SMART BUSINESS

Posts Tagged ‘Attorneys’

Evaluating franchise attorneys and evaluating franchise consultants can seem a daunting task. But the firm a company selects to assist its entry into franchising, refine existing franchise efforts or make franchise opportunity investment decisions will have profound consequences. While asking for a list of references is one approach (and when is anyone ever dumb enough to provide a bad reference?) there are more objective criteria that are not dependent on selectively disseminated information.

By addressing the nine Franchise Questions, topics and subcategories of information discussed below, you will eliminate virtually 95% of the individuals or firms you are considering. Then efforts can concentrate on evaluating the 5% cream of the crop (especially franchise attorneys) that truly merit consideration:

A. FRANCHISE EXPERT:
The #1 factor in evaluating so-called expertise – are the principals really franchise experts? There are objective criteria to determine this:

(1) Have they qualified and been allowed to testify as a franchise expert in court and arbitration proceedings? Being involved as a franchise expert in the franchise litigation process gives a sensitivity and radar for detecting and avoiding future franchise problems.

(2) How many books on franchising have been written by the principals?

(3) How many franchise articles have been published in journals or magazines?

(4) What is their franchise-related teaching experience? (see topics E and F below)

(5) What is their depth of experience in the franchise industry? (see next topic below)

B. EXPERIENCE IN THE FRANCHISE INDUSTRY:
(1) Length of time the firm has operated exclusively in the franchise industry?

(2) Experience on both sides of the franchise fence – working with franchise companies (franchisors) as well as with individual investors (franchisees) who have purchased a franchise?

(3) Past experience principals have owning and operating a franchised business? This factor is absolutely critical. If the principals have owned and operated a franchise, they bring a unique perspective and radar for avoiding future franchise relationship problems from disgruntled franchise owners.

C. COMPREHENSIVE TRAINING & ONGOING SERVICES; CONTROL SYSTEMS:
(1) Can (and will) the firm train your personnel to operate and manage your new franchise company? Remember, you’re entering an entirely different business, one requiring new skills and abilities. If this topic is not addressed in detail, you might as well earmark the franchise fees received when you sell franchises for a future franchise litigation war chest;

(2) Will the firm help you review and update operational (franchise operations manual) and legal documentation (franchise offering circular) on an ongoing basis?

(3) Has the firm developed, and will they help you put into place, franchise marketing, sales control and legal compliance programs during the critical implementation (start-up) phase of your franchise program?

The existence of these programs is essential to ensure only the cream of franchise applicants are allowed to enter the network, and to create a series of documented files should a dispute arise in the future. Most of the legal risk in franchising occurs during the franchise marketing cycle when franchises are sold. If your company’s done a good job here with these programs, then you’ve eliminated most of the risk.

D. LEGAL: FRANCHISE ATTORNEY
(1) Is the law practice devoted exclusively to franchise law?

(2) Total number of franchise disclosure documents (formerly called franchise offering circulars) drafted and reviewed?

(3) Experience filing franchise registrations and working with state examiners in all 14-plus franchise registration states?

(4) Experience represeting franchise companies as well as persons buying a franchise? Knowing both sides of the fence is a tremendous asset.

E. ACADEMIC: UNIVERSITY & COLLEGE
Experience teaching franchise courses at graduate and undergraduate university levels?

F. ACADEMIC: PROFESSIONAL
Experience teaching franchise courses to franchise attorneys and general practice attorneys?

G. BLEND OF BUSINESS & LEGAL SKILLS:
Specialist franchise attorneys and law firms produce tight legal agreements (sometimes overly so leading to future franchise relationship problems) and usually adequate franchise offering circulars. Setting aside the overly tight contract issue, the problem is most franchise attorneys – franchise lawyers are not capable of making sound, strategic business decisions and providing practical, ongoing advice. Some franchise consultants, on the other hand, have good business sense, but lack the requisite legal skills. Questions:

(1) Does the firm have the proper blend of business savvy and in-house franchise legal expertise? It’s always a big plus if the franchise attorney also has an MBA. You can do a Google search with these twin attributes (franchise attorney MBA) and narrow the field considerably.

