Here it is, Sunday evening so we thought we’d check on all you weekend warriors. Now that the day is over, you can relax and do whatever it is you do on Sunday evenings. Personally, we’d recommend watching some lady slaying courtesy of Don Draper but if reading up on more healthcare policy debate is your thing, knock yourselves out.
Even though lots of you are probably too exhausted to keep your eyes open to read this, we’ll kindly remind you that there’s only two more days to go. Yes, we realize you 1040 prep experts still have a month to go and we’ll give your recognition in due course.
As for the rest of you, give yourselves a pat on the back and have a drink, do a jay, whatever gets you in the mood for love or simply vegging out in front of the tube because you’ve earned it. You’re going to make it through another tax season despite all those times you considered quitting in the middle of it.
And if this is your first tax season, special congrats to you. You’re well on your way to becoming a glutton for punishment courtesy of tax deadlines for many years to come. Cheers.
KPMG Australia Has Made a List of Things It Probably Should Have Done Already
...such as "support whistleblowers" and "punish people who do stuff that will give Australian Financial Review an easy 9 months of negative headlines." So KPMG Australia is still in its…
EY Didn’t Do Too Bad Last Year
Shortly after Deloitte released their 2026 revenue numbers on September 24, EY had some numbers of their own, announcing $57 billion in global revenue last week. Notably, they edged out…
The King’s Deloitte Got Hit With a £6 Million Fine and a Homework Assignment For Questionable Auditing
The Financial Reporting Council announced £6 million (nearly $8 million USD) in sanctions against Deloitte UK today and honestly, this client sounds like a mess. But messy clients are what…
Scandal-Embattled KPMG Australia Hits Up the Global Body to Borrow a Few Bucks
This information comes from Australian Financial Review so it's legit: KPMG Australia is seeking up to $100 million in emergency loans from the firm’s global network as well as a…
Deloitte Saw Another Year of Single-Digit Growth, a Respectable $74.5 Billion in Revenue
It's revenue season! Traditionally Deloitte is first to report and report they have: $74.5 billion in global revenue (unaudited). Last year, the firm was the first Big 4 to cross…
KPMG Australia Has Made a List of Things It Probably Should Have Done Already
...such as "support whistleblowers" and "punish people who do stuff that will give Australian Financial Review an easy 9 months of negative headlines." So KPMG Australia is still in its…
EY Didn’t Do Too Bad Last Year
Shortly after Deloitte released their 2026 revenue numbers on September 24, EY had some numbers of their own, announcing $57 billion in global revenue last week. Notably, they edged out…
Monday Morning Accounting News Brief: KPMG Might Be Moving in Chicago; Hope You Like Sales | 10.12.26
Happy Columbus Day to those who celebrate, happy nondescript Federal holiday to everyone else. There are a few things going on today but it goes without saying that this will…
Friday Footnotes: Accounting Education Could Use a Catch Up; Whistleblower Says IRS Leaked His Tax Records | 10.9.26
Footnotes is a collection of stories from around the accounting profession curated by actual humans and published every Friday at 5pm Eastern. While you're here, subscribe to our newsletter to…
The King’s Deloitte Got Hit With a £6 Million Fine and a Homework Assignment For Questionable Auditing
The Financial Reporting Council announced £6 million (nearly $8 million USD) in sanctions against Deloitte UK today and honestly, this client sounds like a mess. But messy clients are what…
Bill Gates Predicts AI Will Be Taking Clients’ Most Tedious Questions 24/7 Within a Few Years
Did you catch Bill Gates' recent chat with Ezra Klein? I didn't, thankfully my washed colleague regularly reads NYT and sent it to me via Slack. Many people are stuck…
The AICPA Wants Tax Pros to Take a Hit From Its New AI Risk CART
Rather than dropping a strongly worded letter on the topic of the IRS's position on AI in tax practice and dropping the topic there to focus on other pressing matters,…
Deloitte Survey: A Lot of People Are Using Clandestine AI at Work
As corporations everywhere shove AI down our throats and businesses wrestle with the conflict between rushing to integrate AI to not be left behind and having to pay for it…
Bill Gates Proposes a Tokens and Robots Tax
Bill Gates has written a loooong essay on AI covering all sorts of things from potential benefits to immediate concerns. Feel free to read the whole thing if you'd like,…
Firms (and Some Guy Obsessed With China) Have Weighed in on the PCAOB Turning an Eye to AI
