2022 STANDARD ENGAGEMENT TERMS AND CONDITIONS
The following standard terms and conditions are applicable to our engagement to provide
professional services - as defined in our engagement letter.
We will not audit or otherwise verify the information you provide for purposes of preparing tax
returns. You are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of that information. Any necessary
adjustments we propose will be subject to your review and approval before you file the tax returns.
You are also responsible for the timely filing of all necessary returns and reports with governing
agencies and the timely payment of all taxes and similar fees or assessments.
You agree that in the event any tax returns cannot be completed by the due date, it may become
necessary to apply to extend the due date. Extensions are required when we do not receive
information needed to prepare a return on a timely basis. Applying for an extension of time to file
may extend the time available for a government agency to undertake an audit of your return or
may extend the statute of limitations. Additionally, extensions may affect your liability for penalties
and interest or compliance with deadlines. We are available to discuss this matter with you at your
request at our regular fee should the need arise.
You are responsible for determining your income and other tax filing/paying obligations for states
other than your state of residence. While we may assist you in meeting those obligations, we have
no responsibility for determining those filing and/or payment obligations unless you specifically
request that we do so.
Each U.S. person who has a financial interest in or signature or other authority over foreign financial
accounts must electronically file a Foreign Bank Account Report (FBAR) on Form 114 if the
aggregate value of the accounts exceeds $10,000 at any time during the calendar year. A foreign
financial account is a financial account located outside the U.S. An account maintained with a
branch of a U.S. bank that is physically located outside of the U.S. is a foreign financial account. A
financial account includes a securities, brokerage, savings, demand, checking, deposit, time
deposit or other account maintained with a financial institution. A financial account also includes a
commodity futures or options account, an insurance or annuity policy with a cash value, and shares
in a mutual fund or similar pooled fund. In addition, a debit card account is a financial account, and
a credit card account may be treated as a financial account under certain circumstances. The FBAR
is due by April 15 following the calendar year for which it applies. Thus, FBARs for the 2021
calendar year must be electronically filed on or before April 15, 2022.
A specified individual or entity must file Form 8938 (Statement of Specified Foreign Financial
Assets) if the individual or entity has an interest in one or more specified foreign financial assets
having an aggregate value exceeding $50,000 on the last day of the tax year or $75,000 at any
time during the tax year ($100,000 and $150,000, respectively, for married individuals filing a joint
annual return). For a specified individual living outside of the U.S., Form 8938 must be filed if the
aggregate value of thee specified foreign financial assets in which the taxpayer has an interest
exceeds $200,000 ($400,000 if a joint return is filed) on the last day of the tax year or $300,000
($600,000 if a joint return is filed) at any time during the tax year. An individual isn’t required to file
Form 8938 for any tax year for which he isn’t required to file an annual return.
We will be available to answer your inquiries on specific tax matters and to consult with you on
income, estate or other business or personal financial planning. In this process, we may analyze
proposed investments in terms of your financial position and goals as well as their tax aspects.
However, we will offer no recommendations as to the investment quality of any specific investment.
Although we are available to provide you with tax planning or other business and/or financial
advice, we are not obligated to do so unless you specifically request it. Our policy is to put all
advice in writing. Therefore, you should not rely on any unwritten advice because it may be
tentative and not yet fully researched and reviewed.
You may request that we perform additional services not contemplated by our engagement letter.
If this occurs, we will communicate with you regarding the scope of these additional services.
Engagements for additional services may necessitate that we issue a separate engagement letter
to reflect the obligations of both parties. In the absence of any other written communications from
us documenting such additional services, our services will be governed by the terms of our annual
engagement letter, including these standard terms and conditions.
Our engagement does not include responding to inquiries by any governmental agency or tax
authority. If your tax return is selected for examination or audit, you may request that we assist you
in responding to such inquiry. In that event, we will discuss providing assistance to you under the
terms of a separate engagement for that specific purpose.
Management decisions on tax or accounting issues or on other matters with a significant and
continuing effect on your company may be required during the engagement. Additionally,
information about your company will be needed by us to render our services. Your representative
for the purpose of conveying your company’s decisions or information to us is identified in our
engagement letter. You authorize us to rely on your representative for answers to all of our
inquiries, and you understand that your representative’s responses will be binding on you. If,
during the course of our services, you experience any service problems or wish to change or
expand the services we have agreed to perform, you agree to contact the firm representative
identified in our engagement letter, who is in charge of your engagement.
In order to preserve our independence in providing accounting services for you, it is necessary
that we not assume the responsibility for any management functions of your company. Such
management functions include, but are not limited to:
• Making management decisions,
• Designating a competent employee to oversee our services,
• Evaluating the adequacy and results of our services,
• Accepting responsibility for the results of our services, and
• Establishing and maintaining internal controls, including monitoring ongoing activities; and
cover activities we perform for you including, but not limited to:
• Determining and recording any adjusting journal entries, account codings, and/or
classifications prior to preparing financial statements,
• Preparing income and other types of tax returns, and
• Assisting with the design, implementation, or operation of your computer and/or other
accounting and information systems.
