tax hire

Anyone ever have success hiring someone for tax who doesn't use your software?

Have opportunity to hire someone with 15 years of experience to come in per diem
but she hasn't used my software in a decade.

It takes me less than an hour to learn new software. Maybe she does too

I'd say it takes a lot longer than an hour to learn tax software. I'm still learning my software and I'm in my third year -- there's always a new box or feature or a new strange client situation that I deal with! If I went back to Prosystems (which I last used back in '05) I could probably fumble through an easy return pretty quickly, but it would take a while before I would say that I had relearned the software again.

That said, if you hire anyone there will be a learning curve. Sure, it will take this person longer to prepare the return than it would take you to, but the learning curve should be shorter given the person's experience. The experience with your software from 10 years ago should help a little.

There is only one sure way to find out. Give her access to training videos or webinars of your software and then do a few tax return hands on and see what the learning curve is. Most tax professionals who know the tax law and use of one software are able to adapt to a new software quickly unless there is a learning challenge.

I knew a man who had over 30 years experience preparing taxes and used Lacerte and fumbled completely trying to switch to Drake!

good answers...ty....ironically, my girlfriend was entering some w2's and 1099's for interest and she's a computer programmer
and she learned pretty quickly for someone who doesn't do tax.

when i worked at another firm with profx; i had a hard time learning the software

i learned from that to have 2 screens for the employee; one to see how did last year and one to see how did this year.

I would suggest an even better idea is to use another software. I find Pfx to be horrible to use. The first firm I worked for used Drake, which I didn't like and I felt was rather unsophisticated. The second firm used UltraTax, which I found to be incredibly intuitive. We would hire bookkeepers with no tax prep experience and they would be up and going within a week or two efficiently cranking out simple returns. Where I work now uses Pfx. It took me almost a whole busy season (at 6yrs experience) to understand how to efficiently do a semi-complex return that I had done well (for the exact same client in many cases) the year before.

i use pro-series. i agree profx is not intuitive in my opinion; brutally hard to learn

ultratax i liked when checked out...but expensive

pro-series i'm happy with; though one person who helped me had trouble with it

wonder how the second person will find it

good answers...ty....ironically, my girlfriend was entering some w2's and 1099's for interest and she's a computer programmer
and she learned pretty quickly for someone who doesn't do tax.

when i worked at another firm with profx; i had a hard time learning the software

i learned from that to have 2 screens for the employee; one to see how did last year and one to see how did this year.

I'm a retired computer programmer and I pick up new software very quickly

programmers and computer techs are very good at tax prep i see

I hired a tax preparer with about 10 years of experience last month. All of that experience was proseries and drake. We use UT. I gave her a 15-minute tutorial and set her lose. She cranked about 10 simple returns in 7 hours. I’ve reviewed and there were no errors. The only thing she struggled with is finding the mileage entry on a schedule C. It’s in a crazy location.

Ultra tax is intuitive.
Most seasoned tax preparers should catch on quickly to any tax software.

Does UT have training videos for the beginner?

ut is very good software. i use proseries, not laid out as easily i think

Does UT have training videos for the beginner?

Yes, last time I checked. In fact, a very full collection of online documentation, user aids, tutorials, etc. They also offer various types of training for a fee, I have not used that.