Widerman & Associates, CPAs provides a wide range of services to individuals and businesses in a variety of industries. Widerman & Associates, CPAs we strive to meet each client’s specific needs in planning for the future and achieving their goals in an ever-changing financial and regulatory environment. Our professional services include:
Accounting/Bookkeeping/Quickbooks
Consulting
Estate & Trust Planning
Financial & Retirement Planning
Financial Statements
IRS Representation
Litigation Support and Forensic Accounting
M & A
Payroll Services
Taxation (Domestic & International)
Tax Resolution
Accounting/Bookkeeping/Quickbooks Services
Accounting : From start-ups to established enterprises, businesses rely on accurate and insightful financial information in order to maintain profitability and capitalize on new opportunities. Our accounting services steer you closer to these goals with accurate record-keeping and reporting as well as support on financial issues such as initial accounting system setup, cost-containment, tax planning, investments, and employee benefit and profit-sharing plans.
We can set up financial reports for your view to streamline your business and save your valuable time. These reports are important tools that can guide your business in making financial decisions, planning, and evaluating performance.
Bookkeeping : Accurate record-keeping is essential to a successful business yet can also be complicated and time consuming. We can help you with the organization and day-to-day tasks of bookkeeping so that you can focus on your core business.
QuickBooks: It can provide useful and timely information in the form of financial statements, reports and graphs. However, it can only provide this information if you purchase the right product and then install, setup and use it properly. We don’t just help you use the software, we help you use it more efficiently and effectively.
Personal Training: We train you personally! Either one-on-one or several individuals within your organization at your company’s location.
Installation: We install QuickBooks on your stand-alone computer or in a network environment, in either single or multi-user mode.
Set-up: We assist new QuickBooks users with initial setup including: Easy Step Interview, Preferences, Lists, Customers, Vendors, Employees, Banking and Reports. We also help experienced users manage their business more effectively by improving their current setup. Many users experience problems and lack the ability to generate and track important information as a result of inadequate setup.
Support: Our QuickBooks support service can assist you with any installation, setup or operation assistance you might need. In addition, our support is not limited just to the software part of it, but we can also provide accounting and payroll support.
Review: Our QuickBooks support service can assist you with any installation, setup or operation assistance you might need. In addition, our support is not limited just to the software part of it, but we can also provide accounting and payroll support.
Review: Our QuickBooks review service helps companies that have the human resource to perform daily accounting and payroll tasks, but need an accounting and payroll expert to review your transactions, accounts and reports. This review ensures that you receive timely, relevant and reliable financial information. We also inform you of any corrections, adjustments or reclassifications necessary to ensure that the financial information you receive reflects the correct financial condition of your business. Reviews many be conducted at any time, but monthly reviews provide you with up-to-date information and feedback about your business.
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Consulting Services
At Widerman & Associates, CPAs, we focus on building close client relationships that add long-term value. This includes assuring the solidity of financial records, evaluating financial procedures and working to produce strategies that help our clients face the myriad challenges of business planning and execution. Our clients benefit from objective analysis to assist in controlling costs, increasing efficiency, and implementing new technologies and procedures that take advantage of changes in the marketplace, accounting standards, and tax law. Our assurance services will improve information quality or its context, meaning more success for your business.
Business Valuation: The range of needs for valuing businesses continues to widen, and Widerman & Associates, CPAs can provide in-depth analysis to help you identify and analyze the factors that drive the value of your company or one in which you have an interest. Uses for this service include estate planning and compliance, buying and selling businesses, divorce matters, family limited partnerships and ESOPs. There are so many factors that contribute to the perceived value of a business. Our expert can help you evaluate entities that you have an interest in and guide you towards making business decisions that you feel confident with.
