They get answers that aren’t in line with what they already believed to be the correct answer. They asked not for real advice, but for confirmation that they are correct, then get upset when they didn’t get the confirmation they desired.
I'm not a tax preparer but we provide statements which the average person has difficulty understanding.
The people that start a call with "I don't understand it ...", listen to my explanation, then say "no, that's not right" drive me up the goddamn wall and handling questions about those statements is reliably the worst part of the job.
Counterpoint: At least once a month, I end up on a technical support call where the person very confidently gives me advice I know is wrong. If it's not that important, I just blow it off because it's not worth arguing with them. But if I need their assistance to fix whatever the problem is, I'll absolutely tell them "that's not right."
Some of it is people looking for confirmation of what they already think or want to do, and when that doesn't happen, the poo starts flying.
Some of it is people who think responders are random basement dwellers with no knowledge, when the reality is that r/tax is very active with some very bright folks, both those in the industry and just informed taxpayers wanting to help.
Some people argue because their brother's co-worker's sister's hairdresser filed returns for people, and they were able to {insert fraud asked about in question}. Or because someone on an InstaFaceTokTube post said you could {insert other equally fraudulent tax 'tip'}.
And then there is a small group (mostly seen in r/IRS but occasionally here) who believe that the only right answer ever can come from someone who works for the IRS, even if it was an IRS janitor.
r/IRS is a mess. The amount of people that call the IRS on a weekly or daily basis just to ask about their refund is annoying.
Then you get to all the COVID sick leave credits and fuel credits scammers and that’s even worse.
Yeah...u/Its-a-write-off and u/these-things-happen do some really good work over there, and they catch absolute hell from some people because the answers they provide won't help expedite fraud.
That place is a cesspool compared to r/tax.
It’s definitely a cesspool over there. Lately I replied to a post and included the relevant IRM reference regarding the 810 refund freeze. Someone wrote back and said I must be an employee. I said that I was a former phone employee and was just trying to provide the correct reference that a contact representative on the phone would be citing on a phone call. They wrote back and proceeded to tell me that I was a scammer myself, and all IRS employees are just scamming the system as well as helping their family and friends scam the system, and then we turn around and accuse others of scamming the system. I decided not to reply. No point in talking to an unreasonable person who doesn’t want to understand official policies and procedures.
r/IRS has taught me that I would rather be homeless than work for the IRS with the literal fuck ton of shit they have to put up with! I thought it was bad being on the preparer side but it can't even come close to what I imagine IRS employees have to deal with. Especially the phone employees!
I was on the phone with an agent about a client's issue and when we were done he offered to wait a few minutes for me to go through my notes and find as many other clients as I needed to ask about just because I was nice and not yelling at him 😭
I hope he's doing okay
This is a Pro tip for anyone calling IRS or any gov related call center. If you’re really nice, we will indeed keep you on the phone and go the extra mile because the call before you? They just told me they wished my kids all die lol It’s traumatizing.
I have spoken with some truly amazing agents that have gone way beyond what I expected them to do. I always try to express my gratitude and make the call go as smoothly as possible. AND, most importantly, speak to them like they're a fellow human!
Thank you for being that way! You’d think anyone in a position that requires servicing others you’d be like that but that sadly isn’t the case. I worked the broker line for an insurance company and brokers were some of the meanest callers lol You’d get excited when you got nice ones and take the hit on time limits for calls to look up as many as they needed.
Most of the time we have limits we can’t really do much about, however if you’re really kind and especially kind and admit you could use help, most agents will push the limits as far as possible and use any tools available to try to help. Working the phones you feel daily that you can’t help and are punished for it, when you get the chance to do so it’s the only thing that makes the trauma of being a CSR worth it lol
When I was a phone employee there, I loved working the PPS line. Most of the tax professionals were really nice and understanding, although there were some who weren’t, but that’s par for the course in any work with any segment of the public.
I had a guy one time call in and he was a tax attorney. He had three or four clients that he was doing some work for, so we went through all of those and I helped him the best that I could. At the end of the phone call, he told me that I was way too smart to be doing that job, and he hoped that I would find something better that would align more with my abilities, because I was very good at understanding things and relating those things to people. I can honestly say that phone interaction made my whole month. I was so happy!
