LIBERTY TAX SERVICE Franchise Complaints

5,730 thoughts on “LIBERTY TAX SERVICE Franchise Complaints”

• Troy,
  I like that you gave him a taste of his own marketing system. It does make it better that he reacted just like the other guys.

• Troy: If you have a picture you’re willing to share, pls email it to UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com.

  Thanks

  ;)

• What happened to Robert Koon?

• Ummm Troy:

  Similar thing happened to me. Seriously. I can’t mention it on here since it would identify me, but he pulls that regularly with franchisees, ex-franchisees and franchisees that leave but challenge the corporate office.

  In my experience, as soon as you put up some sort of fight and don’t leave quietly and without incident, he finds ways to harrass you and make your life miserable. This is all the truth. I’ve been on this forum this long for a reason. I want this man to go down, down, down. Don’t pass GO, go straight to jail. So many issues I’ve endured, it’s amazing I’m still here. I’m just afraid of being too identifiable since I know he goes after anyone and everyone that challenges even the most minute of details. And I had ONE 5 year contract that was quite “successful” by Liberty’s standards!

  Nothing surprises me about that man anymore. He will stoop as low as he can go to make sure people know HE’s boss and thinks nothing about stomping all over people like a mack truck.

  Buyer Beware, back up and go elsewhere!

• I figured I better clarify: I made no signs or taunted him in any way. However, when I left I stood up to him. He made my life miserable for y-e-a-r-s. I cannot talk about it on a public forum, but in general it was what you mentioned…..getting “even” with anyone who he thinks challenged him. Like a little baby. But on a very serious, grown up level. And non-stop.

  I hope this years numbers prove what we’ve known all along………..this company can no longer survive on their gestapo tactics and scaring and shaming individuals. PLEASE find a way to permanently close that company down.

• San Fran…how old is I screwitt??? 75. 76..looking at his teeth maybe 80? He doesn’t have too many years to scew’em much longer. In my un humble opinion.

• ^^^Cute, Mike. Honestly, I cannot believe he’s flown under the radar this long without going to jail where he clearly belongs. I am sooo appreciative for this website where real people can share REAL situations and not some sort of fluff ‘store’ that an AD picks out and scrubs clean before potential franchisees visit. I cannot wait for him to see that his money can no longer buy his freedom. And the island in the Caribbean he ‘bought’ with our money. :(

• Is it possible not being with LTS and be busier in the tax business? Also, don’t have a ton of junker clunkers with IRS debt, child support debt – In other words every tax return is actually translates into money!

  Have I died and gone to heaven without LTS??? Hoping next year is even better. And as stated before, the people do search you out high and low! What are a couple of stories from exfranchisees experiences without LTS?

• Any recommendation on how to break away from them and still continue in business? I’m not talking about breaking contract, it would be the end of a term, and I’d owe them nothing else. I’ve never borrowed from them, so that isn’t an issue. I just know in my heart that while i may lose a little business from early season people as an independent, I’d make way more money in the long run without them and their 19% for nothing racket sucking me dry. I’ve searched high and low and there doesn’t appear to be a good way to transition out, as the only thing they seem semi-capable at is litigation. Sad really. I don’t have any desire to be associated with them any more. I’ve not talked with a corp rep in years, not with my AD this whole season, don’t use tech or tax support, the name recognition is low in this state (so no gain from association there). Basically, despite all that, I’m still ranked in top 15%, so what does that tell you? I could do this without them, I essentially have been for years anyway. It’s not that I haven’t been slightly successful or made money, I have, but a lot less than I should be if they weren’t an anchor on me. I just feel there is no longer value added like there was in the beginning. I could get the same ERC product myself, I could get software myself, there is nothing they have anymore that is exclusive to them or an original idea. Value just isn’t there anymore. Could really use some suggestions here, as I grow more dissatisfied daily it seems.

• @Anon – What is the status of your lease at your current location? Do you have a separate phone number advertised for your new tax business established? Do you have a spot online for your new tax business?

  You will make much more money and have more of tax business you just don’t have the EIC junkers coming in and wasting your time and not getting paid for them.

