By: Fabiola Grosshan
Submitted: 2010-05-20 07:11:07 | Word Count: 439
There is a large number of accounting firms on Long Island, many of them located in the town of Smithtown, which hosts the largest industrial park on the Island, in the hamlet of Hauppauge. If you’re a local business searching for a Smithtown CPA (certified public accountant) or Hauppauge CPA you’ll have plenty of options to consider. But how do you pick the right local tax accountant if you’re a small Long Island business looking to expand? The following are just a few helpful tips to consider.
Are They Certified?
The first thing you’ll want to make sure of is that the tax accountant you pick is a certified public accountant or a certified management accountant (depending on your business’s needs). Certification does not make an accounting company ideal, but it does ensure that they meet certain standard prerequisites, like having a thorough amount of standardized industry knowledge, education and experience.
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Get Leads From Within Your Industry
One good way to start looking for a qualified local tax accountant that will best fit your business is to ask for leads from within your own industry. Financial accountants tend to specialize in helping businesses in a certain niche industry. Accountants who are working for other businesses like yours are more likely to be able to satisfy your own business’s needs.
Pick an Accountant That Fits Your Size
In addition to looking for a local accountant that is familiar with your industry, you’ll also want to look for one that has experience working with businesses that are similar in size to yours. It might seem like a good idea to contract a large company with vast resources and staff, but such companies are often used to dealing with bigger businesses that have bigger budgets and concerns. If you’re a small Long Island company just looking to expand, it might be better to go with an accountant that deals primarily with small to medium sized businesses.
In-Person Interviews
There is no better way to gauge the integrity and reliability of a financial firm than to conduct thorough, in-person interviews. Find out the personality of the people you’ll be dealing with and make sure that you can communicate easily and naturally with them. Your ability to convey your needs to them and their ability to understand them is a key part of a working partnership. During the interview make sure also that you get a written estimate of the expected service costs.
