Category Archives: Legal / Accounting

By Christine Graf

Tax advisory CPA firm Bucknam & Conley has relocated its offices to a larger space at 18 Division St. in Saratoga Springs.

Founded 30 years ago by CPA Melinda Bucknam, the business has six employees. Co-managing partner Carissa Conley, CPA, joined the firm two years ago and formed a partnership with Bucknam in 2021.

“We focus on tax work,” said Conley. “We don’t do audit work, and we don’t work with non-profits or government. We don’t take on small returns because clients won’t get the benefit of our services. Our main focus is on business advisory and tax advisory for businesses across the country of varying sizes and different markets.”

Approximately 50 percent of the firm’s clients are local, and the rest are spread out throughout the United States. Many operate in multiple states and require multi-state returns.

Bucknam & Conley utilizes the latest technology and is 100 percent cloud based. For them, it remained business as usual when the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered offices.

“We already had a half and half work schedule and people were working from home half the time and coming into the office half of the time,” said Conley. “When COVID hit, our work flow did not stop at all. It was tax season, and we were able to get everything done. Our clients didn’t even notice that anything had changed.”

Since the start of the pandemic, staff at Buckman & Conley have helped clients optimize their employee retention credits and apply for New York State grants as well as PPP and EIDL loans. Many of their clients are restaurants—including many in downtown Saratoga–and all were able to survive the pandemic.

By Christine Graf

Saratoga Springs attorney Steve Perkins has announced the opening of his new firm, Perkins Law PLLC. 

The Siena College and Albany Law School graduate handles cases in Saratoga, Albany, Warren, and Washington counties. Perkins, a native of Saratoga Springs, works from home in order to keep overhead costs low. He meets with clients at 524 Maple Ave., Suite 2, a space he leases from attorney Rita Young.

During law school, Perkins interned at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of New York, litigation firm Wilson Elser, and Ayco, a Goldman Sachs Company. After graduating in 2016, he worked for McPhillips, Fitzgerald & Cullum in Glens Falls. He started in the real estate department before moving into trusts and estates. 

Five years later, in the fall of 2021, Perkins made the decision to open his own firm. 

“I’m definitely still in the building phase,” he said. “My model is that I work from home but when I need to meet with clients, I use the conference space on Maple Avenue. I really like that model right now, and I think a lot of people are doing that. It’s really been working for me to help keep my costs down.”

Perkins specializes in real estate, trusts and estates, and estate planning. He also provides services related to business law and business formation and dissolution. 

“I’m advertised right now as general practice, but those are the areas that I emphasize and those are really where my skills are,” he said. “I have a friend who did this a couple of years ago who I have been able to bounce ideas off of, and he really focused his practice on one area of the law to set himself apart in that area. That is really my goal too.”

Since forming his LLC in October, business has increased steadily, he said. As his firm grows, Perkins plans to expand staff and lease a dedicated office space. He is currently focused on building his client base and investing in software and technology. He is also working with a marketing consultant.

By Susan Elise Campbell
As businesses adjust to the unprecedented challenges of a pandemic, so do the attorneys who advise them.
“There have been a whirlwind of legal issues that we never thought we would have to deal with,” said James T. Towne Jr. of The Towne Law Firm PC, with offices in Saratoga Springs and Glens Falls.
Unique issues about government relief, bankruptcy and foreclosures, contracts, COVID-19 fraud, cybersecurity and much more are on a daunting list of topics attorneys are being challenged to address this past year.
“During the first 120 days we were confronted with a variety of labor and employment inquiries,” said Towne.
Many of these were rooted in the logistics and liabilities of sending non-essential staff home to work and as a condition of employment, he said.
“Managers are accustomed to taking their laptops and working from home, but maybe not the support staff,” he said. “Matters come up about restrictions on the equipment taken offsite, using that equipment for personal matters, and businesses not enforcing obligations in connection with work performed at home.”

