Packaging?

[Bucky]

Concerning the shoe box client I send them home with instructions how to organize etc. Yes some don't come back. I figure they either don't know how to do it or are just to lazy. If they don't know how they will at least try to follow the instructions. If they are to lazy you guys can have them. I am sure they will be real impressed with your fancy packaging and will send you other basket cases.

And to BB concerning some of us stuffing everything into an envelope and returning to the client some of us actually know how to place everything in a neat fashion. I would put my method up against most of the others at least concerning user friendlyness. Is that a word? If the client needs to make a copy etc he/she removes 2 staples and bingo. Like I stated in an earlier post 90% are never going to open it. Those binders are a real pain for the new preparer to remove to make a file copy. Maybe that's why some of you use them. Seems they would be hard to mail also. The pocket folders are OK put unless everything is stapled inside things can get lost.

Peace

Bucky

[Black Bart]

Aw, take it easy

...And to BB concerning some of us stuffing everything into an envelope and returning to the client some of us actually know how to place everything in a neat fashion...

Nobody said you were a "previous preparer" (or a slob).

...concerning user friendlyness. Is that a word?

Yeah, but substitute an i for the y.

Peace

And the same to you, bro...

[JohnH]

I started all this, so I guess I need to 'fess up as well. I hate hanging perforated pieces and halfway folded-over edges because I'm always afraind there's something lurking behind all that stuff, so I have a pair of scissors AND a razor blade handy for the various trimming and cutting tasks. I also staple the Copy C's, SSA statements, Goodwill receipts, 1098's, property tax receipts, etc to individual sheets of paper in order to get it all flat and organized.. I overlap the boilerplate stuff with data in order to condense everything a little more on the assembly sheets. Then put it in data entry order and fly through the return without having to think too much except where thinking is truly necessary.

I also run a check tape on my calculator as the last step after the return is assembled. (the check tape is my security blanket). I used to staple the check tapes to my copies of the return, but abandoned that a few years ago on the theory that if it checked out I didn't need to retain the tape, and if it didn't check out I would rework the return until it did.

I don't mind the shoe box clients as long as they don't mind paying the fee. And I wouldn't think of sending them home unless they complained that I was charging them for doing something they could do themselves, in which case I'd probably say "Well, then do it!".

Before stapling everything neatly into the folder, I photocopy it all for my files (usually 2-up to save paper). I am thinking about scanning this stuff next year as a tree-saving step, but I still refuse to e-file.

You had to know I do things this way.
Otherwise I wouldn't have known to ask the question.in the first place.

[Bucky]

BB

About taking it easy I appreciate your concern but you might be reading to much emotion in my post. As for the spelling correction also thanks for taking the time to care. I would be one happy fellow if they added spell check to this site. Now concerning the bro thing although I doubt if we are related I would be honored to have you as a bro.

Choose
The single clenched fist lifted and ready,
Or the open hand held out and waiting.
Choose:
For we meet by one or the other.

[Black Bart]

Hmmm,

I started all this, so I guess I need to 'fess up as well. I hate hanging perforated pieces and halfway folded-over edges because I'm always afraind there's something lurking behind all that stuff, so I have a pair of scissors AND a razor blade handy for the various trimming and cutting tasks. I also staple the Copy C's, SSA statements, Goodwill receipts, 1098's, property tax receipts, etc to individual sheets of paper in order to get it all flat and organized.. I overlap the boilerplate stuff with data in order to condense everything a little more on the assembly sheets. Then put it in data entry order...

well John, actually you might give Howard Hughes a run for his money. But anyway, thanks for nobly taking the rap for our mini-tempest in a teapot. To respond in kind I herewith reciprocate Bucky's olive branch offer with my own and confess to him that I (maybe schizophrenically) also don't use folders, do use just two staples, and simply fold the return like a letter into an oversized (4 3/4" X 11") brown kraft envelope. If it's too big, then a brown kraft 10" X 13" self-seal envelope. All rubber-stamped (nothing printed) "Black Bart Boondoggles, LLC--Dogpatch, AR" / 2007 / TAXPAYER'S COPY." So there -- my mea culpa and apologia.

P.S. to Bucky: Appreciate the offer to become a bro, but must decline -- relatives wantin' notes co-signed are already comin' in the windows now.