Consumer Tax Advocate
Author: Kaitlyn Short
Consumer Tax Advocate provides comprehensive accounting solutions to individuals and businesses throughout the state of California. The business is licensed within the state and provides professional and affordable services in a space where multiple laws and regulations exist.
In addition to providing proactive tax and accounting services, Consumer Tax Advocate can help resolve those issues and work as the middle man between the client and the IRS. Since tax laws are complicated, Consumer Tax Advocate will assist in filing, identifying deductions and credits, and providing experienced tax insights where applicable.
Consumer Tax Advocate specializes its business services by targeting specific industries. Currently the company services businesses in construction, dentistry, healthcare, hospitality, law, manufacturing, and real estate. Accounting, quickbooks, and tax preparation services are available for all businesses in the listed industries.
Top Ranked Companies
The Good
- Individual Services
- Business Services
- Tax Solutions
- Accounting Specialty
Individual Services
Many tax preparation companies target individuals or businesses, but rarely offer services for both. Consumer Tax Advocate believes in helping individual clients in need of this type of financial assistance as related laws are complicated and complex. Consumer Tax Advocate offers the following services for individuals:
- Personal financial planning
- Retirement planning
- Estate planning
- Elder care
- Wealth management
With these services, Consumer Tax Advocate helps protect personal assets of clients, particularly as they age.
Business Services
Consumer Tax Advocate truly shines in the business financial arena. In an effort to help businesses find success and avoid financial pitfalls, Consumer Tax Advocate offers the following solutions for businesses:
- Small business accounting
- Bookkeeping services
- Payroll
- Part-time CFO services
- Audits, reviews, compilations
- Forensic accounting
- Cash flow management
- Bank financing
- Business valuation
- Business advisory services
- Financial planning for businesses
- Succession planning
- New business formation
- Internal controls
- Litigation support
For a company that specializes in tax preparation and accounting services, Consumer Tax Advocate’s range of additional business financial services is impressive, especially considering the competition does not typically offer all of these services.
Tax Solutions
Taxes are complicated; there are so many laws and reductions in place that the average person or business professional is unaware of. To help in this area, Consumer Tax Advocate provides the following services:
- Individual tax preparation
- Tax preparation for businesses
- Tax planning
- Estate and trust tax services
- Cryptocurrency accounting services
- Tax relief
While most of these tax-related services are offered by tax prep companies, few offer tax relief solutions as comprehensive as Consumer Tax Advocate. Clients in need of tax relief will find that Consumer Tax Relief can help with IRS audit representation, non-filed tax returns, back taxes owed, payroll tax problems, IRS liens, IRS levies, IRS wage garnishments, IRS seizures, IRS payment plan, offer in compromise, bankruptcy, innocent spouse relief, and will obtain the client’s IRS file.
Accounting Specialty
The company employs CPAs to help businesses with a cost-effective method of managing their finances. Consumer Tax Advocate specifically works with QuickBooks, one of the more popular business accounting software platforms. The company provides QuickBooks setup, training, Q&A, tune-ups, and tips for small and mid-sized businesses.
The Bad
- Missing Accreditations
- Firm/Staff Size
Missing Accreditations
Within the tax preparation industry, there are a number of accreditations that companies and individual professionals alike can obtain. These accreditations go a long way in demonstrating knowledge and expertise within the tax preparation field. Accreditations in this field include the following:
- ASTPS
- NATP
- NAEA
- AICPA
- IRS CE Provider
- ABA
At this time, Consumer Tax Advocate simply claims to be “licensed” but does not have any of these accreditations. Its competitors certainly have these on their resume.
Firm/Staff Size
According to LinkedIn, Consumer Tax Advocate remains a small operation with a CPA on staff. There are not additional tax attorneys or enrolled agents for the company to turn to for expertise and workload management.
The number of clients and tax cases that Consumer Tax Advocate can take on is relatively small compared to the big competitors within the industry. Prospective clients should consider whether or not their particular situation requires other supporting contributors prior to hiring Consumer Tax Advocate.
The Bottom Line
Consumer Tax Advocate provides services to individual and corporate clients. For individuals, Consumer Tax Advocate offers a number of financial planning and management services to help protect personal assets. For business clients, Consumer Tax Advocate provides a wide range of accounting and advisory solutions.
The company offers tax preparation, planning, filing, and return services. Lastly, Consumer Tax Advocate is known for its accounting specialty assisting businesses with the QuickBooks platform.
While there are a number of reasons clients may want to consider Consumer Tax Advocate for tax preparation or other accounting services, there are limitations that prospective clients should be aware of prior to hiring the firm. Consumer Tax Advocate claims to be licensed but it is missing all industry-related accreditations. The firm itself also solely consists of CPAs and is relatively small compared to its competitors.
Clients in need of quality tax preparation services would likely benefit from what Consumer Tax Advocate provides.