The comment period for PCAOB Release No. 2026-005 Request for Public Comment on PCAOB Standard Setting has closed and when all was said and done, it racked up an unremarkable…
Finance Leaders Are Shopping for a CAS Partner, and They Brought a List
Cash flow, automation, fraud protection. Your firm can deliver all three. Finance leaders would like some help with the accounting. Not a little help, either. BILL asked 354 finance decision-makers…
Expense Management: Because Apparently Clients Will Pay You to Make Expense Reports Suck Less
Spend and expense management is one of the most in-demand CAS services—and one of the most underutilized. There’s still plenty of room to get into the game. Clients are drowning…
For Firms, Growth is Down But Profitability Is Up
That's the headline from INSIDE Public Accounting based on the results of their 2026 Practice Management Report: The report draws on survey responses from 605 North American accounting firms, spanning…
AICPA Pushes Back on IRS Suggesting CPAs Should Charge Less If They’re Using AI
Back in June the IRS Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) issued its first solid AI guidance in the form of a bulletin titled Introductory Guidelines for Responsible AI Use in…
Top Remote Tax and Accounting Candidates of the Week | October 16, 2025
Struggling to Find Remote Accounting or Tax Talent? We’ve Got You Covered.If your firm or internal team is having a tough time sourcing qualified remote tax and accounting professionals, you're…
Twitter Feed
Curious where general sentiment is here, as I think a lot of folks are afraid of being AI-cancelled
For US tax pros, if you're using an AI assistant that doesn't train your prompts into the model (business plans)
Do you think a signed 7216 consent to disclosure is required?
Idk if this was a gap in my knowledge or is commonly unknown. They certainly never did it at any of the 3 firms I worked at.
A Market Discount adjustment in a 1099-B is supposed to be recategorized as interest income.
Did you know this/do you do this?
IRS Employees Looked at Celebrities’ Tax Records, Report Says
Here Are Tax and Audit Salaries at Top 25, Top 300, and Regional Firms
Recruiting firm Brewer Morris has released its 2025 US CPA salary guide and should you want to read the whole thing you can request it from them here. Perhaps you,…
Friendly Reminder Not to Work Yourself to Death For This Profession
Saw this on the bird app yesterday and thought its message would be worth passing along what with 20 days remaining until April 15 and nerves as strained as ever…
Accounting Firm Abruptly Nopes Out of Tax Season Early (UPDATE)
Ed. note: An earlier version of this article's headline stated the sheriff is investigating. The Alexander County Sheriff's Office informed us they are not investigating, only fielding calls from the…
This Deloitte Office Has Eliminated Trash Cans at Desks to Make Staff Get Up Off Their Asses
Boston Business Journal wrote an article about Deloitte's new office in Boston and for some reason they chose to lead with this: You won’t find trash cans at the desks…
The IRS Decided to Troll Tax Pros For 10/15
We realize the decision to run maintenance on IRS systems likely isn't made by anyone who understands deadlines but surely someone who does could inform the IT department of these…
Finance Leaders Are Shopping for a CAS Partner, and They Brought a List
Cash flow, automation, fraud protection. Your firm can deliver all three. Finance leaders would like some help with the accounting. Not a little help, either. BILL asked 354 finance decision-makers…
Expense Management: Because Apparently Clients Will Pay You to Make Expense Reports Suck Less
Spend and expense management is one of the most in-demand CAS services—and one of the most underutilized. There’s still plenty of room to get into the game. Clients are drowning…
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Looking to staff up for a season or hire a freelancer for a project? Accountingfly is ready to partner with you! Gain full access to a pool of highly skilled…
10 Essential Project Management Principles for Accounting Firms
Every accounting firm struggles with project management, with smaller practices that are rapidly expanding taking the brunt of the damage. As your firm adds new clients, takes on more work,…
Review Comments | 09.11.09
• Remembering the Horror of a Bright Blue Morning – Take another moment for those we lost. [NYT]
• Ex-KPMG exec Greg Baroni nabs $50M in BearingPoint deals Nice work man. [Washington Business Journal]
• Deloitte consumer spending index up – Nice work everybody. [Denver Business Journal]
• Leibovitz Buys Back Control of Photos, Real Estate – Nice work Annie. We don’t know how you did it. [Bloomberg]
KPMGer Has a Question for the Group
“can i ask why we just hired three people and have one intern for audit and then two of them are going to Rome for trainig [sic]???”