You and/or your company are solely responsible for all management functions. Our responsibility
is to perform the services identified in our engagement letter in accordance with our professional
standards. We will, of course, answer any questions or provide additional explanations that your
personnel request so that they may properly perform the management functions.
In the event that any client principal requests records you have submitted to us which are required
to complete our engagement or copies of financial statements, tax returns, or other documents we
have prepared, we are authorized to provide copies of the same in exchange for our standard
copying fees. We will be required to release records and/or documents only if all fees and costs
incurred for this engagement have been paid in full.
You are responsible for keeping copies of tax returns, financial statements and other reports and
documents - including supporting records and information. At the conclusion of this engagement,
we will return all original records you supplied to us. Your company records are the primary
records for your operations and comprise the backup and support for your financial reports and
tax returns. Our records and files are our property and are not a substitute for your own records.
Our firm destroys our client files and all pertinent work papers after an appropriate retention
period, after which time these items will no longer be available. Catastrophic events or physical
deterioration could also result in our firm’s records being unavailable. When records are returned
to you, it is your responsibility to retain and protect your records for possible future use, including
potential examination by government or regulatory agencies. You acknowledge and agree that
upon the expiration of the appropriate retention period, our firm shall be free to destroy our
records related to this engagement.
Our engagement cannot be relied upon to disclose errors, fraud, or illegal acts that may exist.
However, we will inform the appropriate level of management of any material errors, and of any
evidence or information that comes to our attention during the performance of our procedures
that fraud may have occurred. In addition, we will report to you any evidence or information that
comes to our attention during the performance of our procedures regarding illegal acts that may
have occurred, unless they are clearly inconsequential.
Any bookkeeping services will be performed based solely on information shown on the bank
statement(s) and certain other documents that you make available to us. We will not verify or audit
this information. We will not perform procedures designed to detect fraud or theft such as
inspecting cancelled checks, substitute checks, electronic transactions, or any legal equivalent of
checks if we reconcile your bank account(s). This engagement does not include reconciling of
accounting records that you may maintain, and we will not be responsible to reconcile your internal
data to match the records we maintain.
In connection with this engagement, we may communicate with you or others via email or facsimile
transmission. We take reasonable measures to secure your confidential information in our email
transmissions, including password protecting confidential documents. However, as email or
facsimile can be intercepted and read, disclosed, or otherwise used or communicated by an
unintended third party, or may not be delivered to each of the parties to whom it is directed and
only to such parties, we cannot guarantee or warrant that email or facsimile from us will be properly
delivered and read only by the addressee. Therefore, we specifically disclaim and waive any
liability or responsibility whatsoever for interception or unintentional disclosure or communication
of email or facsimile transmissions, or for the unauthorized use or failed delivery of email or
facsimile transmitted by us in connection with the performance of this engagement. In that regard,
you agree that we shall have no liability for any loss or damage to any person or entity resulting
from the use of email or facsimile transmissions, including any consequential, incidental, direct,
indirect, or special damages, such as loss of sales or anticipated profits, or disclosure or
communication of confidential or proprietary information.
In the unlikely event that circumstances occur which we in our sole discretion believe could create
a conflict with either the standards of our firm or the standards of our profession in continuing our
engagement, we may suspend our services until a satisfactory resolution can be achieved, or we
may resign from the engagement. We will notify you of such conflicts as soon as practicable, and
will discuss with you any possible means of resolving them prior to suspending our services.
In the event you fail to timely provide us with records that we request, or if the records you provide
are incomplete or unusable, we reserve the right to terminate the engagement without completing
our work. If we can assist you in preparing needed records, we will contact you to discuss the
problem, the additional work needed, our fees for such work, and the anticipated delay in
completing our engagement before rendering further services.
As tax return preparers, our firm is required to conform to certain standards when an undisclosed
tax position is being taken on your tax return. Accordingly, by using our firm for tax preparation
services, you acknowledge that you are aware of this requirement, and consent to our preparation
of your federal income tax return in accordance with the standards applicable to our firm as tax
preparers. If we conclude as a result of our research that you are required to disclose a transaction
on your tax return, you consent to attach a completed Form 8275 or 8275R to your tax return after
we discuss the situation with you. You agree to hold our firm harmless with respect to any and all
actual and consequential damages (including but not limited to taxes, penalties, interest, and
attorney’s fees and costs) that you incur as a result of including such disclosures with your filed tax
returns.
Internal Revenue Service regulations requires us to advise you that, unless otherwise specifically
noted, any federal tax advice in any communication (including any attachments, enclosures, or
other accompanying materials from us to you) is not intended or written to be used, and it cannot
be used, by any taxpayer for the purpose of avoiding penalties; furthermore, such communication
is not intended or written to support the promotion or marketing of any of the transactions or
matters it addresses.
