Is filing your IRS income tax returns getting too cumbersome for you? You could always leverage the services of a tax professional to make the process easy and more accurate. Though it will cost you, it could be an investment to minimize your penalties and optimize your chances of getting a tax refund.
Top 5 reasons to hire a tax professional
There are several benefits of hiring an IRS tax preparer to file your income tax. We list a few for you here:
Ease complicated tax procedures: Understanding complex and ever-changing tax laws can be an uphill task even if you have basic tax knowledge. A professional can help you navigate the technical aspects and help you save time in tax filing.
Prepare ahead for your tax filing: If you hire a tax preparer, you can build a relationship with them long-term so that you can ask any tax-related questions at any time. In addition, you can get support from the tax expert to complicated tax queries so that you can prepare for your taxes ahead.
Leverage additional services: Typically, most tax expert services don’t just offer tax filing services. Their services would also include record-keeping, accounting, auditing, and tax consultation. Thus, if you need any such services, you could get one professional for all your tax-related requirements.
Harness the accounting expertise: Most accountants who are also tax professionals are generalists can offer you assistance in your expense management, measuring your profitability, budget control, and forecasting/speculating future trends. The tax professional can also help with your tax compliance and regulation, resulting in reducing the taxes you pay or maximizing the refunds you get.
Get consultation for tax-related problems: Especially if you own a business, you can also consult your tax professional to audit your financial statements, reports, and other accounts-related documents to ensure they adhere to the government regulation and your tax assessment is accurate.
How much does it cost you to hire a tax expert?
What is the cost of hiring a professional accountant? Well, it depends! The fees will primarily vary based on your tax form requirements and any other unique needs you might have. That said, to hire a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) for tax preparation and Form 1040 submission and filing state returns with no itemized deductions would be $176.
If you want to file state tax returns and itemized Form 1040, the average cost would be $273. However, these costs are for employed taxpayers. In the case of self-employed taxpayers, they need to hire a CPA at higher prices as they would require to prepare a state tax returns form and an itemized FORM 1040 with a Schedule C. The average cost of such services will be up to $457.
However, it is essential to remember that these are only average costs and the fees would differ based on your specific filing requirements. The tax professional’s prices will specifically vary if you need to prepare tax filing under exceptional cases. Under such circumstances, the tax accounts might charge higher consultation fees as they might need to work overtime to prepare your taxes.