State Websites

[Snaggletooth]

States are always changing their reporting websites - and they're not very good at it. Part of the problem is that governments for the most part are not accountable for the jobs that they are supposed to do. Their website design is usually contracted out, but the governments still rush these changes out before they even work. Their noble objective is to prevent identity theft, but the result is simply more and more complicated layers of gatekeeping for which the users cannot navigate.

I had three SIT withheld tax amounts to report and pay forJanuary - and just look at what happened:

1. Alabama: locked out of their website because of "too many attempts" to sign on. [This was my first attempt to sign on since December]
2. Georgia: Website under construction throughout reporting period. Being redesigned "to improve and help you."
3. Missouri: When accessing the Missouri withheld tax menu, the Sales Tax menu popped up.

My own state, Tennessee, does not have state withheld taxes from wages, but they have all manner of taxes nonetheless, and are equally stupid. A couple years ago, the Department of Revenue passed a regulation that all taxes must be filed and paid electronically. So in order to prevent people from sending in paper checks, they stopped Drake (and other softwares) from printing payment vouchers. This colossal act of stupidity didn't last long. A disaster. Revenue employees went crazy opening the mail with checks and could never identify who or what was being paid. Some taxpayers quit paying entirely. So 60 days later, the vouchers came back. Any of us could have told the Commissioner what was going to happen, but they are so out-of-touch and living in their own world.

And if course, you can't call these people. They're on government payroll and don't really have to show up for work during the virus.

Congratulations to the IRS for having the good sense not to tamper with EFTPS.

My rant for the day. Sorry.

[spanel]

What software do you use to help with payroll???

I use Quickbooks Enterprise for Accountants and the great thing is that you pay through Quickbooks. No need to go to external webpages/etc for EFTPS or any states... food for thought.

Chris

[Snaggletooth]

Yes, that is avoided, but QuickBooks takes cash flow to pay for it prospectively, charges a fee for the service, and files under their own EIN leaving the real taxpayer high and dry.

[spanel]

Yes, that is avoided, but QuickBooks takes cash flow to pay for it prospectively, charges a fee for the service, and files under their own EIN leaving the real taxpayer high and dry.

Not sure about filing under their own EIN. I think that is not correct. All payments are paid under the clients EIN, all logins to state/eftps are handled as well with the clients info.

Obviously Quickbooks is not free.. but its not actually to bad for the Accountants version for 50 payroll licenses.

Chris

[Snaggletooth]

Also, I'm not a big fan of Intuit. For one thing, they are trying to put me out of business with TurboTax. Makes the buyer think they know as much as a CPA just by acquiring their product. Also, the QB product is so user-friendly that my customers make a train wreck out of their records for me to have to clean up.