VAST

VAST CFO group added two additional services, Tax Estimates for business and personal, without prior approval of those services. It was not an agreed upon service at our initial contract set up. We were not given notice it would incur an additional charge ($200 and $120 respectively.) VAST refuses to refund the first invoice or remove the second unpaid one.Product_Or_Service: Accounting and tax prepDesired SettlementRefund the first invoice already paid of $200 and remove the second unpaid invoice of $120. Business Response Contact Name and Title: [redacted], Pres.Contact Phone: 775-232-7671Contact Email: [redacted]At VAST, we take our clients' finances very seriously and we work closely with all of our clients to ensure that they have the information they need to make informed decisions and plan appropriately for taxes. We also take our clients' confidentiality very seriously. Therefore, I have provided what I can without divulging any confidential information of the client in a sincere effort to explain how we were authorized to perform this work and how we were also working in our client's best interest. We have never before received a Revdex.com complaint and so this came as a surprise to us. We began working with this husband and wife client in early 2015. Our engagement was to perform quarterly bookkeeping and tax preparation with them having the option to add other services at our standard hourly rates. When they came to us, they expressed that they had previously done their own taxes and felt they had become complex enough to warrant the help of a tax professional. Therefore, we reviewed the client's tax situation and found that they were facing extremely adverse tax consequences for the 2014 tax year. We quickly put in place a sound new corporate structure that allowed them to save a very material amount of taxes for 2014. At the same time, they had not been paying estimated taxes and so we helped them set up a payment plan for the balance that was still due for 2014 (which was a fraction of what it would have been had we not restructured the company). Because we didn't want them to end up in the same situation for 2015, we asked the husband of the husband and wife team if he would like us to prepare a tax estimate so that we could gauge where they were year to date. He said yes. This was in June 2015. We provided the work to the client. He reviewed it and our invoice was paid shortly thereafter. The client did not mention any issues with the work performed or the resulting invoice at that time. Toward the end of the year and as a result of the client's growth, we updated the tax estimate again in order to prepare for year end and ensure the client did not have any unwelcome tax surprises come tax time. We prepared the updated estimate, provided it to the client and at that point the client responded saying that they didn't find the financial information we were providing to be useful and did not authorize the additional tax estimate. I suggested to the client that they suspend the quarterly bookkeeping work if they weren't using the information. At the same time, because the wife was so upset about the small additional invoice, I wrote off the additional tax estimate invoice as a courtesy - even though the tax estimate was provided to the client and they benefited from that information. I do not feel that any additional resolution is needed on our end as I've already written off the most recent invoice that the client is requesting we write off. The other invoice that the client is requesting be refunded is over seven months old. I feel it was properly disclosed (the client acknowledged that our contract specifically discusses how tax estimates are billed in an email directly to me on January 11, 2016), properly authorized (the client's husband authorized the work) and is old enough that the client has benefited from the information it provided while not mentioning any issues with it in a reasonable amount of time. If we had not done the work, the client would be facing a very large tax bill that they would be completely unaware of. Which I'm sure would have caused this particular client to instead file a complaint that we hadn't done the estimate to protect her. Consumer Response (The consumer indicated he/she ACCEPTED the response from the business.)For clarification in June 2, 2015 an email was sent stating "We prepared an estimate for the 2015 based on the income numbers you provided" with the 2015 Tax Estimate attached. This is NOT a question. This is a statement. We were never ASKED if we wanted the service or that it was outside of the annual service agreement resulting in an unexpected bill. Same thing happened again at the end of the year. Never ASKED only a statement of work completed followed by a bill. This is the issue at hand. That a company thinks it is professional to preform work outside of the annual agreement without authorization from from the client FIRST is beyond me. My car mechanic doesn't perform work without authorization FIRST why would accountants be any different? I am not the only client who found these unexpected services and bills upsetting. Unfortunately VAST waits for the client to complain rather than be upfront with them. I acknowledge we did not complain fast enough with the first bill and I appreciate they are now waving the second bill. Hopefully they will reconsider their policies and be more upfront with their clients in the future.