BNA Software — Sales & Use Tax Rates & Forms

The program’s client list
has been enhanced and is now called
Profiles, which is subdivided into
Entity, Individual and Preparer.
This feature is accessed by opening
a blank form, then either saving
the form or clicking on the Apply
Profile Information icon to have
the saved Profile information filled
out on the new form. Once the form
is finished, the form is saved in
the Profile folder. To see all the
saved forms of a certain Profile,
the user clicks on File | Saved
Forms | Profiles or the Saved Forms
and Profiles icon and then clicks
on the folder of that Profile.

BNA’s program uses replicas
of actual forms and schedules for
data entry, with fields that show
the active field, as well as user-entered
and transferred/calculated fields
using a customizable color scheme.

The most notable feature of this
program is the rate lookup utility.
Claiming to represent every taxing
jurisdiction in the United States,
this function is, nevertheless,
very simple to use. With one-click
access from the toolbar, a subwindow
allows users to search by ZIP Code,
city, state or county, and provides
not only the current rates for sales
and use taxes, but also the effective
dates of those rates and the previous
rates, including combined/split,
override and maximum rates and taxes
for overlapping entities, such as
transit systems, school and water
districts, and emergency services.
The rate lookup subwindow provides
a calculation tool that provides
an itemized list of sales and use
taxes per jurisdiction, as well
as a sum of all amounts. Commonly
looked-up jurisdictions can be saved
into a favorites list.
BNA’s application also includes
associated forms such as exemption
certificates, powers of attorney
and business registration forms.

PAPER FILING, ELECTRONIC COMPLIANCE &
PAYMENT – 2.5 Stars

BNA Sales & Use Tax Rates and
Forms can print approved, fileable
returns on blank paper on almost
any printer. The program does not
support electronic filing or payment
to any jurisdiction.

RATE UPDATES – 5 Stars
Included in the license cost, BNA
provides monthly rate updates on
CD, as well as weekly updates that
can be downloaded either automatically
(after configuring the system to
do so) or manually from BNA’s
web site. This is an impressive
feat considering the number of jurisdictions
and volatility of local tax rates.
A preparer with a client operating
in several cities and states could
be overwhelmed if not for this feature.

HELP/TRAINING – 4 Stars

BNA includes a full electronic version
of the user manual, as well as several
task-specific tutorials, both located
through the system’s Help
menu. These are the primary components
of the Help menu, which does not
provide the traditional index or
table of contents, leaving users
to only a text search of the user
manual. Toll-free phone- and e-mail-based
support is included with the program,
and users can also make use of the
online support center, which includes
FAQs, rate updates and phone/e-mail
listings. BNA Software also offers
CPE-accredited training and the
BNA Knowledge Center, which provides
analysis of current financial events
and legislation.

RELATIVE VALUE – 4.5 Stars
BNA Sales & Use Tax Rates and
Forms is geared toward professional
preparers and accountants with diverse
clients whose businesses take them
into multiple taxing jurisdictions.
The program is notably higher priced
than many of the programs in this
category that support only one or
a few states, but this program includes
not only all states, but all municipal,
county and special taxing jurisdictions
within them. That is where the greatest
value lies with this program, because
trying to keep up with changes in
just a few states could easily cost
more in research time and potential
penalties.

2004 OVERALL RATING: 4

For this review of sales
and use tax preparation programs,
we rated products on a scale of
one to five stars based on the following:

Navigation & Data Entry – This section looks at an application’s ease-of-use, its navigation tools and how new or infrequent users could perform within the program, as well as how client sales and tax data is delivered to the program: whether by manual entry, import/export, or direct integration with a company?s financial software.

Filing, Electronic Compliance & Payment – As electronic filing has grown in popularity in 1040 and other entity taxes,
it has started to reach into other
applications, including sales and
use tax. This section looks at the
support for electronic filing and
payment of sales and use taxes,
as well as paper return print and
filing functions.

Rate Updates – For very small concerns, keeping up with rate changes may not pose a great challenge, but for those conducting business in several markets, this volatile tax compliance field can be demanding and a drain on staff time. This section addresses how the software vendors provide such updates, whether periodically by CD, downloadable from their web sites, scheduled system downloads or, in the case of web-based programs, automatically. Much of the value in a sales tax compliance package is the relief they provide by not having to keep up with these changes.

Help/Training – This component looks at how the program provides assistance to users
through built-in help utilities,
tutorials, online support centers
and general functionality, in addition
to training options.

Relative Value – This is akin to the proverbial scale of justice, wherein the reviewer offers a subjective opinion of what the value of the software is compared to its price. There is wide disparity in pricing in this review section, so this section looks at whether the added features and functions in the pricier options justify the price. Of course, the final decision on value will be made by the prospective user after determining which features and how much jurisdictional coverage is required for his or her client.

2004 Overall Rating – This final rating provides an overview of how a product scored
in the above categories, and is
the average of those scores rounded
to the nearest half-star.