Services Offered

Services Offered

SERVICES OFFERED

Tax Services

The term "tax services" is understood by many people to mean the preparation of federal, state, and local income-tax returns. However, tax services include much more than tax-return preparation. Among the other tax-related services available: individual and corporate tax planning, representation during examinations of returns by the IRS and other taxing authorities, estate and retirement planning, design of tax-qualified employee benefit plans, assistance in securing tax-exempt status for qualifying organizations and tax compliance advice.

These days, it seems that tax laws are constantly changing. Keeping up with the voluminous changes in the tax law is nearly impossible for the non-expert. And advising strategies that can best take advantage of these tax law changes requires the expertise only a tax professional possesses. As a result, the complex process of planning and computing taxes, whether on an individual or corporate basis, calls for the sophisticated assistance, technical knowledge, and experience of a tax professional.

L&A has the knowledge and experience to meet your tax needs. As tax professionals, we are fully versed in the recent changes in the tax law and are prepared to put our expertise to work for you. We offer professional tax-return preparation, as well as tax planning, tax compliance advice, representation before the IRS, and other tax services described earlier. We can help you review your current tax situation and help you find ways to minimize your tax burden. We can provide you with up-to-date information on the latest tax developments affecting you (or your business). And we can advise you with respect to all of your tax-related decisions concerning your own finances or those of your business.

Management and Owner Consulting Services

Management consulting involves helping a business' management team set the direction, shape the policies, and guide the operations of the organization. Management consultants look at a business and how it is run and assist management in devising ways to more effectively manage the organization.

Your business is a complex array of related functions and resources. Each area of your business affects the others. Unless you have a firm grip on how these different areas interrelate with one another, and how each area affects your business as a whole, your ability to manage effectively can be adversely impacted.

Moreover, as your business grows, management must grow too with respect to its capabilities. Often, the services of a consultant can help an organization's managers adapt to the new managerial environment that growth creates.

Through our management consulting services, we can help you design and implement those procedures and systems necessary to operate your business more effectively. We have experience advising businesses of many sizes and types, and our management consulting services can meet the needs of nearly every organization.

Our management consultants can undertake an overall review of your business' operation and make appropriate recommendations, or you can help us target those specific areas of your operation that you feel need review. Whatever your needs, we have the know-how to help you to run your business more effectively.

Management consulting services include:

Business valuations
Litigation support
Business financial planning and control
Operations planning and control
Strategic management consulting
Financial forecasts and projections
Development of business plans
Divorce planning
Financial assistance, loan applications and debt restructuring
Business acquisition/sale
Troubled business evaluation
Microcomputer hardware and software evaluation
Computer systems control evaluation
Personnel training and assistance
Employee benefit programs
Retirement planning.

Audit and Related Services

Audit and related services involve setting up financial systems and controls for a business or other organization and regularly reviewing those systems and controls to see that they are meeting the business' or organization's needs.

Every business and organization is unique. And an organization's financial systems must take into account that uniqueness. Audit and related services are required that can match the special needs of each individual organization, be it large or small. No two organizations are enough alike to use the identical accounting systems and audit plan. Audit services can also fulfill other business purposes as well. Audits focus on areas key to your entire operation and can point out problems that can hinder the entity from achieving its goals. Moreover, the auditor can recommend solutions to those problems. In addition, the auditor can enhance the internal accounting controls and, thus, increase the efficiency of your organization and provide peace of mind.

We begin by talking with you and your management personnel in order to obtain an understanding of your organization from your perspective. We want to know how you differ from others in your industry, why you are successful, and any obstacles you see to future success. Then, we plan and execute an audit. Thereafter, we give you detailed advice, and not only do we identify problems, but we suggest solutions you can implement.

And our audit and related services do not end there. L&A maintains contact with you throughout the year and meet with you as needed to advise you on the issues affecting your business/organization.