• Cash Flow and Budgeting Analysis
Good cash management can improve a company’s liquidity, reduce costs, and increase profitability. Widerman & Associates, CPAs can help you maintain optimal cash flow levels by tracking sources and uses, forecasting, and budgeting accordingly. To a business entity, cash flow is something that can make or break the business’ ability to survive. We can help you analyze your spending, rebalance your budget and/or debts for an optimal cash flow to support your business’ success. This balance plan would be revisited if and when there were any major changes in your business structure to ensure that you are operating at an optimal level. With our help and guidance, you will always be on top of your finances and ready for the future.
• Debt and Finance
Whether your needs are corporate or personal, Widerman & Associates, CPAs can assist you in sorting out the different options available for debt management and financing that will lower your payments and/or reduce the total amount of interest paid. Re-balancing your debts can also result in tax deduction savings. Even if you are able to handle the payments and the amounts of your current debts, our expertise many be able to save you money and/or lower your payments.
• Entity Selection and Restructuring
Your business entity has a large impact on your taxes and other liabilities. From your company’s inception through its growth and development, Widerman & Associates, CPAs advise you on choosing an entity type and later restructuring if advantageous. With our knowledge and expertise, you will always be receiving the most advantageous entity type for the functions your business performs.
• Employee Benefits, Pension, and Profit-Sharing Plans
Choosing and administering benefit plans for your employees is often a complex process. Widerman & Associates, CPAs can help you develop, implement, and administrate your benefit, retirement, and profit-sharing plans with an eye toward rewarding your employees and teaching your company’s financial and business goals. We can also help maximize tax advantages in implementing these plans. As your business grows, your business and your employees will be rewarded for the hard work that contributed to the success of your business.
• Financial Projections and Forecasts
No one can predict the future perfectly, but we can all benefit from planning for it. Widerman & Associates, CPAs combines expertise and experience with a gained understanding of your business to produce financial projections that can help you manage your business plan and spending. Forecasting for the future is imperative to your company’s success. We make it a point to keep current with market trends and updates so that your business can be prepared for what is to come. Depending on your needs, our work can range from top-level reports to detailed financial models.
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Estate & Trust Planning Services
Effective estate and trust planning can ensure financial security for loved ones. For businesses, it can maintain a smooth succession of ownership. Our role is to help you navigate the complex and shifting tax laws to facilitate the transfer of assets and minimize the tax liability of your beneficiaries. Everyone should have a well thought out plan as to how to disburse one’s estate so as to avoid complications and to be sure wishes are followed. Having your taxes and estate thoroughly and carefully planned will ensure that your loved ones don’t have any complications to deal with during a time of loss.
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Financial and Retirement Planning
Widerman & Associates, CPAs goal is to help you reach your financial goals and maintain financial independence through a comfortable retirement. We can guide you through tough decision-making processes such as asset allocation, investment performance monitoring, college education funding, retirement plans, insurance, and tax, estate, and business succession planning. Whether you are developing an investment strategy or evaluating current investments, we can ensure that your portfolio will take into account tax implications for an advantageous after-tax return. The road to retirement is a long one and we can help you to take the proper steps to reach your goals.
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Financial Statements
I. Compilations
-Presentation of financial statements without the assurance as to conformity with
Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP)
Compiled financial statements provide business owners with a basic inspection of an organization’s data and are useful when preparing tax returns and analyzing financial results. The types of procedures that we consider reasonable to conduct for a compilation include:
• Gather documentation to support account balances. Documentation is needed to verify that the amounts reported on a company’s financial statements are correct.
• View financial data for obvious errors. Compilation standards do not require the accountant to perform any procedures to verify or corroborate the financial statement information provided by the client. However, we do pose questions to management for any significant issues that arise during the course of the compilation engagement.
• Correction of an obvious error on a company’s compiled financial statements. We record an adjusting journal entry to correct the amount, and to ensure financial statement amounts are supported by the presented documentation. The adjusting journal entries suggested depend on the basis of accounting followed by the organization.
• Draft financial statement reports and footnotes. Our report with compiled financial statements does not express an opinion or any other form of assurance on them. Footnotes describe the accounting policies used to compile the statements. Footnotes may not be required if the compiled statements are not distributed to third parties (so called, “Internal Management Use Only” statements).
