As we mentioned in the prelims, today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and we’re assuming that nearly all of you are serving clients today as opposed to enjoying a day off observing the holiday as you see fit.
While it may cause some bellyaching among the newbies, the more seasoned of you have come to accept the fact that because it’s busy season, you are expected to work today.
So let this function as the sounding board for your frustration or acceptance of working today while many are not. Since we’re feeling nostalgic, we’ll hang in there with you today (as long as possible anyway).
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New Accounting Firm Name Challenge
We read about an accounting firm M&A specialist who is predicting what he calls a “mega-merger” between two of the top 25 firms. Since this guy is probably getting greased on the deal we’ll take him at his word but unfortunately he’s not naming names.
So for the pure sport of speculation, we need your best and worst guesses of what firms will be getting together and what the new combined firm will be called.
We’ve taken the liberty of listing the top 25 firms for you:
The list, after the jump
• Deloitte
• PricewaterhouseCoopers
• KPMG
• Ernst & Young
• BDO Seidman
• Grant Thornton
• RSM McGladrey/McGladrey & Pullen (divorce nothwithstanding)
• CBIZ/Mayer Hoffman McCann
• Crowe Horwath
• BKD
• Moss Adams
• Plante & Moran
• Clifton Gunderson
• J.H. Cohn
• UHY Advisors
• Reznick Group
• Virchow, Krause and Co.
• Dixon Hughes
• LarsonAllen
• Marcum & Kliegman
• Rothstein Kass and Co.
• Weiser
• Eisner
• Eide Bailly
• Wipfli
Try to use your number crunching brains for some creative combinations. Call your friends in marketing if necessary. If we get enough good suggestions, we’ll put together a poll to vote on the best.
We’ll get it started: Hughes Dixon Moss
Think about it. Work with us people. Just charge your time to an administration code, it’ll be fine.
Footnotes: New Digs For EY; LOL French People; Ugh Deadbeat Clients | 11.20.13
After SEC Prod, Microsoft Adds Details on Foreign Taxes and Surface [WSJ Digits] Legendary accountant […]
Nightmare Client of the Day: Lady Gaga
As you are all aware, there are some hella-suck clients out there for accountants. Demanding clients, unorganized clients, asshole clients, etc.
Then there are the clients that just don’t give a damn about how much money they may be throwing around.
Today’s example is none other than Lady Gaga and the nightly extravaganzas she puts on.
For some reason LG strikes as the sort of client that would show up with all her receipts in shoeboxes but in her case, there would be hundreds of shoeboxes and they’d all be fabulous.
The ‘Bad Romance’ singer – who describes her stage show as “ostentatious and over-the-top” – is making a heavy loss every night she performs on the North American leg of her ‘Monster Ball Tour , which has so far overspent by £2m (€2.2m) even though every concert is sold out.
The massive costs have been run up by her elaborate stage design, costumes and props, including the giant bath she used while making a promotional appearance on UK TV talent show ‘The X Factor’.
A source said: “The concerts are losing money hand over fist because they’ve spent a fortune on pricey costumes, technical equipment and elaborate set designs. She spent £500,000 (€550,000) on one stage alone.
“But Lady Gaga gets what Lady Gaga wants. Her wardrobe is huge and she wants to shock – and that costs serious money.”
There are many — including our friends at Fashionista — that say the woman is an “utter genius” and that genius simply cannot be denied.
Fair enough but accountants, being the practical creatures that they are, would not stand for such irresponsible behavior. From the sounds of it however LG’s accountant seems to accept the notion that the woman is an artist, bottom line be damned.
If you’ve got ideas on how to keep her spending under control, we’re all ears but personally, if she walked up to us (sans pants naturally) we’d have a helluva time saying no.