We are highly qualified to provide these auditing services your business or organization needs. We possess the experience obtained from helping a wide variety of businesses and other organizations meet their accounting and auditing requirements.

As part of our audit and related services, we can also:

Help develop a business plan
Compile and review financial statements
Review internal accounting and operational controls
Undertake feasibility studies
Project cash flows
Project proforma transactions
Prepare statements related to compliance with agreements or standards
Perform agreed-upon procedures.

Compilation and Review Services

A compilation involves using the financial records of a business to prepare financial statements that fit within a generally accepted format. A review goes one step further, in that key financial data are carefully analyzed, with the reviewed results being used to prepare the financial statements.

Many businesses in their early stages do not require audited financial statements. While a business frequently may need financial results presented in a proper format (to creditors and owners, for example), often there is no need for financial statements that have been subjected to a full scope of auditing tests. A compilation can often serve the needs of the business in an economical manner. Further, we can prepare your statements on our in-house system (which is designed for accounting firms and is integrated with our payroll and income tax software) efficiently and quickly on a monthly, quarterly or annual basis. We have professional staff who have many years of experience with all kinds of industries to compile these statements.

As accounting professionals, we are thoroughly familiar with the rules regarding the presentation of financial results. We ensure that statements are presented consistently from period to period and that the disclosures made (if needed) are meaningful.

Beyond our knowledge as to how statements should be prepared, we add our experience as business advisors. If your financial statements fail to provide the type of information necessary to adequately determine and evaluate your business' results, we can suggest improvements. If our analysis reveals actual or potential problems in the business' financial position, we can point them out and recommend solutions.

Payroll Processing and Tax Filings

Payroll processing includes the accurate and timely delivery of paychecks, the depositing of, and the filing of information regarding, withheld federal and state or local income taxes, social security taxes, and unemployment taxes with the appropriate government authorities. The timing of tax deposits and filings depends on the amount of taxes withheld during a given period, among other criteria. If timely deposits and filings are not made, significant penalties may be imposed.

For the smaller business, payroll processing can be a time-consuming task, a task that becomes all the more complicated as a business grows. Often, what starts out as an inconvenience becomes a major project of its own. Payroll records must constantly be updated and maintained efficiently. Valuable employee time, in some cases, management time, is spent pouring over payroll records to rectify discrepancies or find and correct errors.

For the larger business, many employees may spend more time than can be justified to perform the many steps that may be necessary to prepare payroll and compile payroll tax filing information, time that may be spent in other pursuits that may be more important to the business' operation.

We offer a payroll processing and tax filing service that can be a cost-effective alternative for both the large and small business. With this service, we examine your business' current payroll situation with you and, then, we help you set up a payroll system that makes payroll preparation and tax filing a simpler task for the business.

Employee Benefit Planning

"Employee benefits" is a broad phrase. It includes such legally mandated benefits as FICA and unemployment insurance. And it includes medical programs, life insurance plans, and disability coverage. Retirement plans, stock grant and option plans, both tax-qualified and nonqualified, are also employee benefits we can consult with you about.

Employee benefit planning seeks to minimize your cost for employee fringes while ensuring that your objectives in providing such benefits are accomplished. Employee benefit planning looks at the "big picture", as it exists now and as it may appear in the future.

Employee benefits constitute a significant portion of every business' overhead. And the cost of many benefits (medical coverage is but one example) has soared in recent years. Containing these costs is important to your profitability.

Yet, many employee benefits are perceived as an employee's "right". Recruiting and retaining qualified personnel would certainly be difficult without a competitive and reasonably comprehensive benefits package.

Our familiarity with various types of businesses and with employee benefits in general makes us uniquely qualified to assist you in your employee benefit planning.

Moreover, taxes are an important consideration with many employee benefit plans. Many significant changes have been made recently in the tax law affecting employee benefits. Our knowledge and experience in the tax area are added reasons for securing our assistance in your benefits planning.