Summary of What This Blog Covers
- Bookkeeping First: A great CPA reconciles your books monthly not just files your taxes.
- Proactive Planning: Strategic CPAs meet in Q4 to lower your tax bill before year-end.
- Multi-State + Entity Expertise: Your CPA should handle multi-state compliance and business structure changes with ease.
- Flat Fees + Year-Round Access: Transparent pricing and unlimited support should be standard not extra.
Let’s cut to it: If you’re running a business and your CPA’s biggest flex is that they file your taxes on time, you’re working with a technician not a strategist. Filing is the bare minimum. You deserve more.
Because taxes aren’t just paperwork, they’re opportunities. Legal opportunity. Financial opportunity. Strategic opportunity. And whether you realize it or not, the CPA you choose plays a bigger role in your business success than most of your hires combined.
So, what separates a real CPA—someone who knows how to protect, position, and propel your business—from the average tax preparer down the street?
Six questions.
These six questions will tell you everything you need to know about who you’re trusting with your books, your taxes, and let’s be honest, your peace of mind.
1. Do They Reconcile Your Books Or Just File and Flee?
Let’s paint the picture. It’s March. You’re scrambling to gather your income statements, invoices, and maybe a few crumpled receipts from your glovebox. You send them off to your CPA, they file your taxes, and you breathe a sigh of relief… until next year.
Now let me ask you: Do you actually know if those numbers were accurate? Were your income and expenses properly classified? Were you missing deductions?
If your CPA doesn’t reconcile your books monthly, your numbers are little more than a guess. And tax filings based on guesses? They don’t hold up under IRS scrutiny.
Reconciling monthly is the difference between confidence and chaos. It’s how you spot miscategorized expenses, missing income, duplicate entries, or even internal fraud. It also helps you identify opportunities before they expire like adjusting estimated taxes, leveraging bonus depreciation, or cleaning up your P&L to prepare for funding.
If you’re searching for a tax preparer near you, make sure you’re hiring someone who does more than crunch numbers once a year. You need a tax accountant near you who keeps your financials audit-ready and strategy-worthy, every month.
2. Will They Actually Plan in Q4 Or Just Ghost You Until April?
Let’s get brutally honest. Most CPAs disappear after tax season. You don’t hear from them until the next year when it’s time to send your documents again. Sound familiar?
If your CPA isn’t reaching out in Q4, they’re not planning. They’re reporting. And reporting isn’t strategy. It’s telling you what already happened, after it’s too late to change the outcome.
Quarter 4 is when real tax savings happen. That’s when you:
- Make year-end purchases to boost deductions
- Issue bonuses at the right time for tax efficiency
- Adjust payroll for S-Corp distributions
- Set up solo 401(k)s or SEP IRAs
- Pre-pay expenses to shift deductions
And if you’re dealing with a CPA in Austin, Texas who isn’t initiating this conversation in October or November, you’re overpaying. Full stop.
A tax advisor in Austin doesn’t just file your taxes. They quarterback your financial decisions. They show up before the buzzer. They help you control the tax outcome, not just document it.
3. Are They Multi-State Tax Nerds or Just Local Legends?
It happens quickly. You hire a remote employee in Florida. You sell across state lines. You open a warehouse in Colorado. Suddenly, you’ve got multi-state nexus. And if your CPA isn’t up to speed on every state’s tax laws, you’re headed for fines, penalties, and compliance headaches that hit harder than any IRS notice.
Nexus isn’t just a buzzword. It’s a legal threshold that can trigger state income tax, sales tax collection, franchise taxes, and registration requirements. And every state plays by its own rules. What’s exempt in Texas might be taxable in Washington. And if you cross the wrong line without filing the right form? It’s not just messy, it’s expensive.
Add foreign bank accounts or crypto to the mix, and now you’re dealing with FBAR filing, international reporting, and serious consequences if you miss the mark.
