PRIVACY POLICY

Our primary goal is to provide you, our clients, with the best accounting, tax and professional consulting services we can. We have always been committed to the protection of our clients’ privacy. As a CPA Firm and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, a Code of Professional Conduct that is more restrictive than the provision of the FTC governs us.

TYPES OF NONPUBLIC PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT

We collect nonpublic personal information about you that is provided to us by you or obtained by us with your authorization. We use that information to prepare your income tax returns and may also use it to provide various tax and financial planning services to you at your request.

PARTIES TO WHOM WE DISCLOSE INFORMATION

For current and former clients, we do not disclose any non-public personal information obtained in the course of our CPA practice except as required or permitted by law. Permitted disclosures include, for instance, providing information to our employees, and in limited situations, to unrelated third parties who need to know certain information to assist us in providing services to you. In all such situations, we stress the confidential nature of information being shared. To the extent permitted by law and any applicable state Code of Professional Conduct, certain nonpublic information about you may be disclosed in the following situations:

1.  To comply with a validly issued and enforceable subpoena or summons.
2.  In the course of a review of our firm’s practices under the authorization of a state or national licensing board, or as necessary to properly respond to an inquiry or complaint from such a licensing board or organization.
3. In conjunction with a prospective purchase, sale, or merger of all or part of our practice, provided that we take appropriate precautions (for example, through a written confidentiality agreement) so the prospective purchaser or merger partner does not disclose information obtained in the course of the review.
4. As a part of any actual or threatened legal proceedings or alternative dispute resolution proceedings either initiated by or against us, provided we disclose only the information necessary to file, pursue, or defend against the lawsuit and take reasonable precautions to ensure that the information disclosed does not become a matter of public record.
5. To provide information to affiliates of the firm and non-affiliated third parties who perform services or functions for us in conjunction with our services to you, but only if we have a contractual agreement with the other party that prohibits it from disclosing or using the information other than for the purposes for which it was disclosed. (Examples of such disclosures include using a third-party software vendor to process and transmit tax returns or engaging a records retention agency to store prior year records.)

Should we receive any request for the disclosure of privileged information from any third party, including a subpoena or IRS summons, we will notify you. In the event you direct us not to make the disclosure, you agree to hold us harmless from any expenses incurred in defending the privilege, including, by way of illustration only, our attorney’s fees, court costs, outside advisor’s costs, or penalties or fines imposed as a result of your asserting the privilege or your direction to us to assert the privilege.

PROTECTING THE CONFIDENTIALITY AND SECURITY OF CURRENT AND FORMER CLIENTS’ INFORMATION

We retain records relating to the CPA professional services that we provide so that we are better able to assist you with your professional needs and, in some cases, to comply with professional guidelines. In order to guard your non-public personal information, we maintain physical, electronic, and procedural safeguards that comply with the professional standards of the CPA industry.

To protect our client’s privacy, we provide secure online client access through the NetClient Portal on our homepage, wherein we provide you with secure, private access to your tax returns and other confidential documents as well as a secure method to upload private information to us. We urge all of our clients to take advantage of this convenient and simple way to communicate privately with us rather than by way of email since information contained in the text of an email or in attachments may not be secure against interception across the Internet. In connection with our work, we may communicate with you or others via email transmission. When providing documents containing private information at your request, they will be password protected. Nevertheless, we cannot guarantee or warrant that emails from us will be properly delivered and read only by the addressee. The use of our client portal is subject to the terms and conditions contained therein.

Please contact us if you have any questions or concerns regarding this privacy policy because the security of your information, our professional ethics, and the ability to provide you with quality CPA services are very important to us. Thank you for allowing us to serve your accounting, tax, and financial planning needs. We value your business and are committed to protecting your privacy. We hope you view our firm as your most trusted advisor, and we will work to continue earning your trust.