Top Reasons to Recruit & Train Your Own Tax Preparers

At the start of tax season each year, there seems to be a scramble to find solid tax preparers. Where are they? Why is it so hard to find them? Many times you hire someone who thinks they know taxes because they’ve prepared returns for their friends and family — but they really don’t have enough knowledge to prepare tax returns for most taxpayers. Or, you end up hiring someone who actually has tax experience but you find out mid-season that there’s a reason they’re no longer working at the tax business down the road from you, and now you’ve inherited someone else’s problem. So what is the solution?

Train Your Own Tax Preparers In-house! It’s a Best Practice. Check Out Some of the Benefits…

Observe Candidates Before Hiring Them

When you train in-house, you develop a rapport with prospective employees and get a preview of who you might hire! You can see what type of personality they have, find out who has the best work ethic, who consistently shows up to class, and who really understands tax preparation. This makes it easy when it comes time to hiring. You’ll know who you want to hire…and who you don’t.

Teach Interview Techniques through Role-Playing

Every tax preparer should know how to complete a thorough client interview. It takes time to get comfortable doing interviews, and it definitely requires practice to ensure you cover everything and are really listening to what a client is and isn’t saying. When you teach in-house, you can include role-playing and cover all different kinds of scenarios that might pop up while working for your tax business. This will also help your students internalize the tax skills they are learning, and enables any new employees you hire to hit the ground running.

Hire for People Skills and Train for Tax Preparation

The most important thing you can do is hire employees who have great people skills. Your clients want a relationship with their tax preparer. They want and need to be able to confide in them, and they need to feel comfortable doing so. If you meet prospects who have excellent client service skills but don’t know taxes, you can teach them! Don’t let a lack of tax knowledge stop you. It’s important to find people who will draw clients in. Tax preparation can be learned but people skills do not come easy to everyone.

You Learn as Much or More Than Your Students Do

When you are the teacher, you are not only refreshing your tax knowledge, you are also learning new things from your students. You can gain new perspectives on things, or even a new way to handle something within your business.