(2) Can the firm produce good legal documentation (franchise disclosure documents) and help you edit (or create) consistent operational documents (such as the franchise operations manual, training program, etc.) If your franchise agreement says “x” but your franchise operations manual or advertising materials say “y” about the same issue, be prepared to pay hefty franchise litigation fees and deal with franchise litigation attorneys in the future.

(3)Can the firm provide competent and practical ongoing advice in critical areas like effective franchise marketing, media decisions, interviewing franchise buyers, adopting the best franchise organizational structure, implementing a franchise advisory council, etc? Mistakes made in these areas can easily cost the franchise company tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars.

H. CONTRACT FAIRNESS:
Does the firm give you an option of choosing between:
(a) an hourly rate and
(b) a flat contract amount, where you don’t have to worry about accumulated hours and an unknown total amount?

I. RED FLAGS – BEWARE OF ANY OF THE FOLLOWING:

• Combination teams where one entity does one part of the project and another the other part. For example, a consulting firm does planning, and operational documentation, while an attorney “they know very well” writes the legal documentation.

• Or, a variant of the above, the company in the “fine print” of its contract, requires your attorney (who you obviously have to pay) to review and approve everything they do because the company (it says) is not rendering legal advice. Actually, by providing documents that affect legal rights, they are rendering legal advice, but in an illegal manner. It’s called the unauthorized practice of law. You end up paying two attorneys – yours and theirs. Besides the expense, it sets you up for future franchise problems. Their attorney represents who? The franchise packaging group, of course, and definitely not you. He or she is typically a recent law school graduate who hasn’t figured out what they’re doing is illegal and could cause them to lose their license to practice law. Besides that, they represent the franchise consulting group, whose interest is to churn as many franchise packages per year as possible. You end up with a bad franchise disclosure document and sloppy franchise operations manuals. To save time, the franchise agreement gets watered down so it’s easier to push through some franchise registration states. Some of the “t’s” may be crossed and some of the “i’s” dotted, but not most of them. The end product are documents that set you up for future franchise litigation difficulties.

• Firms that advise you to franchise your business, and they’ve never seen your business! You’d be surprised how often this happens.

• Firms that say they’ll write your franchise operations manual for you. How someone, who knows absolutely nothing about your business, could ever come close to anything but a mediocre product at best, is a frightening thought. The use of boilerplate manuals produced by consulting groups is yet another future litigation time bomb. You are the true expert in your business. With competent guidance and editing, you’ll be able to produce a professional and workable operations manuals, if you don’t have these already.

• Pricing quotes that seem exceedingly high or low (especially “do-it-yourself” franchise kits).

• If you are buying a franchise, BEWARE of any attorney recommended by the franchise company. Even worse, beware of franchise companies who say you don’t need to use an attorney. There are a couple of these online.

• Firms (or individuals) that have EVER been sued for fraud, misrepresentation, the unauthorized practice of law or violating any franchise law. DON’T FORGET TO ASK THIS CRITICAL QUESTION!!

©1990-2008, Kevin B. Murphy, B.S., M.B.A., J.D. – all rights reserved

For more informaton, consult the Franchise Foundations website.

 

 

 

The goal of finding a sensible solution to tax problems is what an IRS tax attorney has in mind. What really solves the problem and provides real tax relief is smart solution. Hence the term – intelligent. As time passes, overdue taxes only exacerbate as a result of incremental penalties and interest on top of taxes you owe.

The last place you must look to when you are wanting for sensible solutions is to the IRS. Common People make the mistake of trusting the IRS will be glad that the taxpayer came up to them in an honest attempt to compensate their taxes. Sadly, the IRS sees their office as virtually bestowed by divine right and can probably treat you like a fool rather than an honest taxpayer.