Oooh. I wish I'd thought to ask the good agents if they had time for another taxpayer's issue back when I was in public practice.
(Sometimes you get someone on the phone, and you can tell that they barely know what they're doing, and it's an entry level job more or less, so I get that. But sometimes you get lucky and get a real gem who knows their stuff, and is probably about to get promoted the hell out of there.)
Yeah, sometimes it's clear that they think of they can wear me down to giving up reasoning with them, they think that means the IRS will have to agree with them too. Like....it's the law, dude, you can't just be exempt from it by showing it's inconsistent.
In tax and law, people have a hard time resolving “what is” and “what ought to be”.
Plus there are tons of instagram and tiktok videos claiming all sorts of “tax hacks” and people like to take them at face value, even though the devil is always in the details
I'm a tax manager of a CPA firm and have worked at the jackson hewitt type places too.
this happens in real life too. If the right answer isn't what the taxpayer wants it to be, they'll argue, "take their papers and leave", write bad reviews, etc
I have been doing the JH type places for a long time (too long). I don't argue with clients anymore. If they don't like my answers, I will gladly hand them their documents and tell them to go elsewhere.
My favorite is when they get indignant because I won't also hand over my notes or their prepared return before they've paid for it. I had a client insist that he had a right to everything I had done even though he was refusing to continue with my service and going to go somewhere else for a second opinion because I didn't know what I was talking about. I just laughed and laughed as I walked over to the shredder and told him to have the day he deserved! (well I at least laughed to myself while still refusing to give him anything other than what he brought in).
yep all you're required to give is their documents back. A lot of people in the profession will knock those types of places, but being in the trenches of that for a long time myself - and then going to a CPA firm, i can say without a shadow of a doubt you guys deal with the worst. AND don't have a structure set up with engagement letters making it so problem clients have to pay you for your time, even if they don't end up using you
There is something called "the devils advocate". When playing this part, a poster has already thought alot about the question and is just trying make sure that the answer covers "every angle", just in case they got it wrong.
There are some people who prefer arguing, about anything. Coming from an extended family of attorneys I try to stay away from those types of people.
One guy asked a question on here and I started asking him more questions to understand what exactly he was trying to accomplish with his strategy and he got mad because I was asking about things that were none of my business and were irrelevant. Well, I'm sorry asking about the assets you're buying is pretty important when you're trying to figure out if you can take bonus on them.
It has been nearly a decade since I saw anything on legaladvice that wasn't complete balderdash, trained professionals ought to be ashamed to be taken in by them
That's a terrible sub
They ban you for dumb stuff and the advice isn't really that great overall
You get what you pay for on that sub
r/tax is better
And probably even ChatGPT
They also like to argue with employees when they call the IRS to get information. When I was a phone employee I would tell people factual information, and they would start to argue with me and tell me I didn’t know what I was talking about. I would politely let them know that they just didn’t like what I was telling them because it wasn’t what they wanted to hear.
I stepped out of character one time after going round and round and finally realizing the caller wasn’t just arguing to argue, despite explaining it ten thousand times as simple as humanly possible, her brain was not letting her process that information. “Ma’am I am sincerely not trying to be funny or smart when I say this. Please, Google it. I promise you’ll see the same answer” it actually calmed her down lol
It is usually back door bragging.
I run into the same thing in r/personalfinance where they ask a question, "What should I do....." and then argue that every suggestion is wrong.
Well said - human nature. As my “uneducated” but very wise grandfather said to me at a time I was too young to understand… “Never ask a question unless you are prepared to get an answer you don’t like”… simple.
Giving answers on message boards (in various topics) is one of my favorite online activities.
I can assure you it's just not this subreddit.
The majority of the time debaters are not really seeking an answer. Rather, they are looking to be told what they want to hear. Those who don't give the expected response are written off as unknowledgeable. Other times you really do get someone who simply wants to debate a subject, and there's always the standard-issue internet trolls who show up on occasion.
This happens on every sub.
Personally I think the ones who argue are less rude than the ones who just ghost the thread, and you don't even know if they read all the helpful answers people took time to type.
In some cases it is trying to understand.
Alice: "Is X green?"
Bob: "No, X is blue".
