Hi George,

Here's what IRS Publication 535, Chapter 12 (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p535.pdf) says about Consulting being incuded as a Specified Service Trade or Business: Consulting, including providing advice and counsel with the intention of influencing decisions made by a government or governmental agency and all attempts to influence legislators and other government officials on behalf of a client by lobbyists, and other similar professionals. However, it excludes the performance of services other than advice or counsel, such as sales, training or educational courses. It also excludes embedded or ancillary services that are otherwise not SSTBs, if there is no separate payment for the services.

Tax analysts at Intuit are not allowed to give tax advice.  This is a gray area and you would need to distinguish the services being provided as either consulting (SSTB) or software engineering (non-SSTB).

Thanks,

Mike D'Avolio

Intuit