Your licensed CPA should be fluent in all of it. Multi-state rules. International disclosures. Digital sales compliance. This is not the job for your neighborhood tax chain.
4. What’s Their Pricing? Flat, Hourly, or a Wild Guess?
You know what business owners hate? Mystery invoices.
CPAs who charge you for every five-minute call are building walls between you and the advice you need to run your business well.
Hourly billing creates fear. You avoid asking questions. You wait until the last minute. And then you miss out on critical tax planning because you didn’t want to pay $250 to find out if you should write off your new laptop.
That’s why flat-rate pricing is the gold standard. You know what you’re getting. You know what it costs. No surprise invoices. No hesitation to reach out.
At Insogna CPA, we build our packages around your business not ours. We include proactive meetings, strategy sessions, and unlimited access to your team. That’s not a luxury. That’s a necessity for fast-moving businesses.
A good CPA office near you should act like a partner, not a toll booth.
5. Can They Handle Entity Drama Like Subsidiaries, Splits, and Restructures?
Your business isn’t going to stay the same. Maybe you launch a second company. Merge with a partner. Convert your LLC to an S-Corp. Form a holding company. Or take on investors.
What happens when you change your entity structure without the right tax advice? You expose yourself to unnecessary taxes, compliance issues, and structural inefficiencies that could haunt you for years.
Here’s an example: A client came to us after creating a new subsidiary for their eCommerce brand without any coordination between legal and tax. Their prior CPA didn’t advise them to file Form 8832. They ended up double-taxed in the eyes of the IRS for two years. We fixed it, but the damage was done.
An experienced Austin small business CPA sees the ripple effects of every entity move before you make it. They understand how to structure ownership. How to balance distributions with payroll. How to build in tax-efficient exit options years before you’re ready to sell.
If your CPA says, “Talk to your attorney about that,” and walks away, they’re not protecting your financial future. They’re passing the buck.
6. Can You Call Them in July Without Getting a Bill the Size of a Mortgage?
Here’s a real test: Something comes up in July. A 1099 you forgot. An IRS notice. A major purchase. A potential acquisition.
Do you pause and ask yourself, “Can I afford to ask my CPA about this?”
If the answer is anything but “Of course,” you’ve got the wrong firm.
At Insogna CPA, access is included. Strategy isn’t metered. And our clients never hesitate to ask the questions that lead to better business outcomes.
Because when you don’t ask, you’re guessing. And guesswork leads to poor decisions.
A true tax professional near you is available year-round. They’re in your inbox, on your Zoom calls, and one step ahead. You don’t pay for five minutes of conversation. You pay for peace of mind, clarity, and a tax plan you can actually use.
Bonus Round: What Else Should Your CPA Be Doing?
In addition to these six core questions, ask yourself: Is your CPA helping you think long-term? Are they guiding you toward wealth-building, not just tax-saving?
They should be:
- Helping you implement tax-advantaged retirement plans (Solo 401(k), SEP IRA, DB Plans)
- Advising on cost segregation studies for real estate
- Coaching you on how to optimize owner compensation and benefits
- Flagging opportunities for R&D tax credits, energy credits, or state-specific programs
This is where tax becomes opportunity not obligation.
The Bottom Line
You can get your taxes filed at any corner strip mall.
But if you’re serious about building wealth, scaling a business, and staying one step ahead of the IRS (and your competitors), you need a CPA who’s more than a form-filler.
You need a guide. A strategist. A protector.
At Insogna CPA, we don’t wait for you to ask the right questions, we bring them to you before the opportunity passes.
We’re based in Austin, Texas, but we serve smart business owners nationwide. Whether you’re a service provider, eCommerce seller, real estate investor, or scaling startup, we speak your language. And we play to win.
Ask Us These Questions Or Better Yet, Let Us Show You
You’ve read the questions. Now it’s time for answers.
Let’s take a hard look at your current structure, clean up what’s not working, and build a tax strategy that supports your goals, not just your filings.