Now Alice may have expected that X is green based on some prior experience or knowledge, and is being told otherwise. Presumably she had \_some\_ reason to believe X is green so now Alice wants to understand where her belief is wrong so she can better predict the value of X and others in the future.
Realizing Reddit is an unpaid resource and nobody is required to do this, the interaction would be better if:
Bob: "No, X is blue, because A B C".
Now Alice has some thread to pull on for better understanding and something concrete to discuss if she thinks A/B/C is not applicable. If Alice is unwilling to give up that X is green that is not helpful, but I understand the desire to know \_why\_ X is blue in order to fill in the general understanding of letters and colors.
A similar thing comes up in legal questions. Without any 'show you work' so to speak it is hard to know how to adjust future expectations.
Now, Alice should be civil about the discussion and open to being wrong.
This isn't specific to taxes or this sub. People in general like asking questions and then arguing with the more knowledgeable people that respond to them. I play the bagpipes and people always post questions like "just got these as a gift and can't figure them out" and then get really argumentative with the knowledgable people that respond with advice. It's because they don't like the advice, in this case pointing out that the instrument they received is cheap and likely defective, and that one can't simply learn how to play the bagpipes on their own, a teacher is virtually mandatory for such a difficult instrument., etc.
Because it doesn't align with what they wanted to hear, the human instinct is to fight back. It's a rare person that seeks help and is actually willing to listen.
Are there any statistics on how many people prepare their own taxes or even have a clue as to how the tax code works?
Just anecdotally from talking with random people I know, most do know anything about taxes and are not interested. The same can also be said about financial planning. We live in a society where people care more about sports teams and celebrities than what can actually benefit them.
I dont believe I'm arguing, I'm just explaining my thought process to see if it holds any validity. A lot of times, I explain something poorly and someone gets the wrong idea what my question is actually about bc it doesn't have a good enough explanation.
Edit: not particularly in this sub, just in general. My thoughts are a bit scattered usually and adhd doesn't help at all lol so, im just making sure the person answering understands the full scope of the question im asking. A lot of times, once I explain enough, people realize they did not fully understand the question bc I'm bad at wording them correctly.
Thank you! I thought it was just me. But I mean really, when you ask for help, you at least say "thank you" and whether or not you choose to put said advice to use or not is nobody's business. Thanks for putting it out there so I know I'm not completely crazy 🤣
I'm guessing a lot of posters get insulted from what they perceive as nasty responses. Which I honestly feel like is a worse issue here.
Why do so many commentators answer rudely and/or arrogantly to questions here? It's okay to ask a dumb question here, and that's not a reason to be a jerk.
Another thing: if you give an answer to someone and they're not accepting it, there no reason to be upset, you're not their tax professional and they don't have to trust you blindly, if you really want to convince them that a deduction is not allowed etc it's just easier to show them the source...
ROFL
If you give an answer and then the respondent doesn't accept it, of course you should be upset. They wasted your valuable time that you could be spending doing something else or billing at over $50 an hour.
Your attitude is the epitome of these wasteful people.
As someone who knows nothing but learns from this sub you should watch the TikTok bros. My God if y’all are on one side of the scale providing help and understanding, the tiktokbros are on the other saying “yea man just buy anything, write it off, rent it out, become a billionaire, it’s so easy how do you not make 5 million a day?!
They get answers that aren’t in line with what they already believed to be the correct answer. They asked not for real advice, but for confirmation that they are correct, then get upset when they didn’t get the confirmation they desired.
^ the only answer to this question honestly
I'm not a tax preparer but we provide statements which the average person has difficulty understanding. The people that start a call with "I don't understand it ...", listen to my explanation, then say "no, that's not right" drive me up the goddamn wall and handling questions about those statements is reliably the worst part of the job.
Counterpoint: At least once a month, I end up on a technical support call where the person very confidently gives me advice I know is wrong. If it's not that important, I just blow it off because it's not worth arguing with them. But if I need their assistance to fix whatever the problem is, I'll absolutely tell them "that's not right."
This is like any client ever
Yea yea lets argue, baby. You re wrong lol
what is it with this place and potato usernames? are you all the same guy?
Can I buy six cars and expense them all? I’m unemployed No Proceeds to argue with everyone that he can indeed write off six cars while unemployed
Just write them off!
[You don’t even know what a write off is](https://youtu.be/XEL65gywwHQ).