The IRS wants the complete amount of payment including interest and penalizations. The reason why you might not see results if you’ve tried working with the IRS directly is because they are not really interested in tax debt settlement. The agent is not going to offer a compromise, a tax reduction, or penalty abatement simply because you did the right factor by reaching them. Chances are the agency will observe if you were to bid for tax relief in order to know how ample you recognize such issues.

Facing the IRS on your own is not smart. Hiring IRS tax attorneys are like sending in the cavalry. You wish reinforcements that perceive the tax laws and stay abreast of all tax and tax enforcement rules. IRS tax attorneys recognize what rights taxpayers have and will champion those rights against the IRS.

Getting the services of an IRS tax attorney is the most effective way to induce tax relief. They have numerous strategies to make IRS contemplate on the many options available for tax relief.

Tax resolutions that work are the ones that provide a way to eliminate the tax charge. This does not mean you are eligible to a rebate that can be paid immediately. It implies that your s will talk terms about a tax payment program that will eventually pay off the payable tax amount.

The IRS tax attorneys can be in position to negotiate tax settlement that reduces or eliminates the taxes in some situations. It all depends on your current personal financial scenario and the grounds you owe the taxes.

When you hope for help in resolving your tax problems, Instant Tax Solutions will help. Accomplished tax attorneys will work with the IRS to look for out reasonable and sensible tax relief solutions. Attempting to deal with these problems entirely does not create any sense when you think about the history of the agency. A tax attorney will build thorough you are handled fairly in line with your taxpayer rights. Instant Tax Solutions has the tax knowledge and IRS negotiation skills to obtain a favorable and affordable settlement of your IRS tax debt problem.

Levy bank account Bank account garnished

The national and state tax authorities have varied tax-relief platforms that are geared toward reducing down the tax burden on the taxpayers. Underneath property tax relief, income tax relief, and relief for little business owners, nearly all of the tax-relief measures return. However, working through the tax forms and eventually getting the eligible tax relief is kind of a challenge to some taxpayers. Tax-relief attorneys or IRS tax attorneys are notably useful in this situation since they are trained in taxation and law and are responsive to the endless changes to tax laws and law makings both at the national and state levels. Since tax relief is targeted in an exceedingly ample part at taxpayers belonging to the senior citizens and low income categories, the help of a tax-relief attorney or an IRS tax attorney can be abysmally critical in securing that the tax relief is rapidly and easily obtained.

Tax-relief or IRS tax attorneys are attorneys who help taxpayers with tax-related problems. They assist taxpayers particularly in acquiring all of the tax relief that they’re worthy of from the national and state tax authorities. Nearly all tax-relief attorneys concentrate on providing their clients with services associated to offer in compromise, penalty abatement petitions, and full audit representations. Tax-relief attorneys work as private practitioners or are employed with tax firms. Most all of these tax firms have dedicated tax force who also take in charge preparation of tax forms and registering of taxes, but the exclusion of helping clients in getting tax relief.

Concisely, tax-relief attorneys and IRS tax attorneys are professionals who help with resolving tax-related issues. The broad services that they provide will be listed as settling tax debt for a fraction of the debt and whatever services in accordance to their profession. So, even though tax-relief attorneys target to provide services associated largely to tax relief, they also engage in other tax-connected function.

There are various firms that are capable of providing chargeable taxpayers with the IRS tax debt settlement help they need. Some of these firms are actually tax law firms, while some are companies with tax experts that assist with IRS back taxes. These firms are fundamentally staffed with IRS tax attorneys, CPAs, enrolled agents, and even previous IRS employees. These people have the ability and wisdom on how to successfully guarantee a tax debt settlement offer from the IRS. One of these firms is Instant Tax Solutions. Instant Tax Solutions will extend a free tax analysis which allows you to have your tax matter reexamined at no initial cost. Instant Tax Solutions is also aware of all other IRS tax relief platforms available should it come out that you are not likely to measure up for tax debt settlement.

Bank account garnishment Irs tax relief scam