Complaint Review: John A. Losurdo CP CPA - Inverness Illinois

He grossly overcharged me for my 2018 tax preparation. Charged me $2150.00 for my simple tax return my new CPA says was not worth more than $600.00 -$700.00, including book work (very few entries).  The minute you said that the CPA performed your bookkeeping, that's generally the fee you get.  With many CPA's, most of the fee you paid is actually for the bookkeeping.  Most CPA's despise doing the bookkeeping portion of the job because they hate bookkeeping.  If your new CPA is only going to charge you $600-$700 to perform the service, good luck becasue you generally get what you pay for...

She said, after she or whoever works on my taxes, John has to look over the entire return line by line and check everything and I have to pay him as he has a timer too. In other words, I was paying double, once for a person to work on the taxes and him to review.  LOL - that isn't double.  Hilarious.  OK, if there is someone else doing the actual inputting of information for both (a) the bookkeeping, and (b) the tax return, and then the CPA reviews it, then the review is not double time...  Hilarious X 2.  In order to keep the certification and be able to defend the tax positions before the IRS, then the CPA must review his employee's inputs to make sure they transfer over into the correct lines or schedules.  The review is also to make sure the tax positions are defendable before the IRS.

I asked to see their time records or time sheets in detail to prove this gross amount of time.  This gets funnier the more I read.  Yeah, you don't get to see your preparer's timesheets.  Those are not your right to see.  Even if you decide to pursue this in small claims, there will be timesheets provided and I'm pretty sure by that point, the timesheets will sync up with the billing.

Losurdo had my tax related items for over 4 months and waited until after April 15th to complete, then charged me to file an extension.  Yeah, that's pretty standard as well.  Most pretty competent tax preparers I know will file an extension for their bookkeeping clients.  Many CPA's simply get the client to fill out and sign a 4868 upfront.

There's very little that sounds fishy, as you put it, even the part with the bank.  He probably had to make payroll, and that's why he had to run to the bank.  Is he your employee?  No.  Is he your contractor?  YES.  Would a teller understand the difference?  Perhaps not.  

Of the entities you listed, the only entity I would consider filing a complaint with is the IDFPR since they happen to be the only entity that regulates tax preparers.  The others don't, and both the Feds and the IRS truly don't care....

Usually a CPA will tell you their fees upon initial consult. IF you knew of these fees than you agreed to them. IF you did not then you had every right to find another CPA. Fees depend on the length of time spent working on the return and yes they do charge for phone calls because it is part of the business.

I know this because my father is a CPA and always lets his clients know the fees before doing business. Most professionals do. 

 If this person has allegedly been over charging you for years, as you put it, why are you even using them? Did you know the hourly rate? Did they give you an estimate as to how many hours it would take? If this return was so simple, why didn't you do it yourself?

What was the fee schedule you agreed to? You certainly can and should complain to the appropriate entities however you can forget the BBB as being one of them! The BBB is NOT part of ANY government or law enforcement body. The BBB has ZERO POWER to do ANYTHING! Do you know that? The ONLY purpose of the BBB is to SELL their PHONY accreditations and PHONY ratings to ANY business which wants to buy into their deception.

The ONLY reason they refer to themselves as "the bureau" is to DECEIVE the public into thinking they have some sort of law enforcement power which they ABSOLUTELY DO NOT!!! If this firm has BOUGHT their PHONY RATING from the BBB, you have ZERO CHANCE at their sham of a "mediation" process. The FAKE MEDIATOR is paid by the BBB and will not under any circumstances decide against one of their paying customers of their scam.

If the firm is not a "member" of the BBB scam, the BBB will use your complaint as s sales lead to try to get them to buy into the BBB deception. Every legitimate business person knows exactly what I'm talking about. Good luck with your problem but don't place ANY importance on the BBB. They are NOT who you think they are!!!

Charge by the minute?  No CPA charges by the minute......

 Ask to see time sheets /records. . DENIED.

 No way to varify how many hours were needed.

 Explain the amount of time billed.   DENIED.

 Charge for phone calls. No PCA does that.

 Charge to explain bill. No CPA does that.

 Charge for failed attempts to download tax info. No CPA does that.

 Never agreed to their rates.

 Cost went up 100% from prior year.