II Reviews
-A report that proves limited assurance (but not an opinion) about financial statements
based on analytical procedures and inquiries.
In a financial statement review, we perform those procedures necessary to provide a reasonable basis for obtaining limited assurance that no material changes are needed to bring the financial statements into compliance with the applicable financial reporting framework. These procedures are more heavily concentrated in areas where there are enhanced risks of misstatement. The types of procedures that we consider reasonable to conduct for a review include:
• Conduct a ratio analysis with historical, forecasted, and industry results
• Investigate findings that appear to be inconsistent
• Inquire about the procedures for recording accounting transactions
• Investigate unusual or complex situations that may impact reported results
• Investigate significant transactions occurring near the end of the accounting period
• Follow up on questions that arose during previous reviews
• Inquire about material events that occurred after the date of the financial statements
• Investigate significant journal entries
• Review communications from regulatory agencies
• Read the financial statements to see if they appear to conform with the applicable financial reporting framework
• Review the management reports of any accountants who reviewed or audited the entity’s financial statements in prior periods
III Audits
– An all-encompassing analysis to provide the highest level of assurance.
Our audit engagements generally consist of 4 phases, as follows:
• Planning
In the planning phase, the auditor makes an effort to understand what kinds of documentation are needed, collects documents from previous audits and gathers preliminary statements from involved parties. During the planning phase, the auditor also begins to plan the scope of the audit and to determine what the objective of the audit is.
• Preliminary Review
The auditor begins to evaluate the way that a company operates and takes into account the organization’s internal processes. If any of these processes do not allow the auditor to perform the audit as well as he had planned, he may adapt to accommodate for the differences between his assumptions and the way the organization actually operates. For example, if an auditor comes in with the assumption that only a select few employees have access to the organization’s bookkeeping software, when in actuality many employees have access, he may need to reevaluate how he plans to perform the audit. The auditor holds an entrance conference with the organization being audited and will incorporate any recommendations made by the organization, if appropriate. Some of the processes that might be discussed include how an internal accountant approves purchases with petty cash, how an employee receives access to a company credit card and how mileage is reimbursed.
• Fieldwork
The auditor will begin to interview employees in different areas of the organization to understand its general practices and processes. The auditor often performs this work on site. The auditor begins to be able to determine, during this phase, if the organization’s operations and processes are working as effectively as they should. The auditor also clearly identifies the areas that are not in compliance, or that are less effective than they need to be. For example, he may notice that an organization is not keeping records or filing documents as federal or local law mandates.
• Audit Report
All of the work done during the first three phases culminates in the production and delivery of the audit report. In addition to identifying areas in need of improvement, the audit report also includes recommendations that list the processes the organization can follow to improve the way it operates. For example, an auditor may recommend that an organization add an extra layer of approvals before a supervisor is able to okay purchases. An exit conference is held between the auditor and upper-level management to discuss the results of the audit.
IRS Representation
Professional presentation can be vital during a audit, and our experience with tax authorities enables us to guide clients in their dealings with federal and state agencies. If you have been chosen for an audit, the professional representation you can find with our firm can put many of your worries at bay. We are ready and willing to answer any and all questions the IRS many be asking of you.
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Litigation Support and Forensic Accounting
Widerman & Associates, CPAs litigation support and forensic accounting services can be employed in a wide range of situations, including commercial litigation, financial investigations, business valuations, business and marital dissolutions, and bankruptcies. These services can involve quantification of economic loss or damages, analysis of financial records, and fraud and theft investigation. Financial and personal records are often vast and confusing to sort through. With our professional training in this matter, we can make sense of these records and transactions and get to your bottom line.
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M & A
Business transactions and transitions are complicated affairs, and whether you’re buying, selling, or considering a potential merger, Widerman & Associates, CPAs can provide professional know-how to help you successfully structure and negotiate the deal. Widerman & Associates, CPAs employs careful analysis and due diligence to determine a fair asking price, pinpoint the most favorable tax structures, evaluate financial and cash flow impact, and assess compatible business functions and tactics. Expanding or contracting your business is a huge undertaking. With our expert advice, you can make the right business decisions for your business for optimum success.
