Paper Release Form

[geekgirldany]

I have new clients that I took on and got a retainer. After reviewing what was brought to me I have decided that I really should not have any further dealings with them. I will need to return all they brought me which was in a box.

Does anyone have a type of release letter they would not mind sharing when you return a clients information back to them? A letter they can sign off on that they received the information. I thought there was one on the board but I can't seem to find it.

Would appreciate it.
Dany

[ChEAr$]

signing

I have new clients that I took on and got a retainer. After reviewing what was brought to me I have decided that I really should not have any further dealings with them. I will need to return all they brought me which was in a box.

Does anyone have a type of release letter they would not mind sharing when you return a clients information back to them? A letter they can sign off on that they received the information. I thought there was one on the board but I can't seem to find it.

Would appreciate it.
Dany

Did you sign something as a receipt when they brought the box to you? Probably not.

So I would just call them to come by and when they did say: "here's your box back.
bye"

[Burke]

Well, they paid you a retainer, which I assume you are going to return to them? They could sign a receipt for that indicating services have been terminated by mutual consent.

[OtisMozzetti]

aside from return of their box of papers

I have new clients that I took on and got a retainer. After reviewing what was brought to me I have decided that I really should not have any further dealings with them. I will need to return all they brought me which was in a box.

To me it seems that the larger issue is how much, if any, of the retainer money is to be returned to the clients. You made a decision not to have further dealings with them. It looks like little or nothing was provided to them. What sort of agreement you had with them at the start may be an important question. I hope they're not due in for an IRS examination next week. I don't know the facts of the matter; maybe it would be a good decision to return their retainer money to them.

[geekgirldany]

I gave them a handwritten receipt for the retainer. Preparation of two years of tax returns is what I put on it. Got a $600 deposit down. I've spent around four hours reviewing their information and trying to convert peachtree over to Qbs. So I thought I would charge for the four hours. I did not have them sign a engagement letter up front. I always get people to sign that when they pick up a return... not a good idea for in the future.

edit out

I guess it comes down to I just feel like it is too much for me to deal with. I was going to charge for my time of looking over the returns and bank statements brought to me. But I can go ahead and return the whole retainer.

[Burke]

Sounds like a good idea to me. I just did the same with a partnership, that just kept getting more involved the more I dug. Only bookkeeping records were an Excel spreadsheet of the bank account. I had issues with how current firm was handling the whole enterprise, and would have had to change the tax treatment, plus go back to 2005 and reconstruct entire project. When I finally pinned the TMP down as to why he wanted to change preparers, it was to save money. (He paid them about $300 last year.) He got a shock, and agreed with me that it was better to stick with the same guys, esp since the venture would be terminated in another 18 months.

[geekgirldany]

Well got off the phone with the client. He said he would get someone who knows peachtree to do those years and then he would like to come back to me. I told him that would be fine. To get someone to clean all that up for him and then I would not mind doing business with him in the future.

I suppose what I will do is just have him sign a receipt saying he got his retainer back and that he received his paperwork back.