Summary: I would not recommend Frank Ward to file your personal Tax Return due to poor communication, and response time. As a new client, my experience was unprofessional. While I believe Frank is very knowable in this field, his response time and follow-through to requests is unacceptable.
Timeline and Details:
- Feb 06: I had my first call with Frank to discuss the process of filing my personal taxes. Frank seemed very knowledgeable on the phone. We scheduled an in-person meeting to discuss more.
- Feb 13: Had in-person meeting. I was very impressed with Frank and I wanted to move forward with using his service for my personal filing. Frank told me that he, or his staff, will email me a share drive link. In this link, I would have to upload all related tax documents (W-2, income, housing, etc.)
- Feb 18: I sent Frank an email asking for the share drive link. It's possible that I needed to explicitly tell Frank that I'd like to move forward with his services, but this was not clear to me.
- Feb 21: I called Frank's office asking for the Share drive link. I was told that Frank was in a meeting with another client, but the share drive link would be sent that day.
- Feb 25: I sent Frank a 2nd email asking for the share drive link. There has been no response update from my previous call or email (Feb 18 + Feb 21). Frank replied to my 2nd email with the share drive link. I replied to Frank's share drive link email stating that I would upload all files / documents in the coming days, and I would would send another email to Frank confirming that all files have been uploaded.
- Feb 26: I sent Frank an email stating that all files have been uploaded to the provided share drive.
- Mar 19: I sent an email to Frank asking about the status of my tax return. It's been 21 days since I sent Frank an email confirming that all my Tax return files have been uploaded, and no response.
- Mar 24: No response to my previous email asking for an update on my filing status. I called the office, and was told that Frank didn't have my files. I stated that all my files were updated in the provided share drive. I was told Frank would take a look at my files.
- Mar 27: No response from Frank via email or call. I sent another email asking for an update on my filing status.
This is the timeline and details of my experience working with Frank. While I believe Frank is very knowledgeable person, his lack of response and follow-through is unacceptable. I do understand that this is a busy time for CPAs. As a new client, I would have preferred if Frank told me his bandwidth is too thin, and I should look elsewhere. I do believe if you work with Frank 100% in-person, that your experience would be better. Based on my experience, I wouldn't recommend Frank to file your personal tax returns. read more