Professional Development and Event Catalog

When auditors perform attestation engagements and reviews of financial statements under the Yellow Book, they must apply additional performance and reporting requirements. This course is designed to help you understand and effectively apply the Yellow Book performance and reporting requirements for attestation engagements and reviews of financial statements.

When auditors perform financial audits under the Yellow Book, they must apply nine areas of additional performance requirements and seven areas of additional reporting requirements. This course is designed to help you understand and effectively apply the Yellow Book performance and reporting requirements to financial audits.

With different tax rates for individuals and trusts, tax planning takes on more importance. New legislation increases the importance of generating new ideas for financial planning and saving for retirement. The purpose of this course is to explore practical tax-planning ideas that practitioners can use to assist clients with their needs. This course is crucial for CPAs who are looking for good ideas that can save clients money! Continually updated for legislative developments.

With tax rates for individuals, estates and trusts changing, tax planning takes on more importance. New ideas for financial planning and retirement must be considered. The purpose of this course is to explore practical tax-planning ideas that practitioners can use to assist clients with their needs. This course is crucial for CPAs who are looking for good ideas that can save clients money! Continually updated for legislative developments.

The phrase "time management" is misleading. No one manages time. Instead, we manage events in our lives which consume time. Like money, time is both finite and valuable; it should be budgeted and used wisely. Those individuals who "manage" or budget their time wisely often are more productive, less stressed, and able to achieve their goals more effectively than others. Professionals by nature place a high value on their time. Still, successful time management strategies vary based upon the personality, motivation, and discipline of each individual. This course provides simple, practical, and powerful techniques that help professionals work efficiently and achieve better balance in their lives. Successful time management skills also reduce the risk of burnout, which in turn improves the likelihood of achieving success in any endeavor.

The use of technology by businesses of all types, including CPA firms, has exploded in recent years, creating the need for proactive and robust cybersecurity risk management practices. This trend has created the need for a data-driven decision-making process but has also introduced risks into many companies' operating environment. This course will explore the most common technology risks and trends that every CPA should know to better advise and serve clients.

Required minimum distributions (RMD) must begin for the year in which the account owner reaches age 72 unless an exception applies. RMDs must also be taken from inherited accounts, and the process for determining RMDs for these accounts is more complex than those that apply to RMDs for non-inherited accounts. Failure to comply with the RMD rules will result in the account owner owing the IRS a 50% excess accumulation penalty on any RMD shortfall. Interested parties must understand the compliance requirements that apply to RMDs to be able to assist in ensuring that penalties are avoided.

Business tax changes that come from legislation, IRS pronouncements of various kinds, and court cases. This program analyzes the new opportunities that these tax changes offer to businesses and their owners.

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and SECURE Act 2.0 both contained tax law changes that impact many individuals in 2023 and in later years. This program covers many of these changes as well as other tax topics that continue to impact individual income taxpayers.

This program is an in-depth analysis of the Section 754 election and the two adjustments associated with the election under Section 743(b) and Section 734(b). The 754 election is a highly technical provision that provides great tax benefits to the owners of the partnership, and particularly in the case of Section 743(b), a new partner. In this webinar, our expert panel will cover the most common questions encountered by practitioners in their daily practices. The program includes a number of examples that provide insights into the mechanics of the two adjustments that follow upon a Section 754 election.

New accountants, whether coming right out of school or from industry will find that the accounting profession is heavily governed by technical and ethical standards. In addition, the new accounting professional will need to understand new terminology as well as what their team members and clients expect of them by way of job performance and client service. This module will help those transitioning to the accounting profession to understand the role of the accountant in public accounting and in industry, discuss the major standards relating to ethics including integrity, objectivity, independence and serving the public trust. (Please Note: This module is part of Surgent's Audit Skills Training: Level 1.)

This course provides an overview of the similarities and key differences between the revenue recognition and business combination standards issued by the FASB and IASB. While these standards are similar in many material respects, there are notable differences that are good to understand. However, this course is not intended to provide an exhaustive discussion of these differences.

