Tax Professionals, Tax Refunds, and Article Review

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The consequences of tax refunds, for tax payers, include larger fractions of billable fees being billed to the client, then when they owe additional taxes. This is true even with the tax liability itself is constant. This finding goes beyond the commonly understood consequence of overpaying taxes -- a loss of investment income, by giving the government an interest-free loan. An additional wealth-related consequence is the higher preparation fees those receiving refunds pay. This affects millions of taxpayers as approximately 25% of taxpayers made tax payments via quarterly estimated tax payments (Hatfield, Jackson & Schafer, 2008). There are several ethical implications to these relationships as well.

Hatfield, Jackson and Schafer (2008) note the recent investigation into Jackson Hewitt franchises and the generation of fraudulent refunds. These types of firms often also earn additional income from refund anticipation loans. This behavior is contrary to tax professionals standards of conduct, established by both the IRS and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). AICPA Rule 302 expressly prohibits contingent fee arrangements, for preparing original tax returns. For this reason, not only are these findings of interest to taxpayers, but also to agencies charged with regulating tax professionals.

The researchers conclude that using whether or not a taxpayer receives a refund or has to pay taxes, is not a proper decision-making heuristic. Receiving a refund is not an effective means of gauging a tax professional's performance. Tax professionals understand that clients may judge their performance on whether or not they receive a refund.

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This enhanced perception acts as an incentive to motivate tax professionals to engineer tax refunds, through advising clients to make larger quarterly payments (Hatfield, Jackson & Schafer, 2008).

In the end, Hatfield, Jackson and Schafer (2008) demonstrate several relationships. First, tax professionals may advise clients to make larger than necessary quarterly tax payments, in order to generate a tax refund, as a means of increasing the favorable perception of their services. In addition, the amount the tax professional charges for their preparation services is often affected by the amount of refund the tax professional can engineer. It was found that tax professionals often billed a higher percentage of their billable services to tax payers receiving a refund, when compared to those who owed taxes on their return. This results in several consequences. Not only does the client lose out on investment income they could have earned over the course of the year, with their overpayment of taxes each quarter, but also they may pay higher preparation fees. Both of these facets negatively affecting wealth generation. The use of a contingent fee arrangement for tax preparation is unethical and also contrary to both IRS and AICPA regulations, which leads to regulatory applications of this research. For these reasons, clients should not use the size of their refund as a means of gauging their tax professional's performance......

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