  Are you a very out spoken in the past with LTS or have you kept a very low profile? Are there other LTS in your area near you?

  If you are planning on leaving, keep a very low profile and not sign the renewal contract. Just let it lapse out and don’t contact them. They won’t even notice until next tax season!

• @anon: Franchizee’s advice is sound. Make sure that when you open up another store, if that is what you want, that it is 25 Miles outside your territory. They will probably sue you anyway since that’s what they are expert at, but if you comply to the letter of the termination agreement, they can’t get you. Also, don’t worry about your customers because if you treated them well, they will follow you to the ends of the Earth! The EIC people are better left to Liberty, Jackson and HR since that is their clientele anyway. There are always alternatives to meeting your clients, like at a starbucks or something like that. Computers are amazing and you can file from a laptop anywhere. Also, change your computer so that their software does not contaminate your current client base. Liberty has been known to install spyware and have been able to view all your subsequent clients to market to them.

• Also, never, ever use a LTS computer online – (plugged) into the internet once the date of the 5 year contract has ended!! Very important. You can access the processor and all your old files off line, for future reference. Once you know you are leaving, make sure if you go on to Zeenet, you print what you want prior (months) before leaving. Don’t wait until the last minute.

  The lawyers will send the agreement to you, but the sales and management don’t know anything if you are with them or not. It takes month’s for them to realize you are on the books any longer. Buy computers from Costco, Best buy etc and make sure you back up everything since a lot of the computer stuff is being done for you by LTS compared when you are on your own. If you use any tax software, you need to do a physical back up every week or so, because the software companies don’t keep records. Make sure you get a good sound security program. Most of all, just don’t do anything for them to look your way. The clients will come and seek you out especially if you are on line some how, some way.

• Liberty will also try to take your phone number. Most of the older franchisees kept the phone number in their holding company’s name, not in Liberty’s.

  If you did a good job with the non EIC customers, they will find you. You can also send a mailing to them with your cell# or new business #.

  Your AD might be the first one to notice that you are no longer with them. He/she will alert Liberty and then you start getting letters immediately. Again, this will happen close to or during tax season.

• Ya, they send letters, but once the contract is over, they are a moot point. Make sure you change your number from LTS with the phone company just to your company name. My phone number comes up with my company name never LTS and my phone company made sure it was never changed.

  Keep number and check the voicemail every several days and pull the people who leave a voicemail back. Take off your LTS message and just do a message with the electronic voice mail.

  If you are lucky, your contract ends in the middle of summer or so, which gives you a large time frame to get your ducks in a row and do everything you can to get ready for the next tax season.

• I’m reading these posts and it made me think of the movie “The Great Escape”.

  Anon: It will be a hassle but your good customers will stay with you. When I left
  I took a job with an accounting firm and a good number of my old customers now come here. Best of Luck!

• Looks like finally got rid of the loser franchisees like Bill, Mike, Trisha, SanFran that were holding us all down. HR Block and Jackson Hewitt numbers are down while Liberty Tax is up 15% as 2/28!!!!! hahaha….

• Thankfully I’ve been gone from LTS for years. My problem was signing on with that terrorist franchise to begin with. If we “losers” ha,ha,ha (Bill, Mike, Trisha & moi) as a group can stop the general public from signing on to a company that takes, & takes & takes and gives almost nothing in return, I’ll be happy. Already turned away hundreds. Many, many have looked and turned away before signing…..excellent!

  I guess that leaves dumdums as the only loser! :) Somebody has to support JTH!!! Ha,ha,ha,ha,ha!!!

• I guess unhappydumdums needs to take a business course. First carefully ready Liberty’s financial statement, look at the cash reserves available, you will also notice a huge cutback in advertising costs, and the increase for the brick and mortar offices amounts to only 15 returns per office. Also Liberty’s huge increase in numbers was for its internet software considering that Liberty now has different online products, Liberty’s growth was not in office in but the internet returns. Much similar to results the IRS has been reporting.