Yes, you can ask. We’ll put it out to the group. Thoughts?
A Muslim Working in Arkansas. You Know Where This Is Going
A former Deloitte Consulting employee has filed suit against the firm and Wal Mart claiming that, “his civil rights were violated when he was fired for exercising his religious right to pray and clean himself beforehand in a ritual known as [Wudu]”
After the jump, Hairballs (yes) has the story.
According to the lawsuit, Deloitte assigned Memon to a consulting project at Wal-Mart’s corporate office in Bentonville, Arkansas in November 2007. Memon claims he would wash up in the restroom before going to pray in an area designated by Wal-Mart, such as the parking lot or in a hallway. The whole process took about five minutes or so.
…the lawsuit states, Wal-Mart employees began to get upset with Memon for using the bathroom to sprinkle water on himself and Memon was told not to perform the “Wazu.”…Memon’s boss at Deloitte suggested that Memon pray at the hotel. However, this was not practical because it meant driving more than half an hour for each prayer instead of just taking a short five-minute break.
It didn’t take long until Memon was then taken off the Wal-Mart project. He claims that a Deloitte project manager told him that other colleagues would also be removed from the job, but in the end he was the only one.
According to the lawsuit, the project manager told Memon that, “Americans do not deal with Islamic practices and clients particularly in the South do not understand these religious practices.” The manager also allegedly said that Memon “is putting himself at risk” by practicing his religion. Deloitte then fired Memon, citing “poor performance,” the lawsuit states.
Having never been to Arkansas, we can’t really give any first hand account on the populace’s tolerance for, well, anything but we do know a few people that went to school in Arkansas and they are very nice, tolerant people.
Since Hairballs wasn’t interested in Deloitte’s statement, we went ahead and got it:
“The allegations in this case are false and we intend to defend ourselves vigorously. Deloitte is deeply committed to all aspects of workplace diversity and inclusion, including expression of religious beliefs, and is proud to be regularly recognized as a leader in this area.”
Based on the Green Dot’s statement, we’re assuming Mr. Memon was let go for performance reasons, which as you all know, are subject to change at any time.
Wal-Mart And An Accounting Firm Fire A Muslim For Praying, Suit Says [Hairballs]
‘Sex Is Kind of Like Dancing, Right?’
ACORN, yes, Bill O’Reilly’s favorite non-profit, is giving tax advice. Apparently, prostitution qualifies as a performing art. Who are we to argue?
Yes, it’s almost ten minutes but it’s worth it.
Check out Part II over at TaxProf Blog.
Working the Weekend: Sept. 15th Deadline Edition
At this point for you tax peeps your days are probably running together. It’s fine. Tuesday is only how many days away? Just grab your favorite concoction to get your game back on and you’ll plow through.
Don’t worry tax trolls, we’ll get our own cocktail and check up on you this weekend to get you through it. Why? Because we’re solid.
If you’re having nightmares about 1065’s and whatnot, detail them for us in the comments.
The CPA Exam for Commitmentphobes
Editor’s note: Adrienne Gonzalez is founder and managing editor of Jr Deputy Accountant as well as regular contributor to leading financial/investment sites like Seeking Alpha and GoldmanSachs666. You see all of her posts for GC by going here. By day, she teaches unlicensed accountants to pass the CPA exam, though what she does in her copious amounts of freetime in the evening is really none of your business. Follow her adventures in Fedbashing and CPA-wrangling on Twitter @adrigonzo but please don’t show up unannounced at her San Francisco office as she’s got a mean streak. Her favorite FASB is 166.
The first time I addressed the CPA exam here on Going Concern, I may have given the firms a little too much credit. Keep in mind that I write from the perspective of a CPA Review Project Coordinator; in other words, I’ve heard every excuse in the book.
I need more time on my course. Work got really busy and…
Continued, after the jump
Listen, I understand that the CPA exam is a serious commitment. I also understand that first and second year new hires get worked like slave labor. What I do not understand is why this should be my problem 2 years after the student’s course expired with not a peep in between. Can you use this excuse in college? “Yeah, sorry I didn’t make it to my Final… um, I know it was 3 years ago but can I just take it again? I got really busy.” I dare you to try.
