Pricing Amended Returns

There are clients who don’t really care about the information they submit (Usually it’s just laziness) only to come back months later looking to amend. Nothing wrong with that but just wondering how do you prevent this? What’s a reasonable fee that would be both for normal time spent and also act as a deterrent (ok ok mostly a deterrent)?

We can do it right or we can do it again.
Preparing an amended return for a lazy or disengaged taxpayer would cost the same as the originally filed return. My reasoning (to the client) being, "I have to re-review everything in context. If you were to spend more effort ensuring I receive good information for the originally filed return, we can both avoid this situation."

For honest mistakes, I usually charge ~50% of the originally filed return...depending heavily on the scope of the change.

Even if it only takes you 30 minutes, you need to consider the headache and increased risk associated with a client that files an amended return each year. For a client like that, there should also be a "punitive" element, for lack of a better word, internalized in the fee to incentivize them not to operate like that. IMO of course.

If they just gave me garbage the first time around and the return needs to be completely re-prepared, I could see the amended return fee surpassing the original return fee.

If you want to keep them as a client and not fire them that is.

+1 to these responses.

If the client is lazy or uncaring about accuracy - then I likely do not like working with them anyway. Full price. Not concerned about retention.

If it's not their fault, I price depending on the situation - usually about half, sometimes less. "please just cover my software and filing costs" I tell them.

Some of my clients pay an inclusive fee which include amendments. For careless clients that I wish to keep, I raise that inclusive price to cover the cost of the inevitable amendment.

For careless clients, I also explain that when they sign a tax return they are certifying it to be accurate and complete, yada yada yada.