  Lets digest this information the number returns increased in storefront offices was only 15 returns per office. So if your office had a greater increase in returns than 15 that means another office did less than 15. This is disastrous news for a new store front owner only doing 15 returns. Nor does Liberty report the poor results in Wal-Mart locations. Keep in mind Liberty’s growth this year was in the increase in Wal-Mart Kiosks.

  For a company that plans to be the largest company in the universe, the last thing you do is cut back in advertising. Comparing last years amount spent in advertising to this years amount was a drastic decrease. Liberty cannot and will not grow if they do not spend money in advertising. There is no common or central advertising theme by Liberty corporate. The advertising model is to let the Zees do the advertising and since there is no unification between the Zees, there is no common advertising theme.

  Liberty’s cash reserves is a dangerous low level for company its size. I would not be surprised that this coming year that Liberty’s line of credit will be reduced. Need to pay attention to number of default loans that Liberty absorb, that number will most likely show an increase this coming year.

  The information that the IRS has been reporting a decrease in paid returns and an increase in do yourself returns. Liberty is not reporting how many of the online returns were paid for.

  John Hewitt is currently pushing returns right now at the expense of the each office. Why is he doing free returns, because he knows when he reports his 4th quarter results store front numbers will be down and he knows these number need to be on the positive side.

  Also these number are actually a disappointment, Liberty being the only primary tax servicing offering refund anticipation loans, Liberty’s number should have been doubled, but they were not.

  In reference to HRB numbers being downed that had already been planned, as HRB had exited most Wal-Marts and Sears locations.

  Over all as an investor, I did not see any great news within Liberty’s 3rd quarter financial report.

• NCHiLLBilly: Well said, in reviewing those financials you will also see that paid in capital increased during the period from 4/30/13 to 1/31/14 by $7,133,000.00, paid in capital is money directly contributed by shareholders/owners. In addition the cash flow statement shows that for the same period the company was able to raise $4,530,000.00 through investors/employees exercising their stock options.

  While these actions are all normal parts of business operations they can not sustain the company unless it improves its financial position. The best way to improve it’s financial position is through the sale of franchises. This is where we thought this site and collectively could have a major impact on making sure the company fails. Maybe we take guerrilla marketing and use it to our advantage by contacting all of the local business support groups in this area and telling them about our experience with this company. I will be contacting the small business association and Scores in my area about this franchise. Anyone else have any suggestions?

• I think that the return numbers are going to be worse. The main Zee in the area has had 3 of its 5 office managers quit. They only have one person with more that 5 years experience and two others working on the second season. The customer service is a joke.
  With no customer service and no experience, the rest of their season is going to be in the dumps.

• I’m still wondering how this bunch of crooks has hung on for this long. It just goes to show how well money works .

• As I sign on to this website, I see the angst of the Patel family working hard by owning a 7-11 store for years. 7-11 decides to pull the store away from them, just like that.

  There is something fundamentally wrong with our society, which has NO set federal requirements/guidelines for franchisors. Franchisors SOULD BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE, just as they are holding the franchisees accountable. We should not be afraid to voice our discontent, yet we are because of past backlash by these corporate entities, which they call a “non-disparage clause”.

  Our voices need to be heard LOUD & CLEAR. Congress needs to wake up and complete legislation that holds the franchisors way more accountable for their actions.

  Let them begin with Liberty Tax Service, since they are the absolute WORST OFFENDER.

  Bill (?) Were you the one that mentioned talking to Senators/Congressmen? Hope ADMIN. can weigh in on this too. Rather than just complain on here all the time, it would be awesome to actually get results done. And to put that CEO behind bars once & for all.

• You are right, SanFranDan.

  There were two lawsuits filed against 7-Eleven the same day

  7-ELEVEN Franchise Lawsuit Alleges Stalking and Harrassment of 7-11 Franchisee

  7-ELEVEN Patel Franchise Lawsuit Alleges 7-11 “Storm Trooper” Tactics

  There are some extreme allegations, such as franchisee surveillance, tracking, harassment, unlawful seizure of stores. I have heard similar allegations from Liberty Tax franchisees, as well as Dunkin Donuts franchisees and many others.