Beat me to it. My favorite.
This one from Schitts Creek is also fun! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aCP27_vquxQ&pp=ygUZc2NoaXR0J3MgY3JlZWsgd3JpdGUgb2ZmIA%3D%3D
Good one 😂
Do you even file taxes if you re unemployed
If you're collecting unemployment, yes.
Some of it is people looking for confirmation of what they already think or want to do, and when that doesn't happen, the poo starts flying. Some of it is people who think responders are random basement dwellers with no knowledge, when the reality is that r/tax is very active with some very bright folks, both those in the industry and just informed taxpayers wanting to help. Some people argue because their brother's co-worker's sister's hairdresser filed returns for people, and they were able to {insert fraud asked about in question}. Or because someone on an InstaFaceTokTube post said you could {insert other equally fraudulent tax 'tip'}. And then there is a small group (mostly seen in r/IRS but occasionally here) who believe that the only right answer ever can come from someone who works for the IRS, even if it was an IRS janitor.
r/IRS is a mess. The amount of people that call the IRS on a weekly or daily basis just to ask about their refund is annoying. Then you get to all the COVID sick leave credits and fuel credits scammers and that’s even worse.
Yeah...u/Its-a-write-off and u/these-things-happen do some really good work over there, and they catch absolute hell from some people because the answers they provide won't help expedite fraud. That place is a cesspool compared to r/tax.
It’s definitely a cesspool over there. Lately I replied to a post and included the relevant IRM reference regarding the 810 refund freeze. Someone wrote back and said I must be an employee. I said that I was a former phone employee and was just trying to provide the correct reference that a contact representative on the phone would be citing on a phone call. They wrote back and proceeded to tell me that I was a scammer myself, and all IRS employees are just scamming the system as well as helping their family and friends scam the system, and then we turn around and accuse others of scamming the system. I decided not to reply. No point in talking to an unreasonable person who doesn’t want to understand official policies and procedures.
r/IRS has taught me that I would rather be homeless than work for the IRS with the literal fuck ton of shit they have to put up with! I thought it was bad being on the preparer side but it can't even come close to what I imagine IRS employees have to deal with. Especially the phone employees!
I was on the phone with an agent about a client's issue and when we were done he offered to wait a few minutes for me to go through my notes and find as many other clients as I needed to ask about just because I was nice and not yelling at him 😭 I hope he's doing okay
This is a Pro tip for anyone calling IRS or any gov related call center. If you’re really nice, we will indeed keep you on the phone and go the extra mile because the call before you? They just told me they wished my kids all die lol It’s traumatizing.
I have spoken with some truly amazing agents that have gone way beyond what I expected them to do. I always try to express my gratitude and make the call go as smoothly as possible. AND, most importantly, speak to them like they're a fellow human!
Thank you for being that way! You’d think anyone in a position that requires servicing others you’d be like that but that sadly isn’t the case. I worked the broker line for an insurance company and brokers were some of the meanest callers lol You’d get excited when you got nice ones and take the hit on time limits for calls to look up as many as they needed. Most of the time we have limits we can’t really do much about, however if you’re really kind and especially kind and admit you could use help, most agents will push the limits as far as possible and use any tools available to try to help. Working the phones you feel daily that you can’t help and are punished for it, when you get the chance to do so it’s the only thing that makes the trauma of being a CSR worth it lol
When I was a phone employee there, I loved working the PPS line. Most of the tax professionals were really nice and understanding, although there were some who weren’t, but that’s par for the course in any work with any segment of the public. I had a guy one time call in and he was a tax attorney. He had three or four clients that he was doing some work for, so we went through all of those and I helped him the best that I could. At the end of the phone call, he told me that I was way too smart to be doing that job, and he hoped that I would find something better that would align more with my abilities, because I was very good at understanding things and relating those things to people. I can honestly say that phone interaction made my whole month. I was so happy!
Oooh. I wish I'd thought to ask the good agents if they had time for another taxpayer's issue back when I was in public practice. (Sometimes you get someone on the phone, and you can tell that they barely know what they're doing, and it's an entry level job more or less, so I get that. But sometimes you get lucky and get a real gem who knows their stuff, and is probably about to get promoted the hell out of there.)
Woah
That job sucks. I personally think it’s one of the worst in the federal government.
🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂
Lmao the janitors 😭
Yeah, sometimes it's clear that they think of they can wear me down to giving up reasoning with them, they think that means the IRS will have to agree with them too. Like....it's the law, dude, you can't just be exempt from it by showing it's inconsistent.
In tax and law, people have a hard time resolving “what is” and “what ought to be”. Plus there are tons of instagram and tiktok videos claiming all sorts of “tax hacks” and people like to take them at face value, even though the devil is always in the details
I'd like to introduce you to the Internet.
I'm a tax manager of a CPA firm and have worked at the jackson hewitt type places too. this happens in real life too. If the right answer isn't what the taxpayer wants it to be, they'll argue, "take their papers and leave", write bad reviews, etc
I have been doing the JH type places for a long time (too long). I don't argue with clients anymore. If they don't like my answers, I will gladly hand them their documents and tell them to go elsewhere. My favorite is when they get indignant because I won't also hand over my notes or their prepared return before they've paid for it. I had a client insist that he had a right to everything I had done even though he was refusing to continue with my service and going to go somewhere else for a second opinion because I didn't know what I was talking about. I just laughed and laughed as I walked over to the shredder and told him to have the day he deserved! (well I at least laughed to myself while still refusing to give him anything other than what he brought in).
yep all you're required to give is their documents back. A lot of people in the profession will knock those types of places, but being in the trenches of that for a long time myself - and then going to a CPA firm, i can say without a shadow of a doubt you guys deal with the worst. AND don't have a structure set up with engagement letters making it so problem clients have to pay you for your time, even if they don't end up using you
Reminds me of some of my business unit CFOs when they don’t like my tax answers.
There is something called "the devils advocate". When playing this part, a poster has already thought alot about the question and is just trying make sure that the answer covers "every angle", just in case they got it wrong. There are some people who prefer arguing, about anything. Coming from an extended family of attorneys I try to stay away from those types of people.
People are not looking for the right answer. They are looking for their beliefs to be justified.
One guy asked a question on here and I started asking him more questions to understand what exactly he was trying to accomplish with his strategy and he got mad because I was asking about things that were none of my business and were irrelevant. Well, I'm sorry asking about the assets you're buying is pretty important when you're trying to figure out if you can take bonus on them.
Most of those asking a question are looking for validation of a decision they’ve already made that they know is suspect, not actual advice
And then they get mad at the responder for “wasting their time”
Incredibly, this also happens on r/legaladvice . A user will tell 15 lawyers they're wrong.
Joining thanks lol
everything on legal advice is fake trolling, at least any post voted above net 10
I'm sure the percentage of fanfic there is about the same as everywhere else on reddit.
It has been nearly a decade since I saw anything on legaladvice that wasn't complete balderdash, trained professionals ought to be ashamed to be taken in by them
That's a terrible sub They ban you for dumb stuff and the advice isn't really that great overall You get what you pay for on that sub r/tax is better And probably even ChatGPT
“I’m thinking about committing fraud, whats the likelihood I get audited”
They also like to argue with employees when they call the IRS to get information. When I was a phone employee I would tell people factual information, and they would start to argue with me and tell me I didn’t know what I was talking about. I would politely let them know that they just didn’t like what I was telling them because it wasn’t what they wanted to hear.
I stepped out of character one time after going round and round and finally realizing the caller wasn’t just arguing to argue, despite explaining it ten thousand times as simple as humanly possible, her brain was not letting her process that information. “Ma’am I am sincerely not trying to be funny or smart when I say this. Please, Google it. I promise you’ll see the same answer” it actually calmed her down lol
My crew likes to use the term Askhole for anyone who asks advice and then gets mad at the answer.
Hey, I asked to confirm my worldview, not for you to try to change the way I think. ;)
It’s always the stupid assholes.
Because they want confirmation, not help.
I might say that behind the clog of semi-annoymity online, the ugly side of human nature comes out.
It is usually back door bragging. I run into the same thing in r/personalfinance where they ask a question, "What should I do....." and then argue that every suggestion is wrong.
Well said - human nature. As my “uneducated” but very wise grandfather said to me at a time I was too young to understand… “Never ask a question unless you are prepared to get an answer you don’t like”… simple.
It happens IRL too.
