Complete rip-off, and she rudely asked if I was "expecting" twice. I sincerely hope that at least…read morewas a miscommunication, even if everything else was blatantly bad business.
We went to an advertised "free" consultation. I asked a question, and was told it would cost $139 and turn into a tax consult if she answered. So, the free consultation didn't allow us to ask any questions, or else it would become a consultation and cost money...? Make it make sense. I said I understood, she didn't need to answer, yet at the end, after NOT answering my question about realtor commissions counting for cost basis when calculating capital gains, and telling us a tax document was incorrect and sending us on a wild goose chase (it said at the top DOES NOT CONTAIN STATE TAX INFORMATION yet she told us my husband's employer misreported his state tax info, which both other accountants I interviewed caught and explained immediately), she still surprised us with a $139 bill. We paid to avoid a scene as she had other clients, but do plan to reach out and ask for a refund, as we never agreed to pay after being advertised a "free" consult- that contained multitudes of bad information regardless!
We were going to be MASSIVELY overcharged had we gone with her, as she was over 10x the price of the lowest option and nearly 10x the price as the next most expensive option, that included audit insurance. We had moderately complicated taxes, due to capital gains on a house. We are not self employed, do not have any investments, own a business, or have any other complicating factor to justify the insane price we were quoted. It took her the full hour to sort through our documents and she still wasn't near done- other accountants ranged from 45 min- 1 hour for a complete consult. She was going to charge us approximately $5,000. Other accountants quoted us from $300-600. (We went with H+R Block due to their audit insurance for an estimated total of $600, which still very much on the high end for filing taxes.) And before anyone assumes miscommunication- she gave us a printed bill with estimated charges totaling $4896. That was not our estimated tax burden, that was HER fee to file our taxes.
During the free consults with the other accountants, they both answered all my questions (like one does during a free consult...) and both accountants pointed out factual errors in what we had been told. (See above, some 2024 W2s put state tax information on a separate page/document, and she was unaware of this change, for the most stressful example.) Anne Shade insisted we had to file extra paperwork and called it "difficult" when you sell and buy a house in the same tax year- even though most people who sell a house buy another to have a place to live- and both other accountants explained that in our case we only had to file paperwork on the first house, and any paperwork related to the newly acquired house would only matter when we go to sell. She also gave us information disputed by both other accountants and my own research about the medical exemption to capital gains tax, and the amount of up-front documentation needed to claim that exemption. She was going to file, and charge us for, a ton of unnecessary documents.
I do not know how this "free" consult went so horribly off the rails. But I am not the only review online with a claim of being overcharged to file unnecessary documents.