  One of the main problems is that these franchisors organize and spend money (their franchisees’ money, that is). Through the IFA they have put together a political action fund and are very adept at fighting pro-franchisee legislation. Franchisees are getting better and more vocal, but there needs to be more cooperation across brands.

  On the plus side, you guys are making a difference by using social media, posting thousands of comments here, and alerting Googlers to the problems you faced. You can bet that you have saved many from making uninformed decisions. Keep it up!

• Again, ADMIN, so many of us are sooooo appreciative to you for starting this website. FINALLY a place to get our frustrations out of our incredibly awful, awful franchise experiences. So much money lost, so much heartache…………….it should not be this way at all.

  Look at how many people have written on the Liberty Tax site alone over the last 5 years………….and just imagine how many are frustrated and disgusted that are out there that are not writing on this forum.

  It would be awesome to see real changes. Lesgislation. People behaving badly going to jail. The general public not losing their savings. The government working on OUR side. Imagine that!

  Anyone reading this forum for the first time…………….you don’t need to lose your savings by joining this franchise. It’s so not worth it. There are so many other ways to earn a living where you can be honest, productive and not thrown under the bus over & over & over again. This is not the place for you! Really.

• LTS on their marketing just took another down turn. They are not in the local phone book this year. No ad at all. Last year their ad went down, now none. I am glad I am not with them. I wonder what they are doing with the 5% that is mandated to pay per zee? They didn’t run hardly any radio ads and now being this time of the tax season, only hear “crickets”.

  They did send out discount cards to “current” clients. I mean they are such marketing gurus.

• Its the usual story with LTS marketing: you get nothing for your money! The marketing money is used as a slush fund to pay for extravagances like the convention or the special dinners all around the country. Most Zee’s only see a very small fraction of the marketing royalty in their territory. The rest goes to Hewitt and the Area Developers. Real fair system.

• Buyer beware!! The 5 percent advertising you give LTS now, does not go back to you or your area.

  When we started, we got a “guerrilla marketing” amount to spend on real good items for marketing. As the years went by the items for “guerilla marketing” money were reduced to items they could not sell and the last two years, the amount given back especially once he went public dwindled down to very little. The items were junker clunkers. I left money on my account because the shipping was so outrageous, you could spend double just in shipping.

  So, now no guerrilla marketing money nor any yellow page presence. Are they going out of business? Before I left, they never stated that they were pulling out of the yellow pages. I wonder if they did that on the sly or do zee’s know? Our AD said they did not work, but I had people tell me they used the online yellow pages etc.

  What do you know NCHillbilly?

• Liberty’s 3rd quarter report stated that advertising fees from franchisees increased from 709,000 to $759,000. The income statement showed that Liberty has decreased it’s adverting spending by $1,735,000 through the quarter ending 1/31/14 compared to this time last year.

  John Hewitt explained the decrease in advertising spending for the year as being strategic. Since tax season is starting later they were holding back spending this money until the 4th quarter. Anyone who has been with Liberty knows the advertising fees are a waste of their money.

  Buyer Beware!

• If a company wants to be number 1 you must advertise with a central theme through out the United States and this not the case with Liberty. Liberty’s marketing department is stuck in the early 90’s and until John makes serious changes within his inner circle, his business will stay stuck in the early 90’s and his growth will be limited.

  The yellow book and pages is now a dinosuar going extinct. You will notice both the page size and thickness of the book has drastically shrunk. Not advertising in the yellow pages is probaly a smart move on Liberty’s part. But they should have used this money towards other advertising.

  Right now Liberty is pushing offices to do free returns. John is telling the franchisees that the free return program will reduce the amount the competitor can advertise. He does not realize it does exactly the same to both Liberty and the franchisee, less dollars coming in means less money to spend on marketing and advertising.

