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Tax Tech eNews
Volume 1
January 2012
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Happy New Year!
Welcome to the January 2012 Edition
of ACT's Tax Tech eNews!
We are looking forward to another great year! As always, Members will be receiving timely information regarding trends in tax technology, as well as tax law updates through informative articles and webinars. Members are also invited to participate in surveys throughout the year, as well as have unlimited access to the survey results, such as the results included in this edition of eNews. Everyone is invited to attend the 2012 Annual ACT Conference, and if you are a member, you will receive special "Member's Only" pricing upon registration. If you are not currently an ACT Member, now is a great time to join!
Don't forget that all ACT Memberships expired on 12/31/2011. If you have already renewed, Thank You! If not, please renew now to prevent any disruption in your ACT benefits. You may do so by clicking here or calling our office at 845-987-9690. Don't forget -- now is also a great time to update your profile information, as well as add additional team members to your Regular Membership profile at no additional charge.
We would also like to invite you to join us at the 2012 Annual Conference being held at the Walt Disney World Contemporary Resort in Orlando, Florida May 23-25, 2012. Registration for the conference is now open. Be sure to complete your registration before March 1, 2012 in order to receive the full early bird discount. This is your only opportunity to benefit from the live presentations and networking until 2013, so register today!
We have an outstanding line-up of presentations by experts in the tax and tax technology fields. This conference is perfect for tax professionals who want to better utilize technology and for the IT professionals seeking to learn more about best practices in the tax technology field.
Attending the ACT conference is a great way to learn how other companies are utilizing technology in the tax function. It's an opportunity to see the latest offerings from tax software vendors and to network with other companies to find out how well their technology solutions work. It's also a great way to stay current on topics such as data warehousing, VAT, R&D tax credit, provision, international tax, sales and use tax, property tax, best practices within tax, budgeting, project management, Power Excel training for tax, and much more!
This year the conference is arranged a little differently, based on your feedback, we are continuing to offer a full day of specialized sessions for you to choose from on Wednesday. These sessions will include data warehousing, tax sensitizing your ERP, tax training for technology professionals, property tax, sales and use tax, budgeting, and more! All General Sessions will be held on Thursday and Friday with the conference ending at lunch time on Friday. And if you have a little extra time, conference participants are invited to purchase discounted Walt Disney World attraction tickets directly from the hotel. Both the weekend before and after the conference is "Star Wars Weekend", which is always a lot of fun for the entire family!
We look forward to working closely with you in the new year and seeing you in sunny Florida!
Sincerely,
The ACT Board, Committees, and Staff
Thank you to our 2012 Sponsors
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 The Evolution and Technology of Hosting Written by: Mike Carabott, PTS Services, LLC
In recent years, tax departments began facing the decision of whether or not to utilize hosted software solutions for their key tax processes, particularly provision and compliance. Make no mistake; this was no small change. Corporate tax departments had a long history of owning and managing their own data through self-hosted solutions, and the emphasis on security by legislation such as Sarbanes-Oxley made tax departments wary of having their critical data stored somewhere outside of the corporate data center. However, driven by vendors able to demonstrate that they could provide a high level of security, tax departments began taking advantage of hosted solutions.
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Automating Your Transactional Tax Environment
Written by: Scott Billadeau, DSTax Consulting
This article is meant as an overview of Indirect Taxes and the Automated solutions and is article #1 of a 3 article series. Future articles will drill down into more details on some of the more important aspects of evaluating what automated indirect tax engine is right for your company.
Transactional Taxes
Transactional taxes include United States sales taxes (collected by the retailer) and use taxes (remitted by the purchaser) as well as international value added taxes (including Canada GST, PST, HST). Sales and use taxes are two sides of the same coin, meaning a purchaser may need to either pay sales to a vendor, or remit use tax to a state, but not both.
Transactional Tax Software
Several software applications have been developed to assist companies with their transactional taxability determinations and tax calculations ("Tax Engines”). In addition there are also independent tax compliance and reporting software applications for the US indirect taxes ("Compliance Packages”).
