Business Innovators Radio - Interview with Caitlin Wedgewood, Partner with Knoll & Company P.C Discussing Tax PreparationServices

Episode Date: February 25, 2026

With over a decade of hands-on experience in bookkeeping and eight years specializing in tax preparation, Caitlin brings a strong foundation of financial expertise and reliability to our team. Holding an accounting degree and currently working toward CPA licensure, Caitlin is dedicated to providing accurate, timely, and client-focused support to small businesses and individuals.Learn more: https://www.knollcpa.com/The information provided in this content is for general informational purposes only and should not be construed as personalized financial, tax, or legal advice. While every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, laws and regulations frequently change and may vary depending on individual circumstances. Please consult a qualified financial, tax, or legal professional for advice specific to your needs before making any decisions. Knoll & Company P.C. and its representatives do not provide legal advice. All services are provided in accordance with applicable professional standards and ethical requirements.Influential Entrepreneurs with Mike Saundershttps://businessinnovatorsradio.com/influential-entrepreneurs-with-mike-saunders/Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/interview-with-caitlin-wedgewood-partner-with-knoll-company-p-c-discussing-tax-preparationservices

Welcome to influential entrepreneurs, bringing you interviews with elite business leaders and experts, sharing tips and strategies for elevating your business to the next level. Here's your host, Mike Saunders. Hello and welcome to this episode of Influential Entrepreneurs. This is Mike Saunders, the authority positioning coach. Today we have back with this Caitlin Wedgwood, who's a partner with Nolan Company PC and we'll be talking about their tax preparation services. Caitlin, welcome to the program. Hi, again. Thank you for having me again.

Hey, you're welcome. And I know that tax all of a sudden makes people's blood pressure spike when you just hear that word alone. So tax preparation, that's an action word. I've got to prepare something. Who can do that on their own? And yeah, I watch commercials on TV. And I see all those things and quick and easy and little people in the video bubble. But still, you're like, okay, you give what you pay for.

And the people that do the little free or the whatever online prep. It's like, is it really accurate? And so let's talk a little bit about what your firm does to set you apart regarding tax preparation. What do you feel is a differentiator that you would like people to know about Nolan Company? There's a couple of different ones that I would like people to know. We are very tech focused and we utilize a platform called Luccio. It's for document storage, but also for signing engagement letters, reviewing and signing a return. uploading your tax documents to us.

So essentially you can upload and get your items to us. Also sign your returns anywhere in the world. So there's no need to have to stop into the office and drop off the paperwork. Those days are long gone. And no matter what, we're going to always focus on tech. We are a paper-free office and absolutely love it. Another thing I would like people to know about our firm is we are really passionate, not only about people understanding their taxes, but also helping people optimize. If there's a new credit out there, we will let people know about the credit, but also whether or not they qualify for the credit.

We will, a good example actually is the Trump savings account that is coming out. There, you can either go online to fill out the application or it can be done with your tax return. Not very many people know that you're able to do it with your tax return. Well, that is something that we are offering this year. And if you don't know, the Trump savings account is only for babies born, I believe, is 25 through 27. They get an additional $1,000. So it is a really great, great program that not everybody's going to know about. We stay up to date on tax changes, tax benefits, things along those lines, to ensure that we're getting the best for our clients.

That's really great. I love that. And I'm sure we could probably also come up with 412 other ideas like, oh, and one time we had this client that, And it's just neat to hear that you're keyed in on that. Just like I've heard rumor that the tax code is like tens of thousands of pages, like 20,000, 30,000, something crazy. And it's like, how is a business owner supposed to know all of that to see what they can benefit from or take this deduction or write this off or this new program?

So having someone that is really keyed in on doing only that, I think is really huge for a business owner. Yes, that's exactly right. And since we do also offer bookkeeping and payroll services with our businesses that partake in those services, we're able to do analysis throughout the year to kind of see where they're at, see if we need to increase the owner's payroll or if we need to maybe buy a piece of equipment that you're on the fence about for current year or next year. We're able to do those analysis. throughout the year to make sure we are optimizing things as best as possible. And it's a strategy that you may not find with other accounting firms, or especially with a bookkeeper that may not know the tax laws that my, you know, my partner and I spend a lot of time studying and ensuring that we're up to date on. Yeah, that's a really great point. Talk a little bit about examples or really going deeper on what's the difference between tax prep and tax planning.

I feel like people just go, I have my taxes done. But there's kind of a little bit of a difference there between tax preparation and tax planning. Yes. So tax preparation is really just, you know, you get your W2 and maybe you have a 1099 interest. and you take that to a person, and they're really just copying the numbers from one form into their tax software. That's tax prep.

Tax planning, tax strategy can look like maybe you're getting close to retirement. So you want to move some funds from a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA. Well, since Roth IRAs are, they're not tax exempt. You have to pay taxes to move the funds from a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA. However, if you do it strategically, there's ways to lessen the tax burden of doing that. So, you know, maybe one year you know you're not going to have much income.

Well, that means that you can go ahead and move $30,000 to a Roth and take that money tax-free later. If you know you're going to, conversely, if you know you're going to have a lot of income, well, don't do the conversion that year. So that's something that we help our clients with. Same thing as if you're going to sell a rental property. We can help estimate what your tax liability is going to be and the benefits of maybe doing a Section 179,

which is essentially trading. one property for another income generating activity. So there's a lot of things out there that people may not, they may be aware of them, but not sure how to implement them. That's where I come in. I'm able to help with the planning, the strategy, so that we can lessen the tax burden and get as much money back into people's pockets as possible. You know, you brought up Roth, and I want to just talk really high level about that because I work a lot with financial advisors and in interviews with them.

