On April 27, 2011, the California Supreme Court declined to review the Court of Appeal’s decision in Nortel Networks, Inc. v. State Board of Equalization. This precedential decision may have far reaching implications on the taxation of pre-written software, or “canned software,” for sales and use tax purposes. Examples of canned software include Microsoft Office, Quic [...]

We are frequently asked a simple question, “what are my chances of being audited?” While there is never a precise answer to this question, the IRS annually releases information about the audits that have been conducted in the previous year which provides a measuring stick. This information is compiled in an IRS publication called the Data Boo [...]

On April 5, 2011, the U.S. Senate voted to repeal the controversial information reporting requirements that were enacted as part of the package of last year’s Health Care Reform and Small Business Tax Incentives. The bill was previously approved by the House on March 3, 2011 and is now headed to President Obama, who is expected to sign the bi [...]

What food executives look for in today’s CPAsThink back to the days when you might visit a CPA only to find him sitting in the corner of his office, wearing green eye shades, hovering over a stack of documents trying to make heads or tails of a client’s financial statements or tax returns.Well, those days are long gone and that vision has been replaced by a close work [...]

A new voluntary disclosure program, the 2011 Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Initiative was announced February 8th by the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) to encourage taxpayers with undisclosed offshore accounts/assets to disclose and report such information to the IRS. The program is open through August 31, 2011. All requirements must be met [...]

After much Congressional deliberation, The Tax Relief Act of 2010 (the “Act”) been passed by the House just before midnight on December 16, 2010 and is expected to be signed into law by the President imminently. This significant piece of tax legislation temporarily extends the Bush-era tax cuts, provides for significant estate tax relief, and [...]

On October 8, 2010, the California budget impasse finally ended when Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the California budget into law. In conjunction with the passage of the budget, a trailer bill, Senate Bill 858, was subsequently enacted into law on October 19, 2010. This bill contains several key tax provisions noted below: Net Operati [...]

The House passed H.R. 5297, the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 (the Act) on Sept. 23. The measure had been previously passed by the Senate and is expected to be signed into law on Sept. 27, 2010 by the President. The Act includes a number of important tax provisions, including: a liberalized and expanded expensing for 2010 and 2011, revived bonus depreciation for 201 [...]

In this issue, we address price sensitive consumers, obtaining capital in a tough economy, and implications of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).

Written by Ilan Haimoff, principal in our Internal Controls Consulting team, this publication offers a brief description of the management letter and ideas for how lenders and investors might use the management letter as part of their risk assessment.