Background: My husband and I have been using H&R Block as a tax service for the last 3-4 years to keep up with some rapid life changes (college, student loans, marriage, moving, etc). I am due to have a baby at the end of February, so I had called ahead of time to see if it was possible to start my tax return and put it on hold until I got the last piece of paperwork that hadn't come yet. H&R Block said it would be no problem.
First appointment:
***Husband and I arrived at 8:55am for 9am appointment. Our tax advisor walked in at 8:59am, disheveled looking, and was not ready to take us for several minutes.
***When seen, tax advisor proceeded to tell us how she had just woken up at 8:20am and essentially wasn't all there yet mentally.
***Tax advisor started off the appointment suggesting that our taxes were filed incorrectly last year as single vs joint. This was not true.
***Tax advisor took a personal phone call mid-appointment, that the office manager thought was an emergency for one of us - honest mistake. However, even when the mistake was realized, the tax advisor proceeded to finish the phone call in front of us.
***Tax advisor spent approximately 20 of the 60 minutes interrupting our appointment to talk about their health issues and family, rather than focusing on the task at hand.
***Tax advisor made several inappropriate comments regarding our salary.
***Tax advisor told us that the last piece of missing information could be dropped off at any time or with an appointment to quickly finish up and submit our tax return.
***Overheard that another client was offered a discount for having to wait, while we were offered no such deduction for our wait or unprofessionalism.
***Husband and I had called a day ahead of time to schedule a second appointment to submit last piece of paperwork.
Second appointment:
***Husband arrived at 8pm for 8pm appointment. Tax advisor appeared to be unaware that we were coming and unprepared.
***Tax advisor spent first few minutes of appointment cleaning desk and organizing papers.
***Tax advisor pulled out cell phone to read personal text messages aloud for several minutes.
***Tax advisor left appointment to assist a co-worker (and relative) with another client for 10 minutes.
***Co-worker (and relative) repeatedly came over to our tax advisor to complain about the job and the day's work amid our appointment.
***Co-worker in next cubicle was coughing very badly, and said aloud how they were in the worst of a cold and going to the doctor soon. Considering the close quarters of these appointments, the health of clients should have been considered before coming to work.
***Tax advisor made several more comments regarding how our salary compared to their own, and made sarcastic suggestions on donating money to them.
***Tax advisor made a sexual reference to moaning in bed when trying to get out of their chair.
***Appointment took over an hour for tax advisor to fill out one form that was supposed to be a quick adder. 20 minutes of the hour were spent trying to figure out how to resolve the H&R block program errors, while husband could tell exactly where the problem was and how to fix it. Husband ended up explaining how to fix the error.
The office manager was not working at the time of the second appointment to convey the issues immediately, it was closing time, and there was no privacy to discuss the issues with any level of discretion. Therefore, we proceeded to pay for the completed service and I called customer service immediately the next day to report the widespread unprofessionalism and to request a refund and a second review of our tax return for accuracy. I submitted the same list of experiences to both corporate and local office for review. Corporate customer service said that the office would determine resolution, while the office manager claimed that corporate prescribed his means of resolution, which illustrated to me that no party is willing to own the behavior of their employees. It also quickly became apparent that these issues were not taken seriously as the office manager soon implied that I was lying - based on the fact that my husband paid without complaint (reasons already explained) and that I referred to my husband as a plural "we" (not sure what difference there is in saying husband vs "we" when it is a joint filing).
Everyone will experience some degree of unprofessionalism in a range of fields that more often than not, can be quickly disregarded. However, this was relentless. While this behavior may be isolated to select individuals, I have received no sense of comfort in the response received from corporate either. Needless to say, we will not be returning to H&R Block and thought it in the best interest of the community to share with folks the quality of service that this local office provides. read more