Federal law has extended the attorney-client privilege to some, but not all, communications
between a client and the client’s CPA. The privilege applies only to non-criminal tax matters that
are before the IRS or brought by or against the U.S. government in a federal court. The
communications must be made in connection with tax advice. Communications solely concerning
the preparation of a tax return will not be privileged.
In addition, the confidentiality privilege can be inadvertently waived if the contents of any
privileged communication are discussed with a third party, such as a lending institution, a friend,
or a business associate. We recommend that you contact us before releasing any privileged
information to a third party. As a corporation, you need to be especially careful about privileged
communications. If a communication is made in the presence of a corporate employee who is not
authorized to act or speak for the corporation in relation to the communication’s subject matter,
then the communication will be deemed to be made in the presence of a third party and any
privilege will be waived.
If we are asked to disclose any privileged communication, unless we are required to disclose the
communication by law, we will not provide such disclosure until you have had an opportunity to
argue that the communication is privileged. You agree to pay any and all reasonable expenses
that we incur, including legal fees, that are a result of attempts to protect any communication as
privileged.
In the event that we receive a subpoena or summons requesting that we produce documents from
our engagement or testify about the engagement, we will notify you prior to responding to it if we
are legally permitted to do so. You may, within the time permitted for our firm to respond to any
request, initiate such legal action as you deem appropriate to protect information from discovery.
If you take no action within the time permitted for us to respond or if your action does not result in
a judicial order protecting us from supplying requested information, we may construe your
inaction or failure as consent to comply with the request.
Both parties to our engagement agree that any dispute that may arise regarding the meaning,
performance, or enforcement of this engagement will, prior to resorting to litigation, be submitted
to mediation upon the written request of either party to the engagement. All mediations initiated
as a result of this engagement shall be administered by the American Arbitration Association
(AAA). The results of this mediation shall be binding only upon agreement of each party to be
bound. Costs of any mediation proceeding shall be shared equally by both parties.
Fees for our services will be billed to you upon completion of the engagement or per the terms of
the engagement letter. In the event of extended engagements (those taking more than one month
to complete), we will invoice you as work progresses. The total fees and costs for your accounting
services may exceed any estimates given to you. It is not possible to know in advance what the
total fees and costs will be, because much of the work to be performed may be contingent on the
activities of others and circumstances over which we have no control. From time to time, you may
ask us to estimate what a specific portion, or the entirety, of the services will cost. To aid you in
planning, we will attempt to assist you by providing estimates. You understand that all such
estimates are approximations based on our experience as accountants, and they are not and
should not be taken as promises or guarantees.
All invoices are payable on presentation. Your engagement letter may require that all invoices be
paid through an ACH Debit, and in that case we will require your signed ACH Debit authorization
to be on file. Any billings remaining unpaid 15 days after the original invoice date are considered
delinquent and subject to a 2% per month (24% per year) service charge. We reserve the right to
suspend or terminate our work due to nonpayment. You acknowledge and agree that we are not
required to continue work in the event of your failure to pay on a timely basis for services rendered
as required by this engagement letter. You further acknowledge and agree that in the event that
our work is suspended or terminated as a result of your failure to pay on a timely basis for services
rendered as required by this engagement letter, we shall not be liable for any damages that occur
as a result of our ceasing to render services. You further acknowledge and agree that we will not
be responsible for your failure to meet government and other filing deadlines, or for penalties or
interest that may be assessed against you resulting from your failure to meet said deadlines.
If the company is provided a portal for document and file transfer and delivery, we reserve the
right to discontinue access to the portal after termination of services, or if our account is more than
15 days past due on unpaid invoices.
In the interest of facilitating our services to your company, we may send data over the internet,
store electronic data via computer software applications hosted remotely on the Internet, or allow
access to data through third-party vendors' secured portals or clouds. Electronic data that is
confidential to your company may be transmitted or stored using these methods. We may use
third-party service providers to store or transmit this data, such as providers of tax return
preparation software. In using these data communication and storage methods, our firm employs
measures designed to maintain data security. We use reasonable efforts to keep such
communications and data access secure in accordance with our obligations under applicable laws
and professional standards. We also require all of our third-party vendors to do the same. You
recognize and accept that we have no control over the unauthorized interception or breach of any
communications or data once it has been sent or has been subject to unauthorized access,
notwithstanding all reasonable security measures employed by us or our third-party vendors. You
consent to our use of these electronic devices and applications and submission of confidential
client information to third-party services providers during this engagement
In accordance with our professional responsibilities and confidentiality laws, we will not provide
copies of any financial statements, tax returns, or similar information to any third parties including
banks, attorneys, etc. At your request, we will provide additional copies of such information to you
so that you can give it to such third parties.
Either party may modify or cancel our agreement at any time by providing advance written
notification to the other party. In such an event we will be entitled to be paid for all time expended
and services rendered prior to the date of cancellation.
The unenforceability of any provision of this Engagement Letter shall not affect the enforceability
of any other provision hereof, and this Engagement Letter shall be considered in all respects as if
such invalid or unenforceable provisions were omitted
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Updated: January 5, 2022
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