most audits could be done in considerably less time than they usually take (and to a higher standard of quality) if the audit teams actually had experience in corporate accounting and financial reporting, rather than the usual bumbling audit team of fresh college graduates being guided by slightly-less-fresh college graduates. (This will never happen because it is marginally cheaper for a firm to staff an audit team out of fresh college grads willing to work 80-hour weeks on a fixed salary than it is to hire or retain experienced auditors.)
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Feb 24, 2021 19:06
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Blotto_Otter posted:I went and did financial reporting (and other odd tasks) in industry for a while and then went back to auditing, and I can confirm your theory - I'm a far better auditor (more efficient, more effective, and more empathetic to the client) after learning exactly what goes in to making the financial statements that I'm auditing. Most audits could be done in considerably less time than they usually take (and to a higher standard of quality) if the audit teams actually had experience in corporate accounting and financial reporting, rather than the usual bumbling audit team of fresh college graduates being guided by slightly-less-fresh college graduates. (This will never happen because it is marginally cheaper for a firm to staff an audit team out of fresh college grads willing to work 80-hour weeks on a fixed salary than it is to hire or retain experienced auditors.) I know that dealing with things like payroll, sales tax, and the general bullshit that came in dealing with a not-for-profit service organization made my ability to do compilations for various small business much easier. Not the same level, but now I see it from the other side.
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Feb 24, 2021 20:24
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I’m dealing with one of my clients JV partners to do what should be a simple tax return for a commercial real estate portfolio. They just admitted to us that they weren’t sure if they were on cash or accrual basis. I’m THIS close to leaving a third one-stare Yelp review on their page.
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Feb 24, 2021 23:23
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Y’all think £74,500 salary (~, 6% 401k match and 35 days PTO sounds reasonable to be a tax manager in London? Would prefer more, but this seems like a good number while I’m currently making $94k in Atlanta.
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Feb 25, 2021 19:30
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It's like a 10k raise in gross USD terms, but you'll have less take home if you're paying UK taxes (which are higher than US taxes) and London rent (which is higher than Atlanta rent). I'd still probably go for it for the experience of living in London. 75kGBP/105kUSD is a good salary IMO.
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Feb 25, 2021 19:39
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Lol I forgot to convert from GBP to USD and was like “wow what the gently caress that’s a huge step back”
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Feb 25, 2021 20:23
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I'm the accountant at a small business and I have to constantly tell my boss that we need to do things the hard way because I've worked at other companies that have been audited before and having your ducks in a row beforehand makes things a LOT easier.
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Feb 25, 2021 20:29
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We get stuff like healthcare, pensions and paid holidays in Europe as well  But London is rediculus expensive and finding a nice apartment is hard. I would not move to that city when people I know that would be able to buy a house in any other city are forced to have roommates in London to make ends meet.
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Feb 25, 2021 20:31
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Hurt Whitey Maybe posted:Y’all think £74,500 salary (~, 6% 401k match and 35 days PTO sounds reasonable to be a tax manager in London? Would prefer more, but this seems like a good number while I’m currently making $94k in Atlanta. Is that the starting offer? Wiggle room? 35 days PTO is probably way more than you’d get anywhere here, and that’s worth a lot to me, especially in a new country where I could use those days to go out exploring.
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Feb 25, 2021 20:38
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England is dark. You go to work the sun is down, when you get off work the sun is down, when you step outside for lunch it is overcast. The quality of british blue eyed soul is reflective of how depressing the place is. Bring a lil UV light box to combat Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD lmao). Ensure your job helps you with housing. Make them assign someone to at least assist with deciphering housing. Don't look down on council flats, their version of HUD housing.
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Feb 25, 2021 21:18
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Literally Lewis Hamilton posted:Is that the starting offer? Wiggle room? Also, once the pandemic is (hopefully) over, way easier to take advantage of cheap continental flights for excursions. One of my main reasons for wanting to move there, too. So many European destinations I'd like to visit but I have to plan around 6-10 hour flights. At least now I get 3 weeks' paid vacation.