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Payroll Services
Widerman & Associates, CPAs payroll services can help you reduce the time spent on administration through developing and implementing a computerized payroll system that will facilitate processing, timely payment and preparation of tax returns.
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Tax (Domestic & International Taxation)
At Widerman & Associates, CPAs, we guide our clients through a full range of tax planning and preparation decisions with strategies that minimize your tax liabilities, maximize your cash flow and keep you on track to your financial goals. Our expertise, experience, analysis and thorough research allow us to optimize financial opportunities to be found in existing as well as recently altered tax laws. We are knowledgeable and up to date on the tax laws and can make sense of your receipts, bills and notices.
International Taxation : Whether you’re a corporation with overseas operations or a business or individual needing to work out taxation of U.S. residents working abroad or foreign citizens working in the U.S., , Widerman & Associates, CPAs can help you plot a course through cross-border taxation issues. These are many special rules and policies for businesses with a foreign presence. We can help you make sense of how you are affected by them.
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Tax Resolution
• Short Term Payment Option
If you cannot pay your tax in full at the time you file, you can apply for a short term extension of time to pay of up to 120 days. There is no fee for an extension to pay. However, late payment penalties and interest is charged until the full amount due is paid.
• Streamline Installment Agreement
This plan is available if a taxpayer owes up to $50,000. The taxpayer is not
required to issue a financial statement to the IRS, and the repayment period
for the debt can be up to six years. If $25,000 or less is owed, file Form 9465
Installment Agreement Request, and those who owe between $25,000 and
$50,000 should file Form 9465-FS. (Form 9465-FS is new and is part of the
IRS’s “fresh start” initiative.).
The proper form is attached to the front of the tax return or is submitted
separately if the return has already been filed. The IRS usually responds within 30 days
with an acceptance or rejection. The fee for the installment plan is currently $105
($52 submitted electronically).
The installment form asks for the taxpayer to make monthly payment as high as possible to avoid additional interest and penalties. However, we have created our original formula to calculate the monthly amount that the IIRS will frequently accept.
• Traditional Installment Agreement
Taxpayers with amounts due of more than $50,000 can apply for a traditional installment agreement that, like a streamlined agreement, allows the taxpayer to pay the bill in monthly increments; this is usually done by direct deposit or payroll deductions to ensure timely payments. However, the IRS requires the taxpayer to provide financial information so that it can determine the amount the taxpayer is able to pay. Individual taxpayers and sole proprietors must complete Form 433-A, Collection Information Statement for Wage Earners and Self-Employed Individuals, and, if the taxpayer owns a business with employees, Form 433-B, Collection Information Statement for Businesses.
• Offer in Compromise (OIC)
On May 21, 2012 the IRS announced another expansion of its “Fresh Start”
Initiative by offering more flexible terms to its OIC program.
The new provisions include:
Revising the calculation for the taxpayer’s future income.
• Allowing taxpayers to repay their student loans.
• Allowing taxpayers to expanding the allowable living expense allowance category and amount.
• Allowing taxpayers to deduct state and local delinquent taxes.
In general, an OIC is an agreement between a taxpayer and the IRS that settles the taxpayer’s tax liabilities for less than the full amount owed. An OIC is generally not accepted if the IRS believes the liability can be paid in full as a lump sum or a through a payment agreement. The IRS looks at the taxpayer’s income and assets to make a determination of the taxpayer’s reasonable collection potential.
Under the new policy, the IRS calculates a taxpayer’s reasonable collection potential. It will now look at only 1 year of future income for offers paid in 5 or fewer months, down from 4 years; and 2 years of future income for offers paid in 6 to 24 months, down from 5 years. All offers must be fully paid within 24 months of the date the offer is accepted. The revisions will result in a 75% reduction in the amount required to settle tax obligations in 5 or fewer months, and a 60% reduction in the amount required to be fully paid within 24 months.
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