By Paul Zarecki
Small businesses are more likely to become the victims of fraud than larger businesses.
Small businesses are the most vulnerable to occupational fraud and abuse, according to the Association for Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE). In its 2020 Report to the Nation on Occupational Fraud and Abuse, ACFE cites that the smallest organizations, 100 employees or less, suffered higher median losses than did the largest organizations (10,000 employees or more).
While the largest companies suffered losses of $140,000 on average, small businesses’ losses averaged $150,000, based on its survey.
Considering the potential losses and how much more of an impact $150,000 is to a smaller business than a larger business, it befits small-business owners to make the prevention of fraud a priority. Though no business owner wants to feel it employs unscrupulous people, sometimes temptation or personal financial pressures can push even the hardest working, most trusted employee into perpetrating fraud.
Here’s how you can prevent fraudulent activity in your workplace:

By Rachel Phillips
In business, accounting is the day-to-day tracking of financially operations, both in the short term and the long term.
Not only does accounting serve the purpose of tax compliance and record keeping, but also recording metrics used for evaluating business performance. As such, it is a vital function for success in business.
However, with improving technology and the internet, it has become easier than ever for certain business tasks to be done remotely. As a result, recent years have seen an increase in businesses using outsourced accounting services.
When a business outsources accounting, they hire an outside professional to organize and evaluate their books and records.

by Stephen Ferraro,
CPA/ABV/CFF, MAFF, CVA, CEBC
Business owners need an ongoing planning process to grow, maximize business value and create the most successful business transfers. It’s just as important to work on your business as it is to work in your business.
The process should coordinate business valuation, growth planning and business transfer analysis with personal retirement planning. The ultimate goal…successfully operate, grow and transfer your business on your terms and time frame, while maximizing and protecting your personal wealth.
Maximize Business Value
To determine how fast you can get to where you want to go, you need to know where you are now. That’s why business valuation is so important.

BY DANIEL S. GLASER, ESQ.
Local. Real Estate. Attorney.
When buying or selling real estate, it is imperative that you have the counsel, guidance, and skill of a local real estate attorney.
For example, next week you are going under the knife for a triple bypass surgery. You are given two options on how to proceed: use the services of a cardiothoracic surgeon; or save some money by trying to do it yourself.
Yes, you may have a steady hand but going with option one seems like the better way to go.
While the hypothetical may seem unrealistic, the message behind it is real. When you are dealing with something very important, for example making the largest purchase in your life, seek assistance from professionals that have a plethora of experience in their field.

By Jennifer Farnsworth

As technology continues to grow and expand across the business sector, accounting firms have worked hard to keep up. 

Accounting advisory and consulting services have benefited from the way technology has allowed them to work with clients without meeting face-to-face. But these services still need to be personalized. Many local firms have found ways to balance technology with personalized service.

Kristen D. Berdar, CPA, CMA, a partner at BST & Co. CPAs LLP, runs the company’s Virtual Accounting Solutions Division. She said they offer outsourced CFO and accounting solutions for clients on a cloud-based platform, working entirely outside of the client’s office. 

They work to create a personalized service that is based on each individual client’s needs and goals.

By Kenneth J. Entenmann, CFA

What a difference three months make. At the end of the third quarter of 2018, every equity market index was posting significant positive returns, and the markets were focused on an overheating economy and the fear of rapidly rising interest rates. 

Suddenly, market psychology turned sharply negative, and the new fear was an imminent global economic recession brought on by trade wars, overaggressive central bank policy and an earnings recession. By year’s end, volatility spiked to levels not seen since 2008, and all the major equity indices were decidedly negative. International markets suffered the most, with the developed markets (MSCI-EAFE Index) falling 13.32 percent and the emerging market (MSCI-EM Index) falling 14.49 percent. 

The domestic equity markets fared better, but still posted negative returns for the year—Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 3.38 percent, S&P 500 fell 4.39 percent, Nasdaq composite fell 2.81 percent and Russell 2000 fell 11.03 percent—a very tumultuous end to 2018.