well i'm glad that's over

after spending 20 minutes in line at the post office this morning, it's over (knock on wood). getting the taxes done this year was possibly one of the worst experiences of my life.

since the last post on the topic, i called the md comptroller myself to find out what the correct forms were to file. turns out these guys filled out the wrong form for me. good thing i checked, because they obviously didn't bother and i would have sent in the wrong paperwork. after i told them that, i actually had to tell them what day the maryland taxes were due. they thought it was may 1st. eventually, they sent me a version of the correct form, of course it was filled out incorrectly.

i ended up taking the day off of work yesterday to do them myself. i sat down with a pencil and printed the forms and the instructions and did them by hand. i called the accounting office several times throughout the day and not once did they call me back. finally, when i finished doing them by hand, i drove over to the accountants office and laid into them. the owner was such a dickhole he wouldn't even turn around to acknowledge me when i walked in. he told me that they "have done 75 personal tax returns" and that i was "the only one who ever complained" and that he found it hard to believe that they were doing it wrong, implying that i must not know what i'm talking about. it was ugly, but i'm getting my money back (the owner claimed he was too busy to stop and write me a check at that time, but whatever). with any luck, my refund checks will be the last i will ever see of our 2008 taxes.

for the record, the accounting firm is Accounting Solutions Network, PLC and their url is http://arlingtoncpas.com. stay away. far far away.

final score:
md refund ~$500
va refund ~$1300
federal refund ~$1000
accountant fee refund $540

lousy accountant update

i still have no answer from the accountant regarding the proper forms to file in MD, however i did have a chance to look over the numbers on the return she filled out for us and we should be getting back at least $700 instead of owing $290. at this point, the service i am getting is bordering on criminal.

to recap:

taxes as done by account, we owe $522
taxes after corrected by dan, we get ~$3100

criminal. i will be calling the owners next week to get my money back.

random posts

* i have been trying to refinance our houses. rates are extraordinarily low, with 30 year fixed mortgages at about 4.875%. i've found that closing costs are generally more than i'd like to pay, and for some reason i have to pay local taxes when i refinance. i'm not entirely sure what i'm paying taxes on though. i'm having a hell of a time getting anyone to call me back. it appears that no one is interested in my business. one of the existing mortgages is with suntrust, so i thought i would just call them and see if i could renegotiate the interest rate without refinancing. i called them yesterday at 9:30am. i waited on hold for FOUR hours, at which point they stop playing soothing music and assuring you that your call is important to them. i left the office with the phone off the hook on speakerphone around 4:30pm, still on hold. when i came in this morning, i was still on hold. holding for 24 hours must be some kind of guiness record.

* yesterday i went mountain biking at wakefield park in annandale. for some reason, i didn't go all summer last season. i had forgotten how much fun it was and i'm glad i went. i almost ate it at one point crossing a narrow wooden bridge about 3ft above a gulley. i didn't have enough speed and rode off the side. luckily i was not clipped in and just tossed the bike away and landed on my feet. anyway, i also realized how fat and out of shape i am. at least mountain biking is fun enough that it doesn't feel like exercise.

* this morning i was listening to NPR and they ran a sound byte from an upcoming story. they were talking to a banker about how when the FDIC takes over a bank, it ends up costing other banks money. the guy they were interviewing made the comment that his bank was "paying for the sins of others". that made me laugh. welcome to the club blowhole.

"We were very angry that we were paying for the sins of others," Marranca says. "Obviously, the cost of this was because other people were doing silly, imprudent, criminal things. We never got involved in subprime loans. We would never do a loan with no documentation. We didn't cause this problem. Imagine if you had to pay for your neighbor, or your competitor screwed up somehow, and you had to pay for it." Yes, taxpayers, close your eyes and try to picture a scenario where you pay for the mistakes of others.

* on a related note, NPR ran another story on FDIC takeovers a week or two ago that was actually quite interesting. it sounds like the FDIC might be one of very few government agencies that is capable of acting swiftly and effectively.

* my accountant cannot tell me for sure which forms i need to file for MD. i was reading over the instructions because i wanted to double check everything again and it appears as though i might have to file both a resident and non-resident forms. i sent her a copy of the pdf instructions from the maryland website and she doesn't know the answer either. we're kinda running out of time here. also, according to our accountant, it appears that we have to pay taxes on laura's income in MD, despite the fact that she did not live in, nor make any money in MD in 2008. i find this hard to believe.