Click here to read more of this article.
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With the start of a new year, now is a great time to re-activate existing members, as well as add and remove members on your account. Regular Members can add as many members to their accounts as they would like for no additional charge. So, now is a great time to add your sales and use tax team, your IT support, and anyone else in your organization you think might benefit from the information provided through ACT.
If you would like to add or remove members on your account, do the following *NOTE: Only the Primary on the account can perfrom these steps:
1. Click on "My Profile" on the right menu. (Note: You must be logged in first).
2. Click on "Sub-accounts".
3. To add new sub-accounts, enter the email address of each person. You may enter one email address per line. Click "Send Invite".
4. The sub-accounts you just invited will be able to now setup their profile and begin accessing the ACT website as a member.
5. To remove members from your account, click on the "blue person" icon to detach the member's account and then click on the red X to suspend the member's account.
**Each year the primary must enable all sub-accounts they would like to have as member, so if you are a sub-account and cannot access the website, please contact your Primary Account Manager or contact us.
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The ACT Career Center Is The Key to Finding the Right Candidate or Finding Your Dream Job!
Looking to hire someone or just looking for a new job to start the new year? Don't forget to check out the new ACT Career Center! The Career Center will allow you to find career opportunities specific to your role and industry at other ACT Member companies, as well as non-member companies. When you find a targeted opportunity you are interested in, you will be able to post your resume anonymously and create job alerts -- all in less time than it takes to search through job postings on the mass job boards -- all for free! In addition, if you are looking to fill a position within your company, you can post the position to our Career Center and have the opening viewed by individuals all over the world which provides you with a very large base of talent to fill the position! ACT Members can post their first Career Opening for free and then post additional jobs at a deeply discounted price. Check your email or click here to get your ACT Member Discount Code.
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Ask the Excel Expert: How to Use the "vlookup" Formula
Written by: Eric Lin, Seagate Technology
This month’s article will feature the "vlookup” formula and how it could be useful for tax professionals when working with their excel spreadsheets.
The lookup formula is one of the most commonly used functions when trying to relate or "lookup” two or more sets of data with each other. . Click here to read more of this article. |
Bi-Monthly Webinars
We hope that you have been able to attend and have been enjoying our bi-monthly webinars. As a reminder, if you have missed any of the previous webinars, please click here to visit our website for a link to the archived presentations.
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Next Webinar
Best Practices Implementing a Transaction Tax Engine
By Effectively Tax Sensitizing Your ERP Data
| Host and Sponsor: |
Ernst & Young |
| Date: |
February 21, 2012 |
| Time: |
2:00 PM EST |
| Duration: |
1 Hour |
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Implementing a transaction tax engine brings unique challenges for every Corporate Tax Department. Utilizing Best Practice techniques to configure ERP data can conquer these challenges resulting in a World Class Tax Function. This session will address the challenges of implementing a transaction tax engine as well as the benefits derived by showing how to:
- Control risk
- Add enhancements
- Increase accuracy
- Boost productivity
Speaker Opportunity
ACT is looking for speakers that are experts in their area to speak at our webinars. If you have a presentation you would like to contribute or if you have a topic you would like us to cover, please let us know by filling out the Speaker and Author Opportunity Form.
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2011 ACT Tax Department Survey
Each year, the Association for Computers & Taxation (ACT) surveys its members to learn about current trends in corporate tax automation. This report is a summary of selected information from the ACT software survey conducted in the Summer/Fall of 2011. The survey canvassed tax automation decision makers and users to find out what tax systems, hardware and software products are currently being used. The members were also asked to evaluate their tax automation tools, and provide feedback on their successes and shortcomings.
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Registration is Now Open for the 2012 Annual ACT Conference
Be sure you arrive early Tuesday, May 22, 2012 to join us at the Welcome Reception beginning at 4:30PM.
To view a description of all of the conference sessions, click here.