  Until Liberty corporate takes a very aggressive approach in marketing and advertising in both the media (TV, radio, internet) and direct mail, Liberty will remain number 3. Liberty is being out flanked by its competitors in those areas. Guerrilla marketing is only effective for the early season clients not for mid or late season clients. These two groups are areas that Liberty is extremely poor in attracting and until Liberty understands how to attract these two groups into the offices they will continue to stay in third place. H&R Block is very good at attracting these groups.

• NC Hillbilly:
  I agree with what you are saying, but according to the third quarter results the advertising has been decreased by 23.8%. The number of store fronts are down 4.11%, and the kiosks are up 14.74% The number of returns processed were up 6.1% or 66K returns for both types of offices. This gives you a 274.97 return per office average. With 275 (rounded) returns per office, you would not make any of the top office lists, you would be loosing money.
  The kiosks are only for first peak, and the store fronts are where the mid and late season clients will file. These clients also want to see the same preparer each year.
  I see in Linked In that St Louis in not doing as well as they like, and NE Ohio is down 12% in the number of returns. The zee’s managers and preparers have not posted as much there this year.
  The local Liberty offices have the free extension arrows out already. To me that means that they have given up on the season.

• Again, advertising has never been Liberty’s strong point. they use those royalty assessments as their own personal slush funds for the AD’s and corporate. Notice how less extravagant the ‘convention’ has been lately? That royalty money was used to fund that and other corporate parties. You never get 100% of the advertisement royalties for your DMA. In fact, if you see about 25%, you should consider yourself lucky.

• Let’s keep Liberty at the top of the Unhappy discussions.

  ^^Texastee: you say advertising has never been Liberty’s strong point. You’ve got that right!! :) But what is??? NOTHING, except taking, taking, taking and not giving anything back in return. Anyone reading this for the first time……I have tons of proof to back up my statements.

  I’m thrilled to hear the general numbers are down. How long does he think he can keep this up? It sounds like a ponzi scheme to me.

  Potential franchisees need to know up front: NO National Advertising during tax season on television. Block-yes, Liberty-no. Liberty: time to go bye-bye.

• You guys should be happy to know that your crying is affecting this company stock price….NOOOOT!!! LOLOLOL….

  On Mar 19, Zacks Investment Research upgraded Liberty Tax Service’s parent company, JTH Holding, Inc. (TAX) to a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). Estimates have been rising ever since the company reported strong third-quarter fiscal 2014 results.

  Why the Upgrade?

  JTH Holding posted strong third-quarter fiscal 2014 (ending Jan 31) on Mar 13. The results included a substantial positive earnings surprise of 4.8%. Following the earnings release, shares of this property and casualty insurer gained nearly 0.9% to close at $27.05 on Mar 19.

  JTH Holding’s third-quarter fiscal 2014 net income of 28 cents per share was significantly better than 12 cents earned in the year-ago period. The result also exceeded the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 8 cents per share.

  Bottom-line growth was largely attributable to increased market share and focus on JTH Holding’s high performers.

  Moreover, JTH Holding’s total revenue amounted to $40.7 million during the reported quarter, escalating 8.3% year over year. The increase in revenues was attributable to higher royalties and advertising fees, financial products and tax preparation fees. These were driven by increased returns and average net fees.

  Additionally, total long-term debt amounted to $22 million at the end of third-quarter fiscal 2014, reflecting an improvement from $24.3 million at fiscal 2013-end.

  Also, the company is witnessing rising earnings estimates following its strong financial results. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2015 has increased 5.6% year over year to $1.90 per share. For 2014, the Zacks Consensus Estimate is currently pegged at $1.60 per share.

• ^^Oh look. One of the stooges has re-appeared. Oh joy :(

• ^^Higher royalties and advertising fees naturally! hahahahahaha That amount to bubkiss for the franchisee. Exactly what I said, he takes and takes and takes some more to inflate his numbers for potential franchisees and shareholders. The current franchisees will see NOTHING and if he doesn’t change things around there will be far more ex-franchisees than current ones. Yeah, keep doing FREE returns. He’s laughing all the way to the bank, not the poor franchisee that got stuck with a 5 year contract totally lining JTH’s pockets.