This course is a case study designed to provide a comprehensive overview of U.S. taxation of a foreign corporation. Using a specific example, the course will walk through step-by-step mechanics on how to calculate the income inclusions and foreign tax credits under GILTI (Global Intangible Low-Taxed Income), Subpart F, and PFIC (Passive Foreign Investment Company) regimes. The case study will further evaluate tax impact of subsequent distributions from the foreign corporation and sales of its stock. A compare-and-contrast approach will highlight the different outcomes of these regimes for individuals and for C corporations, empowering participants to advise their clients on the most tax efficient way to structure their international investments.

Surgent has partnered with UiPath(TM), the world's leading robotic process automation (RPA) software company, to provide this CPE course that gives learners practical application in RPA. Participants in this course receive an engaging introduction to RPA through an experiential, use-case approach. They learn how general, real-world problems can be solved in a non-RPA environment. The course teaches skills that enable participants to create a robot using free UiPath software to automate the solution. By automating repetitive tasks and streamlining workflows with RPA, firms and their employees can benefit from fewer errors, increased productivity, and job satisfaction.

This course provides CPAs with a comprehensive understanding of derivatives and hedging in financial management. Participants will explore the fundamentals of derivatives, their strategic role in risk management, and the differences between hedge accounting and traditional accounting methods. The course specifically covers fair value, cash flow, and net investment hedges, and discusses their practical applications. This course also addresses hedge accounting, including designation, documentation, and effectiveness testing.

In 2006, Congress passed the Tax Relief and Health Care Act. Prior to the Act's passage, rewards to individuals who provided information to the IRS regarding tax fraud were capped at $10 million. The Tax Relief and Health Care Act authorized the IRS to create a Whistleblower Office dedicated to investigating, processing and recovering claims concerning the underpayment of taxes. Under the IRS' new program, whistleblowers may recover 15 to 30 percent of the amount collected provided the taxes and amounts in dispute exceed $2 million. If the whistleblower's claim does not meet these criteria, the IRS may still consider granting an award under its pre-2006 Tax Relief Act discretionary authority. Given the rapid growth of this program, practitioners should have a basic understanding of the procedure and content for IRS Whistleblower claims, both from the perspective of a claimant's potential to recover and a taxpayer's exposure to liability.

The enforceability of non-compete agreements in the U.S. is in flux. While the FTC's proposed ban is on hold pending legal proceedings, existing state laws continue to govern the validity of non-compete clauses. Some states, like California, Oklahoma, and North Dakota, prohibit non-compete agreements, while others enforce them under certain conditions. Although state laws vary, non-competes are often used to protect the creation and development of corporate goodwill, customer relationships, and specialized training, among others. Today, employees are more likely to be asked to sign non-compete agreements as a condition of employment. Non-compete agreements are also a common component of a business sale agreement. This program surveys non-compete agreements from all angles, including the current state of play regarding the usefulness and enforceability of agreements going forward. Whether you advise individual clients or work for an employer, this course provides an understanding of common issues that arise in the negotiation and enforcement of non-competes.

How debt is allocated to the partners in a partnership is important. It dictates how much money may be taken tax-free as a distribution, the losses that flow down to the partners, and the gain or loss on the sale of a partnership interest. However, the allocation of debt can differ depending on the type of debt it is and the type of partner we are talking about. Furthermore, 704(c) can complicate things. And what in the world is a constructive liquidation scenario? In this course, we will tackle the concept of debt allocations - how you do it, what it means, and why you do it.

Partnership tax law is always difficult. However, when certain transactions come up, not knowing how to handle them can be costly to clients and practitioners. In this course, we discuss several of these types of situations. We will explore the tax impacts of a PTE election and how a 754 election affects the inside basis of partnership assets. We will then examine those tricky look-through provisions on the sale of a partnership interest in order to properly calculate the tax implications.

Calculating partnership basis is one of the most important things that we do as practitioners. However, it is also one of the most confusing. When we use the term "basis," we really could be referring to one of three different things. This course will explore the differences between inside basis, outside basis, and 704(b) basis. Through several examples and practice problems, we will show you how to easily distinguish among these terms. We will also explore the tax implications of initial contributions of property to a partnership as well as the different types of partnership distributions.