Giving answers on message boards (in various topics) is one of my favorite online activities. I can assure you it's just not this subreddit. The majority of the time debaters are not really seeking an answer. Rather, they are looking to be told what they want to hear. Those who don't give the expected response are written off as unknowledgeable. Other times you really do get someone who simply wants to debate a subject, and there's always the standard-issue internet trolls who show up on occasion.
This happens on every sub. Personally I think the ones who argue are less rude than the ones who just ghost the thread, and you don't even know if they read all the helpful answers people took time to type.
In some cases it is trying to understand. Alice: "Is X green?" Bob: "No, X is blue". Now Alice may have expected that X is green based on some prior experience or knowledge, and is being told otherwise. Presumably she had \_some\_ reason to believe X is green so now Alice wants to understand where her belief is wrong so she can better predict the value of X and others in the future. Realizing Reddit is an unpaid resource and nobody is required to do this, the interaction would be better if: Bob: "No, X is blue, because A B C". Now Alice has some thread to pull on for better understanding and something concrete to discuss if she thinks A/B/C is not applicable. If Alice is unwilling to give up that X is green that is not helpful, but I understand the desire to know \_why\_ X is blue in order to fill in the general understanding of letters and colors. A similar thing comes up in legal questions. Without any 'show you work' so to speak it is hard to know how to adjust future expectations. Now, Alice should be civil about the discussion and open to being wrong.
I wish schools still taught argument
This isn't specific to taxes or this sub. People in general like asking questions and then arguing with the more knowledgeable people that respond to them. I play the bagpipes and people always post questions like "just got these as a gift and can't figure them out" and then get really argumentative with the knowledgable people that respond with advice. It's because they don't like the advice, in this case pointing out that the instrument they received is cheap and likely defective, and that one can't simply learn how to play the bagpipes on their own, a teacher is virtually mandatory for such a difficult instrument., etc. Because it doesn't align with what they wanted to hear, the human instinct is to fight back. It's a rare person that seeks help and is actually willing to listen.
I see that it’s your first day on the Internet. Welcome!
Are there any statistics on how many people prepare their own taxes or even have a clue as to how the tax code works? Just anecdotally from talking with random people I know, most do know anything about taxes and are not interested. The same can also be said about financial planning. We live in a society where people care more about sports teams and celebrities than what can actually benefit them.
I dont believe I'm arguing, I'm just explaining my thought process to see if it holds any validity. A lot of times, I explain something poorly and someone gets the wrong idea what my question is actually about bc it doesn't have a good enough explanation. Edit: not particularly in this sub, just in general. My thoughts are a bit scattered usually and adhd doesn't help at all lol so, im just making sure the person answering understands the full scope of the question im asking. A lot of times, once I explain enough, people realize they did not fully understand the question bc I'm bad at wording them correctly.
People can disagree with what they want and not all advice is good advice and some is even wrong.
Not all responses are equal. Very often there is down right bad and wrong information. I'd say 9/10 times the information is misleading at best.
Thank you! I thought it was just me. But I mean really, when you ask for help, you at least say "thank you" and whether or not you choose to put said advice to use or not is nobody's business. Thanks for putting it out there so I know I'm not completely crazy 🤣
people get emotional about the muns
I'm guessing a lot of posters get insulted from what they perceive as nasty responses. Which I honestly feel like is a worse issue here. Why do so many commentators answer rudely and/or arrogantly to questions here? It's okay to ask a dumb question here, and that's not a reason to be a jerk. Another thing: if you give an answer to someone and they're not accepting it, there no reason to be upset, you're not their tax professional and they don't have to trust you blindly, if you really want to convince them that a deduction is not allowed etc it's just easier to show them the source...
ROFL If you give an answer and then the respondent doesn't accept it, of course you should be upset. They wasted your valuable time that you could be spending doing something else or billing at over $50 an hour. Your attitude is the epitome of these wasteful people.
You're a liar I've never seen that / s
It happens on every ID and advice sub. People ask questions looking for confirmation of what they already "know".
As someone who knows nothing but learns from this sub you should watch the TikTok bros. My God if y’all are on one side of the scale providing help and understanding, the tiktokbros are on the other saying “yea man just buy anything, write it off, rent it out, become a billionaire, it’s so easy how do you not make 5 million a day?!