What I’ve learned from my time in the CPA Review trenches – something that I will take with me for the rest of my life – is quite simple. In the time it takes to come up with reasons why you don’t have the energy, time, knowledge, or ability to pass the CPA exam, you could have already passed it.
Yes, you. You could have passed this thing years ago. All of a sudden you’re staring down a promotion and realize that there’s no way you’ll be able to make the leap with that obnoxious colleague who passed the exam in 4 months. How can you possibly compare?
Well you can’t, first of all. Second of all, I’m willing to bet my entire inventory of Wiley CPA Review books that he’s full of shit. So is the guy who said he had an hour and a half left when he walked out of FAR, as is the chick who says she got a 95 on BEC (she’s our student, you know, and she got three 60s before that, not to mention cussed out by me for an hour before she finally passed). They are not you. And you, little CPA exam candidate, are the only person who matters in all of this.
Not your parents, not your boss, not your firm and not even your significant other. You. Is this what you want to do with your life or not?
If it was, you’d be at the Prometric center in full war paint ready for battle 45 minutes before they open, not calling me trying to explain how complicated your life got in the two years since I’ve heard from you. Apparently you forgot that you friended me on Facebook and I can see you filling out 79 quizzes in just three short hours.
What exactly are you waiting for? Time? Trust me, you’ll never have it.
Your Firm Has Questions. Answer Them Here
E&Y’s global survey has rolled out and we’ve obtained a list of questions that Ersnters are being asked.
After the jump, we’ve presented a partial list for feedback on your respective firm.
Since the standard “Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree, or Strongly Disagree” format doesn’t tell the whole story (and are pretty boring), we’re asking you to pick your favorite(s) and give your full answer in the comments.
• I have the time I need to deliver quality work.
• People at the Firm are held accountable for their performance.
• If I had a question or concern about the way we conduct business, I would not hesitate seeking advice or reporting my concerns.
• People I work with inspire others to do great things at the Firm.
• I understand the measures used to evaluate my performance.
• I am rewarded appropriately for the work I do.
• I believe my pay and performance are linked.
• I trust the information I receive from leadership.
• Leadership does a good job of explaining the reasons behind major decisions.
• I rarely think about looking for a new job with another company.
Be honest. Please. If you don’t see your favorite, submit it in the comments along your response.
Now That the #1 Spot Is Secure, Deloitte Is Making Some Changes
We’re not sure when Deloitte dropped the hammer on Pandora but the timing of us hearing about it is dubious since the coveted #1 spot on BW’s list is safely in print.
Much like E&Y, we’re curious as to the motivation here. Bandwidth sucking notwithstanding, your morale doesn’t seem to be much of a concern here. Green dots, kindly discuss in comments your theories behind the latest buzz kill. The rest of you (minus E&Y, natch) can share what you’re listening to currently as pure schadenfreude.
Preliminary Analytics | 09.11.09
• Accountants Misled Us Into Crisis – Yes. You. [Floyd Norris/NYT]
• Prosecutors Are Poised to Impanel AIG Grand Jury – “In the AIG matter, the swaps at issue led to billions of dollars in write-downs for the insurer after PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, its auditor, said the process AIG used to value them was flawed. Pricewaterhouse could be called to testify about, among other things, the way in which it came to determine there was a material weakness in the internal controls used by Mr. Cassano’s group to value the swaps, the people familiar with the matter said.” [WSJ]
• Bloomberg Among Potential Bidders for McGraw-Hill’s BusinessWeek – Whether the Big 4 remains on the Launch list remains to be seen. [WSJ]
• New Charges in Stanford Case – “Mr. Perraud arranged for a shredding company to come to the office and supervised the shredding of a 95-gallon bin full of documents, the indictment said.” This guy thought he knew how to destroy documentation. Fool. Leave that to us. [Reuters via NYT]
Review Comments | 09.10.09
• SEC contrite over failure to uncover Madoff – The victims, we understand you want to let them know. The rest of us? WE GET IT. [Reuters]
• AICPA Proposes Clarification on Sharing Client Information – In a word: Don’t. [Compliance Week]
• Geithner: Banks To Repay $50 Billion In Rescue Funds – Is someone still tracking this? [NPR]
• Recession Takes Heavy Toll on U.S. – There’s this…[WSJ]
• Stocks Rally to New 2009 Peaks – …then there is this. [WSJ]