Thank you. You are so right. Yes having the forms is one thing, completing them correctly is yet another. I saw somewhere that Intuit said Form 5471 was a reconciliation of GILTI income, as though it was something new.
My practice does not have but a few clients that require 5471, 5472, 965, etc. and certainly not enough to justify paying more for tax software but more importantly, making the transition so late in the year. I have been downloading IRS Adobe pdf forms, completing them and compiling them using a PDF editor. But it seems that every time the IRS updates a form, it is not totally compatible with Adobe, with the biggest problem being (aside from not being able to save completed forms in many cases) is that when you compile several of the same forms, the numbers "bleed through" and all the forms either have the information of one entity or the information mixes that of different entities into one form. Last year this occurred on forms that were not compiled with others but only filed in the same folder on my PC. So this is no longer an option.
Thanks again for replying to my ranting. I am now approaching 69 years of age and although I have been specializing in international tax my entire career, I am now finding it so very frustrating that the treasury doesn't simplify this for small businesses. I also don't understand how these other expat online tax services can do this type of work at such a ridiculously low fee. Actually I can. I have seen Block employees prepare "forms" without regard to previously made elections, I have seen CPA's who claim proficiency in international and expatriate tax screw up 5471s and schedules (especially these new schedules like J and P, file returns with no unreported income under the Streamlined program and submit incorrectly prepared 5471s, FBARs, 8938s, etc. Now as the new accountant, I am left advising if I should go back and amend this CPA's mess, and possibly open a can of worms on the new client.
