Author Archives: Neil

Pension brouhaha south of the border

FASB is coming out with some tough new standards relating to defined benefit pensions that is expected to result in significant new liabilities (or increases to existing ones) for companies that had been accounting for their pensions under the more lax requirements of the old standard. Defined benefit pension plans are definitely the more complicatedContinue reading “Pension brouhaha south of the border”

Now that’s a niche

There’s a particular blog that only discusses the idea that accounting firms, and indeed all professional services firms, should “trash the timesheet” and implement “value pricing.” The basic concept is sound: Timesheets treat the chargeable hour as the measure of the firm’s services’ value, which distorts its true value to the client and further commoditizesContinue reading “Now that’s a niche”

Attending inventory counts

Part of any audit is attendance at the client’s inventory count. If the company being audited has material inventory in multiple locations, you’ll have to observe each count. I’ve been busy lately with inventory counts. Yesterday I went to one and counted washing machines and dryers. This morning I was counting packages of cottage cheese,Continue reading “Attending inventory counts”

Incorporate or not: It’s the investment

A small business usually starts out as a sole proprietorship, owned and operated by the founder personally and reporting business income on their annual personal tax return. But as the business grows, the question of incorporation will always arise, and there are several factors to consider when this happens. The most important single factor, inContinue reading “Incorporate or not: It’s the investment”