Accountant made a mistake?

Hi all,

Hope you can help. I just did my taxes and I think my accountant made a mistake. I have 3 investment loan against 3 properties... Well I also have a 4th loan which was setup using equity from my PPOR. This 4th loan is for deposits and bills and it's linked to another account where I place excess funds to offset this 4th account... Should my accountant have included this in my tax return?

 

Have you mentioned this to your accountant?

 

I did briefly as he was rushing to get ours done... He was flat out that morning... If I'm right and this should have been included, what options do I have? Is it too late for this financial year and can I claim it and back date it for next financial year?

 

What is clear to you will not be as clear to them. Discuss it with the accountant and they can easily amend to fix it. Its easy to fix. You will need to sign the amended return authority.

If it was me I would document the account numbers and loan amounts so that next year I'm checking for the interest for the four loans and allocating correctly to the respective IPs. When you have loads of clients and most have multiple properties you need such processes to review for whats changed and to identify possible errors or misunderstandings.

There is a two-four year amendment period so plenty of time. No you don't include in next year.

 

Thanks Paul...Good to know. I'll be contacting my accountant

 

Striple - Was it me ?

 

LOL no not you...

 

I dont make mistakes. I thought I did once but I was wrong.

 

Haha based on all your replies I've seen in the past, I think you would rarely make any mistakes

 

They should only have included it if you gave them the summary and specified which property the interest related to.

If you didn't then it is not their mistake but yours.

 

My concern in reading through this is your accountant "rushing" through your return because he was "busy",correct me if I am wrong but I would have thought you would have had a block of time booked in to complete your return and for your accountant to work through your situation to get your maximum refund.!!

 

Get what you pay for.. Sounds like your accountant is more a tax agent than accountant..

 

He over booked I think... He had 3 other parties waiting to see him while doing our return... yes I believe it's my mistake and will contact him on Monday to get it addressed.

 

A good property tax agent will always look at the information the client provides with a view to identifying errors / misunderstandings. Things I see:
- Incomplete info eg insurance missing
- Summary shows 50% of income and costs rather than total to be shared.
- Doesn't add up
- Duplication or missing info
- Capital costs on a QS report v's not on a QS report
- Capital costs under repairs
- Borrowing cost mistakes (5 yrs, 100% deductible, residual claims)
- Some QS reports show the respective owner interests - Double it !!
- New acquisitions : No settlement costs OR they are incorrectly included. eg arrears of council rates are not paid by owner but a settlement adjustment.

Tax advice and tax work is a bit like contracts. You both have to work it out so you both agree. I explain some things to them and they explain what they have meant to me. I can easily misunderstand them and they often misunderstand me. I'm comfortable with client queries and discussion as it can even find things that are missing. If I don't encourage them they wont know.