We collaborate with accountants and bookkeepers because few of them have law licenses, and we are not experts in tax. It takes a team of highly-skilled contributors to operate a business, and we can’t be skilled in everything. We know enough to spot potential tax issues, and we will often recommend you consult your accountant regarding tax consequences of the work we do together.
In reverse, accountants and bookkeepers frequently refer clients to us who have been assessed penalties for failure to secure workers compensation, disability, and Paid Family Leave insurance for their employees. This includes employees who had been misclassified as independent contractors. We have also supported accountants in providing their clients exceptional service by helping them resolve other workplace disputes that might otherwise end up in court.
Services for Employers
- Penalty Resolution (e.g., disability, Paid Family Leave, workers compensation)
- Legal Consultations and Compliance Support (e.g., audits, audit defense, policies)
- Mediation of Workplace Disputes (e.g., discrimination, performance, sexual harassment)
- Continuing Education and Training (e.g., Managing Diverse Workforces, Sexual Harassment Prevention)
Services We Refer to Strategic Partners
- Taxes, payroll, or financial advising
- Bankruptcy or business dissolution
- Commercial litigation
- Intellectual property protection or litigation
- Litigation of discrimination, ERISA, or Wage and Hour claims
- Mergers and acquisitions
How We Support Accountants in These Areas
Penalty Resolution
We have resolved hundreds of penalties for employers who staffed their businesses solely with independent contractors, not realizing they had misclassified many of them independent contractors. Austin is one of them. He is a typical entrepreneur running a multi-million dollar general contracting business in the construction industry. A master of collaboration, he often has three or more huge projects in progress simultaneously and keeps them all moving with his teams of strategic partners. Some of them have formed separate businesses. Others have not. When one of their workers filed for unemployment insurance (UI) after being terminated from Austin’s project, he was audited for potential UI liability. This also triggered a workers compensation, disability, and Paid Family Leave insurance inquiry.
Austin thought he could simply return the inquiry form to the Workers Compensation Board with an explanation that he had no employees. His accountant told him this was fine, since they had classified all workers as outside labor and took a reasonable deduction on the business’ income tax returns. The Board disagreed with some of Austin’s classifications, especially where the workers were laborers paid under their social security numbers, instead of tax identification numbers (TIN) assigned to businesses.
We got Austin’s business in compliance, resolved the penalties, and worked with his accountant to prevent future ones.
Business Dissolution and Restructuring
We have assisted small and family businesses with multiple owners resolve the personal conflicts hindering dissolution or restructuring. Dallas was one of them. She was a founding shareholder in a small corporation in the computer technology industry. Not surprising, the corporation was formed online, using a well-known retailer of legal forms. The business was growing so quickly that Dallas and her co-owners forgot to hold their organizational meeting and pass the by-laws governing the business. They kept growing, well beyond their wildest dreams, and investors began competing for a piece of the pie.
Of course, investors want to see complete and accurate records, and Dallas’ business didn’t have them. She approached her fellow shareholders about formalizing the by-laws only to discover they each had very different views of how much ownership they held individually. Because one of the owners initially refused to meet with the group, we were unable to resolve the disputes through mediation. Instead, we counseled Dallas on her legal rights and helped her to develop a communication strategy based on mediation techniques, or the Third Ear Conflict Resolution process.
Dallas did not want to enter an adversarial process like litigation with the friends she trusted enough to go into business with. We helped her guide them to agreements that built effective by-laws and dispute resolution processes. The business has since grown at least three-fold, which keeps their accountant very busy.
Commercial Litigation
We have intervened when collaborators disagree about creative direction, intellectual property, the value of sweat equity, and more. Similar to Dallas’ situation, Belton went into business with a colleague he thought he knew well. He was a musician; his colleague was a videographer. They respected each other’s work and decided to create a music video together. Everything went well initially. Belton created the music tracks. His colleague filmed a lot of video footage. Both had invested a lot of time, money, and effort forming their separate visions for the final work. Neither realized how far apart their visions seemed.
When Belton called the videographer to discuss changes, one of them would get so angry that he would hang up the phone and refuse to talk to the other for several days. They had already paid for a launch campaign and other services in anticipation of the video’s release, but neither could imagine working with the other.
Through mediation, we got the video project back on track. (We can’t give more details due to our commitment to client confidentiality, but it’s good!) The two artists haven’t done additional work together, but Belton’s accountant has a happy client that is still producing other profitable works regularly.