Conference Registration Fees:
- Before March 1, 2012 (includes a $150 early bird discount)
Regular Member: $790.00
Regular Non-Member: $990.00
Associate Member Sponsor: $790.00
Associate Non-Member Sponsor: $990.00
Associate Member Non-Sponsor: $1390.00
Assoicate Non-Member Non-Sponsor: $1590.00
- After March 1, 2012 and Before April 23, 2012 (includes a $75 early bird discount)
Regular Member: $865.00
Regular Non-Member: $1065.00
Associate Member Sponsor: $865.00
Associate Non-Member Sponsor: $1065.00
Associate Member Non-Sponsor: $1465.00
Assoicate Non-Member Non-Sponsor: $1665.00
- After April 23, 2012 (no discount)
Regular Member: $940.00
Regular Non-Member: $1140.00
Associate Member Sponsor: $940.00
Associate Non-Member Sponsor: $1140.00
Associate Member Non-Sponsor: $1540.00
Assoicate Non-Member Non-Sponsor: $1740.00
Attendee Types:
A Regular Member or Regular Non-Member Attendee is a person from any company which has a continuing ownership, or lease and use of tax related computer software, except a company that develops and/or markets such software and except a company which is engaged in the business of providing consulting services or personnel recruitment. Those not meeting the requirements of Regular Membership are considered Associate Attendees.
If you are uncertain which type of attendee to select, please contact us or call 845-987-9690. If you select an attendee type you are not eligible for when registering, we will refund or invoice you for the difference.
If you are an ACT Member registering a non-ACT Member, the non-ACT Member registration needs to be completed separately or have them join as a member before doing your registration.
**If you are a member, please be sure you login before registering in order to receive the member price.
Cancellations:
To cover administrative costs, a service fee will be charged for all canceled registrations. Cancellations received in writing by April 23, 2012 will incur a service fee of 20% of the original registration fee paid. Cancellations received after April 23, 2012 and no-shows will be charged the full conference fee. Submit your refund request to dmerritt@taxact.org no later than April 23, 2012.
Your conference registration includes:
- Attendance at all General Sessions on Thursday and Friday
- Attendance at your choice of 5 Sessions on Wednesday during each time slot*
- Breakfast and Lunch Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday
- Participation at the Welcome Reception on Tuesday evening
- Participation in the Vendor Expo and Reception on Wednesday evening
- Participation in the Networking Event on Thursday evening
- You will also receive an attendee bag that contains information related to the conference, vendors, and a USB drive with all conference presentations included
* For the sessions on Wednesday, you may select to attend one session for each time slot.
Additional Helpful Information:
- You should make your hotel reservations as soon as possible. We expect the hotel block to sell out.
- Through ACT's partnership with our conference management team, we were able to negotiate an oustanding room rate of $189/night double occupancy. Be sure to make your reservations through the hotel link to get the discount ACT rate. If you do not make your hotel reservations before the hotel deadline, the rate will increase.
- The special room rate will be available until April 30, 2012 or until the group block is sold-out, whichever comes first.
- The Group Rate is available three days before and three days after, based on availability. If you are told that the ACT room block is sold-out, try entering the exact conference dates.
- Included with your registration is the Disney Magical Express which is transportation to and from the Orlando airport. Once you have confirmed a room reservation, complete the Disney online form for group guests or call (407) 827-6777 to provide your flight information for Disney's Magical Express. To ensure seamless service, please provide this information at least 30 days prior to your arrival date.
- Also, as a conference attendee, you may purchase Disney attraction tickets at a discounted rate through the hotel.
- The hotel has requested we use their online system to book hotel reservations. To make your reservation, please click here.
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Member Spotlight - Greg Sopin, Owens & Minor
Calling all members! If you have a process you've automated or streamlined in your tax department, other members want to know. If you are interested in being featured in our eNews Member Spotlight, please contact us.
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The Tax Tech eNews is published by the Association for Computers & Taxation (ACT), a nonprofit organization. Permission is required to reproduce in any form. Opinions expressed are solely the author's, and not the opinion of ACT. Send all editorial correspondence, manuscripts, etc. to: ACT, P.O. Box 1093, Warwick, NY 10990.
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