Pacific Northwest Tax Service

Been using PNT for years now, my accountant April is absolutely amazing. For personal and Financial purposes. She even helped me with my Trust accounting. Is there a 6 star rating?

I had Pacific Northwest Tax Service do my 2020 taxes. If you remember, that was pandemic times. The service at the time was great! We were able to to meet online and do everything mostly virtual. Fast forward to 2024. I got a letter in the mail that I was getting audited by the State of Oregon (for the 2020 tax year). It had to do with a mistake where more taxes were paid to California and less to Oregon. (I'd moved states that year). The person who prepared my taxes in 2020 no longer worked at the company but PNW Tax Service did everything to correct the issue. They promptly amended my California return and requested a penalty waiver from the State of Oregon. While it was a headache, everything ended "net 0" on the money side and I was really satisfied with how the company handled the situation. It's when things don't go according to plan when people really show themselves.

Will never take any business here. Terrible communicators and unable to perform even the most basic of customer service interactions without being extremely petty/condescending. Here’s the TLDR of my interaction with them and the full run down below that. TLDR - Made an appt on their portal 10 days in advance, paid $300 retainer. Realized I made a mistake, called the next day to politely request a refund (9 days out from appt). Got the run around for a MONTH and they retained $75 because apparently occupying a slot on their not-busy calendar for less than 24hrs and failing to provide even basic answers means they deserve money. Here’s the full summary in the form of my last email to them and their office manager’s response: Hi XXXXXX, Thank you for finally giving me a definitive answer. I must say I’m pretty disappointed in the outcome here, but thankful that we are moving towards a resolution. Here’s my experience with your company: I made an appointment 10 days in advance (3/25). I realized I made a mistake and needed to cancel this appointment, so I called the following morning (3/26). I requested a cancellation and a refund of my $300 retainer. At the time of booking, your online calendar had many open slots for the same day and the rest of the week. Note this was still 9 days advance of my scheduled appt. The person on the phone told me they needed to escalate this request to management as these retainers are “non-refundable” and they would call me back when they had an answer. I agreed and several hours later that day I wrote them an email summarizing my request and clarifying my contact information as I had not heard back from them yet. I never received a response to this email. Having still not heard any response(written or phone) by 2pm the next day (3/27), I called again. This time I’m put on hold for 5 mins and then told that it will be at least a week before I am refunded and it will be less “50 or 75 dollars” in fee. I asked at this time for a follow up with an email summarizing their intended resolution - again, nothing sent. By the end of the first week I realized your team had failed to even cancel the appointment as I had requested to be done when I called. So at that time I canceled using the portal. At 2 weeks (4/9) I called for an update and the person who answered asked if I had spoken with XXXX previously. I said yes and I was told she would call me back with an update (and confirmed my call back number). I called again 2 days later (4/11) after still receiving no call back and they told me they would know more “next week”. I called back the next week (4/17) and finally got through to you, who let me know that apparently “after tax day” was the intended action time all along and that the $75 for was “payment processing fees and also staff time it took to create your file, and correspondence”. Pretty hilarious given that I had to call 5 times over 4 weeks just to get a straight answer. What is my time worth for simply trying to understand what your intention is? This was just a really unpleasant experience around such a simple business function. Sure if I’d canceled the day before my appt or even inside of a week, charge me a fee for opportunity cost...but $75 for this? For occupying less than 24hrs on your calendar? File creation - when I never even discussed or shared information with you? So a template was generated with my name on it? I’m sure I’ve been an annoyance in my quest to get a straight answer, but that is a two way street. I am very much looking forward to concluding our business. I will look for the refund as specified next week. Brian Howell THEIR RESPONSE: Hi Brian: Yes, our time is valuable, especially during our busiest time of the season. You booked an appointment and agreed to the terms, which included the retainer being non-refundable. We understand things happen, and as a courtesy are issuing a partial refund. Take care, XXXX, Office Manager, West side

I gave them a second chance and they have won my business. I am a partner at Roofing Company and they have been great with walking us through our first full profitable year. Responsive & efficient. I have been working with Jasper only and am very happy to have him advising on tax & revenue questions. I strongly recommend giving them a chance if you own a small business and are looking to speak with a professional about getting started and progressing.

I made an appointment with Pacific NW Tax on Broadway for my mom, who had a very complicated return. She was also running late this year filing and was overwhelmed by some new tax complications--a new rental property and inherited stocks. I met her there with April, who was very patient and never rushed her, but went over everything in great detail. She filed an extension right away so my mom could relax. We had a review appointment with Baruch, who was wonderful about explaining the return. He also alerted us to some details we need to handle right away. He and April found deductions and also asked about possible deductions that we could find paperwork for. Baruch very patiently went over spreadsheets he had created for all the different aspects of various deductions. It is difficult to understand and he did a good job of showing us everything. I know Pac NW Tax has a policy of having several people review each return in case one person missed something, and they found something we missed and filed it for us for another state, thank goodness. We really appreciate the time and effort April and Baruch put into my mom's tax preparation (as well as other staff). The price was well worth it for such a complicated return--very reasonable compared to other tax professionals my mom has used. Pacific NW Tax will have our business in the future.