• JTH bottomline is larger because he ain’t advertising and taking the money and doing what ever he does with advertising royalty which is not giving back to the franchisees. Also with more fees charged by the zee’s no wonder the money is up, how could it not be. The problem is the franchisee’s pay more and get nothing in return.

  John are you John Hewitt or are you John AD out of CA?

• This franchise is a farce. The business model works in a few areas, and those areas are dwindling, and the rest of the Zees muddle along figuring out how to stay afloat but not making enough to make the effort worthwhile and not being able to sell it for any decent $$. I know several Zees right now holding on making little money but only getting low-ball offers from other Zees so they hang on. I was in the same boat, I finally got out.
  I could write PAGES about this farce, but I don’t have time, because whiile the corporate stiffs want to make me (us) out to be losers, I am quite successful, thank you very much, at my other high tech business (NOT a franchise, I will NEVER do that again!).
  I am one of the lucky ones – I didn’t have to take any corp FRAC loans (oh – they wanted me to when I complained about cash flow!) and was able to make enough profit to stay alive until I sold. Getting out is like cutting the anchor.
  The only thing that makes me a “dumdum” is getting involved with this loser in the first place. Live and Learn.
  As far as stock value – who cares?? That only make corporate rich, does nothing for the Zees.

• Thanks Zeeout! A lot of us were duped into believing their inflated numbers and their false claims of people living off their system. It rarely happens and it seems most of the Top Guns are heavily indebt with the company.

  The corporate office makes their money early due to taking the banking products money up front from the heavily debted zee. What a great plan for automatic income for the home office.

• Can anyone still involved with the company tell us about current state of franchisees in their area? How the company got people to purchase kiosk
  in Wal-marts? If there know any of the poor performing franchises that
  Liberty took back and sold to other franchisees?

• @Bill = The franchisees in my area via state. Two entities want to sell multiple offices, but may not get what they want. They would sell in a heartbeat. So not very happy. Only maybe two franchisees in our state have Walmart kiosk’s. But I know of one for sure. The one franchise who took a kiosk always stated they were a money pit.

  Two offices closed down in the last tax season. LTS would not take back the franchise’s that were shut down, they would rather just let people walk away than give any money for those territories. Oh, that’s right, those areas were not real territories, but over sold areas to line the pockets of the AD.

  The franchisee’s did well early, but haven’t heard as of late, but several weeks ago, everything dropped fast and furious.

  No advertising at all in our areas, but Block is hammering the radio and tv.

• This whole “Top Gun” Zee ranking is a joke. I have watched so called *high ranking* Zees buy territories for pennies on the dollar and guess what – those stores go nowhere! They aren’t any better than anyone else at running this business. Its demographics and economy. Either the market is there or its not. No bank products, and more free returns = less $$ for the zees. How many free returns is Liberty asking the new Zees for now?? If I only knew then what I know now…..

• No adverstising?? That’s because we are suppposed to spend our own $$ for wavers (can you spell payroll!), donuts, cookies, marketers and other such nonsense. H&RB offices do none of their own marketing and rake in the $$. When I drive by a *waver* now I cringe. Outside VA and NC no one has heard of Liberty. Period. We pay marketing royalty so they can tell us how to spend our $$. Oh, and what happened to “when sales are down we should spend more on marketing?” I guess that is only good for the Zees, not corp. easy to spend someone else’s money.

• It was always on the franchisee to do the marketing. Liberty is very good at taking our advertising royalties, but not so good at advertising. That is why I describe the royalty fee at 19% instead of 15%. Liberty likes to rip off its zees as well as its customers. John Hewitt even told us during training that we are to charge whatever we can because most of the folks don’t know what they are paying. The higher the fees, the more the royalty. Don’t forget, royalty is taken before you pay your expenses which shows you how greedy Hewitt is.

  Liberty Tax continues to Rip off whoever they can.

• I just round the cost to 20%, however if you stay in the minimum which is probably at least 30% or more of your income back to Liberty, if the stars don’t a line and you happen to have a “dog” of a territory, which is

  very likely since all the good ones have been taken long before I even started.