* last.fm is insisting that i will like the goo goo dolls, the bodeans and hootie and the blowfish. augh.

note to consumer product engineers

dear engineers,

please do not let your accounting department talk you into using plastic gears when you know you should be using metal ones. especially relatively expensive, in high-torque applications like:

- my broken shredder
- my broken stick blender
- my broken garage door opener

thanks,
dan

fda impotent, needs viagra

i was going to ramble on about the state lawmaker from west virginia who has proposed a bill to ban barbie dolls on the premise that "the Barbie doll, I think, gives emphasis on if you're beautiful, you don't have to be smart", but decided that the topic was already absurd enough and didn't need any ridicule from me. instead, i will ramble about the recent supreme court ruling regarding regulatory pre-emption.

the facts of the case (from what i understand) are this:

• wyeth, a pharmaceutical company, created a drug (called phenergan) for treating migranes. the drug and drug warning label were approved by the FDA.
• a certain method for administering the drug carries a risk of gangreen, and there was no warning about this on the FDA approved warning label.
• a woman had to have her arm amputed as a result of being treated via the method described above and sued wyeth.
• wyeth claimed that since the fda approved the warning label, they could not be held responsbile and the the fda's approval essentially immunized wyeth from lawsuits.
• the supreme court ruled that "that Phenergan's label did not contain an adequate warning about the IV-push method of administration" and that wyeth's defense did not hold. the woman was awarded $6.7M.

now, while i don't disagree that if wyeth knew about this risk, they undoubtedly, should have included this on the warning label, it does make me wonder what the hell is the point of the FDA approval process?

the whole purpose of regulatory bodies like the FDA is to assure some degree of quality & safety to the general public. these agencies exist because it is generally believed that it's not possible for an average consumer understand all the risks they are faced with (and is a topic worthy of it's own rant), be it with respect to automotive safety, the grade of your beef, prescription drugs, or toy dolls that send the wrong message. there are probably hundreds of the agencies; FDA, USDA, NHTSA, SEC, FTC, CPSC and on and on...

the supreme court effectively ruled that FDA approved warning labels do not sufficiently divulge the risks inherent with the use of some drugs. this inevitably leads to the question, if the FDA approves insufficient warnings, how can i trust them? if i can't trust them, then why do they exist? the supreme court essentially rendered the FDA impotent, and have possibly set the same precedent for all regulatory agencies.

without getting into an argument about whether the fda should or should not exist, they should be held responsible in cases like this. if the FDA knew about this risk and approved the label without a proper warning and had the legal authority to force wyeth to include it, the FDA is equally responsible.

saving money on auto insurance

• drivers who switch to all-state save an average of $353
• drivers who switch to geico save an average of $230
• drivers who switch to liberty mutual save an average of 20%
• drivers who switch to state farm save an average of $426

at least that's what all the commercials say. you'd think i could get free insurance if i just switch insurance companies back and forth a few times. now how can this be? surely, someone must be lying. nope. they just aren't telling the whole truth. the reason they can all make this claim is because who the hell changes insurance companies to a more expensive company? no one. obviously, anyone who switches to a new insurer only switched because that new insurer was cheaper than their current insurer. all drivers who switch, save. drivers who don't save, don't switch. duh.

sheisters getting what they deserve (hopefully)

well, it turns out that network solutions is being targeted in a class action suit for their domain name locking i mentioned previously. where do i sign up?

sheisters

according to ICANN, network solutions is the 3rd biggest domain name registrar in the industry, and yet for some reason they feel it necessary to squat on domains from it's own potential customers. i had used godaddy previously but it turns out that this industry is filled with shady companies. godaddy likes to charge you triple if you want to renew your domain name after a year. i didn't want to send them any more money so i thought i would try and find registrar. i decided to try network solutions since they seemed more reputable than the boob-jiggling-superbowl-ad-running godaddy. after finding one that was available i started to go through the registration process. turns out that network solutions charges about three times what most other registrars charge so after going through most of the checkout process and getting the final price at the end, i decided i to try yet another registrar. unfortunately, all of the sudden, the domain name that i was going to register was no longer available. network solutions now locks all the domains that anyone searches for for 4 days. they claim it is some sort of grace period for the benefit of their customers. what it really is is holding domains hostage, forcing customers to either pay their higher prices, or wait it out. bastards.