One would have thought after all the stories of malfeasance by Accountants
that have been in the press (Enron, Baptist Convention, etc...ad nauseam) that
the organizations that oversee their licensing would be a little more
proactive when it came to complaints. Well obviously not here in
Arizona.
As most of you know we fired our Accountant last year for cause.
1. Her high-school aged daughter took a blank signed check (signed by the
accountant) of the House Corp and made it out to a name on a drivers license
that she had stolen and tried to cash it at the check cashing place. There was
not enough money to cover the check or they would have cashed it for her. If
she had tried two days later there would have been funds available. The
daughter was arrested when we pressed charges and the accountant has been
hiding the daughter out of state in both Mexico and Utah and has missed
repeated court dates. Last I heard the Country is considering seeking an
arrest warrant.
and most importantly...
2. The Accountant got repeated notices for years from the IRS concerning at
least five years of unfilled tax returns. She ignored those notices and did
not notify us that there was a problem. It was only during our efforts
last year to secure financing to purchase the house that we discovered her
failure to notify us and to prepare and file the taxes (she had power of
attorney on these matters and was the signer on the checking account).
Last year, around June or July, we filed a complaint with the State Board of
Accountancy on these matters and an investigation was started. As I
understand what happened there was a change in the board last year and this
complaint got "forgotten". Because I had it on my calender to
follow-up every few months I kept contacting them to obtain a status.
Well this morning I called down to find out what the status was since I had
been told that the committee on these issues was meeting on 6/30. The
answer - to close the file. No letter of reprimand, no penalty
whatsoever.
That certainly inspires trust and confidence in the system to police renegade
members of their profession.