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Feb 25, 2021 22:29
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Hellblazer187 posted:It's like a 10k raise in gross USD terms, but you'll have less take home if you're paying UK taxes (which are higher than US taxes) and London rent (which is higher than Atlanta rent). Democratic Pirate posted:Lol I forgot to convert from GBP to USD and was like “wow what the gently caress that’s a huge step back” Literally Lewis Hamilton posted:Is that the starting offer? Wiggle room? KirbyKhan posted:England is dark. You go to work the sun is down, when you get off work the sun is down, when you step outside for lunch it is overcast.
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Feb 25, 2021 22:31
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mojo1701a posted:Also, once the pandemic is (hopefully) over, way easier to take advantage of cheap continental flights for excursions. One of my main reasons for wanting to move there, too. So many European destinations I'd like to visit but I have to plan around 6-10 hour flights. At least now I get 3 weeks' paid vacation. Exactly. I see it like a forward operating base (as lame as that sounds). Whole hell of a lot easier to do a weekend in Paris than from the US. Also, thanks for the replies y’all, appreciate it a lot. It’s nice having a semi-anonymous sounding board for this to make sure I’m not that crazy.
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Feb 25, 2021 22:33
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Hurt Whitey Maybe posted:Exactly. I see it like a forward operating base (as lame as that sounds). Whole hell of a lot easier to do a weekend in Paris than from the US. Yeah I was there on 2012 doing military things and that does sound lame, but you are correct. But yes, in europe it is rediculously cheap to travel, hella expensive to stay places and eat to live. Keep in mind, you are going to a post Brexit London. So the border will be tougher for you to navigate unless you have a large org backing you. Sounds like you do have that, so it should be fine. Every trip I took off that tiny island was pleasent and painless. Coming back in had a 66% chance of being hassled. If you got large org backing, then that all neck, flat nose ~protector of albion~ can question and caress your rear end all he wants it won't ultimately delay anything. But do have your papers and a copy of your papers. They were jerks back then and I can only assume the border folks have escalated since then.
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Feb 25, 2021 23:01
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KirbyKhan posted:Yeah I was there on 2012 doing military things and that does sound lame, but you are correct. But yes, in europe it is rediculously cheap to travel, hella expensive to stay places and eat to live. I’m an American I have rights! Was thinking about Brexit, but at the same time I’ll totally wait slightly longer in line on my way back from vacation while I’m living abroad with a job opportunity that’s been dropped in my lap. I always wanted to live abroad at some point and it’s just a perfect convergence of events. My lease even runs out two weeks after I’d want to put in my two weeks notice, it all just works out very well. This all started with a random LinkedIn recruiter messaging me and I wanted to quit my current job anyway because I’ve started realizing I hate my bosses, so this is all gravy at this point. I guess the main lesson here: check your LinkedIn spam.
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Feb 25, 2021 23:40
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Oh my dude the stars have aligned. Go on that adventure! But do get paid. Mention how the you have tested your skill at reacting to brand new and poorly written regs by citing the TCAJ of 2018. You are hopping on to an ~interesting times~ rear end space where everyone had 5 years to plan for this while not actually planning for this. Speak with confidence and authority in your voice, that is what the american accent. Remember that you can't say oval office there, it just sounds off out of any american dialect. But, "motherfucker" is your magic phrase. They can't say it right or fluidly. Thats a spook trick that will let you know if a brit has an american background. Edit: you need to know that you do not have rights because you are american. You have rights because some org with more money than god bought you as a high value asset. Never forget that you do not belong. KirbyKhan fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Feb 26, 2021 |
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Feb 26, 2021 00:03
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Hurt Whitey Maybe posted:UK taxes are creditable for US, right? Yeah, you won't pay double tax. you'll either claim the FEIE or the FTC and pay nothing in the US most likely.
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Feb 26, 2021 00:21
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KirbyKhan posted:Oh my dude the stars have aligned. Go on that adventure! This is precisely what I needed to hear, thank you lmao. I certainly won’t forget that I am a highly valued international businessman with access to the effectively limitless financial resources of whichever large international accounting firm that’s happened to pay for my services.
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Feb 26, 2021 04:28
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