  They sell like you will be a millionaire and you will be very successful. Just open your doors, put a waver outside and viola, the dough will roll in. They will do this and that in marketing to help your market. Yup, they send coupons and flyers to your “current” clients. Ya, that really works huh? So my current people, I need to give huge discounts when they were paying normally.

  Bottom line, they don’t do “jack” to help your business, but help themselves to your hard earned money for their jack wagon of a name. Buyer beware. Anyone leaving them, who would admit they have ever been associated with them is a fool.

• @bill: The recent Liberty 10-Q is a good source of location changes and buybacks. Hopefully the formatting here isn’t too bad. Any potential Franchisee needs to question why 566 locations folded up from one season to the next.

  Tax Season
  2014 2013
  Franchised U.S. offices, operated during the prior tax season
  4,028 3,845
  U.S. offices opened
  558 596
  U.S. offices purchased from the Company
  66 60
  U.S. offices acquired by the Company
  (91) (64)
  U.S. offices closed
  (566) (409)
  Franchised U.S. offices, operated during the tax season
  3,995 4,028

  http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1528930/000152893014000013/jth-131201410q.htm

  See page 10.

• I am a current Zee. Thank GOD our franchise agreement ends this year (4/30 cannot come soon enough). All that I read above is true: no support from corporate (heck, their “support” is a bunch of wacko’s that they hire off the street – I had one tax support guy, who was helping me with a support copy of a return, complain about my client’s earnings being larger than his???!!! Who does this???), royalties are a rip off considering said lack of support, AD is worthless – after selling us the territory he could have cared less about us except for telling us how to spend $30k per year in marketing, the marketing is gimmicky (so you think you’re getting a great deal with that $50 CIF, huh? Wrong – we just jack up the prices)…. thankfully we only did CIF once – we learned real quick that it is NOT the way we wanted to do business.

  I could go on.

  Bottom line, this business doesn’t align with my moral compass. I got into this business to provide professional, accurate and friendly service at a fair price. LTS doesn’t support that. LTS is a way for someone who doesn’t care fair pricing to make a quick buck in the first 2 or so years then get out as quick as you can because people wise up and go else where. Or bounce between the 3 biggies depending on where the best coupon is that year.

  For those of you who are out, what did you do with your files? I’ll be damned if I’m driving to VA Beach in a U-Haul with my files. Only thing that I can think of it is to go through each and every packet, keep only signature pages and shred the rest.

  I am just sick to my stomach with this company. I have put in long hours, treated my employees and clients right and will walk away with nothing but some debt from our initial investment. Thankfully we NEVER borrowed from corporate; they OWN you then – tell you how to run your business, require you to use ADP and submit hours, require CIF, etc.

  Glad I found this site. I couldn’t sleep tonight, literally feeling sick over how I’ve been treated by the company. I needed to vent and this was just the place to do it. Now off to bed since I have returns to do all day tomorrow (which I love, just not under the Liberty name).

• Sicktomystomach – Thanks for the post! All of it is true for professionals in this non professional company.

  Has LTS contacted you about renewing your contract?
  Have you told them anything about not renewing your contract?
  What is the status of your lease?
  Is you phone number have Liberty come up when you call or does it show your business name?

  Regarding the files, you can keep them, there is an IRS code where it is optional for the ERO to give back files or keep them in case of audits via the IRS and the bank requires the ERO to keep files 2-3 years incase their is something they need.
  First, don’t tell them nothing.

  They will send letters, but if you are far from them, there is nothing they can do legally especially once you pay your final royalties.

  One thing I would do, is have quite a number of “free” returns! A good parting gift to yourself.

  Enjoy your time off from LTS and hopefully you will keep being a tax preparer to help put them out of business in due course.

• If the stockholders only knew what they were investing in. What a joke This is a local store in Norfolk

• OOPs I was trying to post a pic but dont see how?
  
  Troy: Email it to me at UnhappyFranchisee[at]gmail.com and I’ll add it.

  Thanks, ADMIN

• Do the “Free” returns. Zero them out. Have payments mad to you or your company independently . These crooks have taken enough of your money.