What can I add that hasn't already been said about David Fisher's practice? My mom had been using…read moreDavid's firm's services for over 10 years for both trust and personal taxes. When my father passed away, my mom struggled to pick up the pieces. Between filing for her own health insurance, preparing paperwork for his pension, and figuring out things she'd never had to figure out before, she was beside herself. She was diagnosed with a neurological condition and subsequently had a stroke. She was struggling to live and went into skilled nursing for a month so was unreachable. I contacted David's office since there had been an extension in filing date granted due to COVID, but wanted to also make sure I could pick things up in the meantime. I noted that there was a note saying my mom had used an incorrect TIN for one of the pieces of paperwork, and according to my mom, she'd been in the process of rectifying that problem.
Finally, when she was out of skilled nursing and, thankfully, alive, in the process of engaging attorneys to establish DPOA and a trust (and figure out how to keep her home up, pay caregivers, and manage her health), I went to David's office to sign the submittals and pay for her taxes. I inquired as to why filing her personal taxes was double the cost of previous years and was told that the trouble of the incorrect TIN had "made a mess" of things and cost several hours. I'm an engineer, not a CPA, but I do know that correcting an error in a spreadsheet and communicating that to a client does not double the effort of the service. Additionally, my mom was on a fixed income, burdened with sudden insane caregiving costs, and was mourning her husband. Surely, a firm who had been preparing her taxes for over ten years would provide some reprieve and not charge her ~$1000 for her personal taxes consisting largely of a pension and social security - after all, as a family owned business, they have some discretion over what they charge clients. David emerged from his office as this discussion was happening with his wife, and subsequently asserted that if my mom was cognitively impaired and overwhelmed with grief that I should have taken over her finances earlier. My mother was a bookkeeper and fiercely independent. Additionally, I was grieving too. The absolute lack of compassion took me aback. They subsequently offered to reduce our bill if we agreed to not come back as a client, like many of the other reviewers here who have faced their rage when they challenge them. I accepted, and they offered to efile.
A few days later, I received a letter and email regarding the termination of services with their firm and that they had changed their minds regarding filing our taxes - this was less than a week before the filing deadline. They also stipulated that we were not to use their work for filing, leaving a grief-stricken overwhelmed family scrambling to find a CPA all because we were "very displeased" with their services and associated lack of discretion in billing. I've attached a letter I sent back to their office that has names of their personnel and my family redacted. Only after this letter did the firm reverse their decision and opt to file.
As an aside, I hired a CPA to independently review the submittals and several errors were identified; we had to file addendums/corrections after the submittal.
I strongly recommend going elsewhere. I've had very few encounters with such petulant professionals in my life.