I know that it's a strategy that could be helpful for some people to talk to the right professional. But I know that when you move it from a, you know, qualified account that hasn't been taxed yet, like your 401k or IRA, and you take money out to do the Roth strategy, it sounds great to grow tax free, but you trigger the taxes on whatever amounts. And part of what you mentioned is there's a strategy to that. And we don't want to get in the weeds. We don't want to use numbers or anything. But I just want to get your thoughts on, like if someone has this large account and we want to do the Roth conversion, it might mean, oh, you know what? Ultimately, we want to move all the money, some of the money, part of the money, but in stages.

Because if we took out X, the whole amount from the account, you're going to trigger the taxes in such a higher tax bracket. And all of that is confusing to people. but for someone from the tax side of things, you can look at it and go, okay, what we want to do is take out just this amount to keep you under this limit and then the next year we'll do that. But you can't do that on your own and neither can chat GPT. That's exactly correct. Yeah, again, technology is a tool. Chat GPT is great.

However, I have caught, we actually use one called CPA pilot and I have caught it giving me incorrect numbers and I had to ask it why it gave me that. So I would not trust any sort of chat GPT or any sort of AI platform to give me correct numbers in regard to converting because the consequences of it can be significant in a financial respect. And it is very important to do this strategically. Because like you said, if you do it wrong, you're ending up in a higher tax bracket. And that's not what we want. Yeah. Yeah, that's a, that's a good, that's a good point. So let's talk a little bit about also, you know, the proverbial way back in the day is, you know, you talk about technology. Well, let's look at the opposite. I just throw them my receipts in a shoebox and I bring them to the accountant at the end of the year. Or maybe someone feels like they're really techie and they've just taken pictures of the receipts and then you get this big, you know, zip file email like, here's all my stuff. Good luck. but you feel like clients should be doing year-round tax planning as opposed to just at the end of the year, you know, go and do my taxes. Talk a little bit about that.

Yeah. So year-round tax planning is especially important for small businesses that have up and down years. So most tax preparers, when they finish the tax return, the current year tax liability will be used. use to create estimates for the following year. And what estimates are is then you would pay your taxes in quarterly instead of like via a W-2 withholding. However, a lot of small businesses, I guess not a lot, but some small businesses can have a lot of fluctuation year over year.

Well, say that they had a tax bill of $20,000 in year one, but year two, they did 20,000 less in income, which brought their tax liability down to zero. Well, they don't need to make those tax estimates throughout the year because their tax liability is not going to be there. So by doing tax strategy tax planning throughout the year, we're able to tell that client, look, this estimate that we have scheduled for Q1 of year two, we don't need to do that this share will reanalyze in Q2. Look at Q2, same thing. We don't need to make that.

Maybe Q3, they have a really big, the profitable period. Okay, let's go ahead and make an estimated payment. And then come year end, turns out that their income was low enough that the one estimated tax payment made was enough. to cover their tax liability. So that's a strategy that we'll use. Another one is looking at maybe a client has an extraordinary year in comparison to the prior year,

but they want to buy a new vehicle. Should they buy it in current year or wait for a year? Those are the types of things that we'll look at because there's a lot of benefits via depreciation that are going to come into play. That's a really good point. And I think that there's also, it kind of reminds me of like you want to be proactive, not reactive. You know, you don't want to go, oh, this happened, let's go fix it.

You want to go, this could happen. Let's prevent it. And that's what you're describing there. Exactly. Yep. So what are some other things when you're sitting down with a business owner and maybe they're considering coming on board with a new tax prep, tax planning, tax strategy company? What are some of the things that you're seeing in their current situation that are some of the low-hanging fruit that you're able to recommend and fix for them right away?

Typically, utilization of business expenses. There's some strategies out there that not every accounting firm is utilizing. One that comes right to mind is called an accountability plan for an S corporation, which allows the S-corporation owner to be. reimbursed for home office expenses. I have not been seeing a lot of new clients coming on with that as an option or with that being utilized, I should say. So something along those lines of like, say expenses not being utilized. a lot of clients don't understand their tax returns.

Now this is both business and individual, and I feel it is absolutely imperative for everybody to understand their tax return. So one thing that I will really push with new clients is, look, I will do your taxes, but I really would love for us to have a meeting. If we can't do it during tax season, then let's do it after tax season. But I want to go line by line on your return

and make sure you understand where these numbers are coming from and what they're doing. And the reason I feel that's so important is just because if they don't remain my client and go somewhere else, I want to make sure that they know what their tax return should look like. So there's no chance of, fraudulent activity because that is on a rise in my industry. A lot of made up expenses and incorrect returns are being filed.

And that liability falls back on the taxpayer, not the tax preparer. Yeah. Yeah, because you're the one that put the expense in. Yeah, exactly. Yep. Great point. Well, I tell you, there's so many things that go into running a business, growing a business and taxes and bookkeeping shouldn't be one of the ones that, you know,

takes up a large percentage of your brain power, stress, and time. So for someone looking for tax preparation services and building off of what we've talked about here, what's the best way that they can learn more and then also reach out and connect with you? Best way to learn more and connect with us is to go to noelcpa.com. And in the upper right hand corner, there is an option to get in touch. You can also take a look at the services that we offer, as well as everybody in the firm. Excellent. Well, Caitlin, thank you so much for coming back on. It's been a real pleasure chatting with you. Same. Thank you so much for your time. You've been listening to influential entrepreneurs with Mike Saunders. To learn more about the resources mentioned on today's

show or listen to past episodes, visit www. influential entrepreneurs radio.com