What you need to know about the Equifax Data Breach

Background: What is Equifax?

Equifax is one of three major U.S. credit reporting bureaus. The other two are TransUnion and Experian. There is also a smaller, less well-known credit-reporting agency called Innovis (aka CBCInnovis) that operates slightly different in that its main purpose is to provide mortgage credit reporting services to the financial services industry.

Equifax, like TransUnion and Experian, track the financial histories of consumers and use this information to analyze whether a person is “credit-worthy” by issuing them a credit score. The credit score is based on the credit history contained in the credit report, a record of consumers’ financial histories. Credit reports are comprised of information about your bill payment history, loans, current debt, and other financial information. Credit reports also contain information about where you work and live and whether you’ve been sued, arrested, or filed for bankruptcy.

Credit reports, which are also called credit records, credit files, and credit histories, help lenders decide whether or not to extend you credit or approve a loan, and determine what interest rate they will charge you. Prospective employers, insurers, and rental property owners may also look at your credit report. Typically, the information collected on consumers is sold by the credit bureau (e.g., Equifax, Experian, or TransUnion) to credit card companies and other financial institutions.

What Happened?

The hackers had access to data from May 2017 to July 2017, including names, birth dates, Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers and credit card numbers.

Who is Affected?

As many as 143 million people in the United States were affected, as well as 400,000 in the United Kingdom and up to 100,000 consumers in Canada. Credit card numbers for approximately 209,000 U.S. consumers and certain dispute documents with personal identifying information for approximately 182,000 U.S. consumers were accessed, according to Equifax.

What to do if it is likely that you were impacted by the Equifax data breach

The first thing you should do (if you haven’t already) is to obtain and review your credit report(s) and determine whether there’s been any unusual activity. Next, check whether your data has been hacked using the special website Equifax set up for data breach victims (www.equifaxsecurity2017.com). You will need to provide your last name and the last six numbers of your Social Security number. From there you can sign up for their free credit monitoring service. You won’t be able to enroll immediately; however, but will be given a date when you can return to the site to enroll. Keep in mind that Equifax will not send you a reminder to enroll so you should mark the date on your calendar so that you can start monitoring your credit as soon as possible.

Note: Equifax removed the arbitration clause from the website that was set up for data breach victims. The arbitration clause stated that by signing up for the free I.D. theft protection and monitoring from its TrustedID service a consumer could not take legal action against the company–including participating in any class-action lawsuits that might arise from the breach.

Freeze your credit report accounts at each of the credit bureaus. Freezing your credit reports (make sure to freeze your account at each of the credit bureaus) prevents anyone (including new creditors) from accessing your account. Equifax has waived the fee until November 21, 2017) and has agreed to refund fees to those who have paid since September 7, which is the date that the data breach was announced.

If you do not want to freeze your credit account, you can place a fraud alert on the account. A fraud alert warns creditors that you may be an identity theft victim and that they should verify that anyone seeking credit in your name really is you.

Note: Unfortunately, a freeze on your credit report does not necessarily mean that your bank accounts and other identity-related information is safe. Furthermore, if you do need access to your credit report, you will need to pay a fee to “unfreeze” it.

Get in the habit of periodically check your bank, credit card, retirement, and other financial accounts that could potentially be impacted now or down the road and make sure your Internet security (antivirus, firewall, malware detector, etc.) is working properly.

Finally, filing your taxes earlier, rather than later (i.e., at the last minute) helps prevent a hacker from filing a tax return using your stolen identifying information.

Precautions to take if it appears that you were not impacted by the Equifax data breach

Even if the Equifax data breach website states that you were not affected, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on your credit reports, bank accounts, credit card accounts and other financial information. You can freeze your credit accounts as well (see above) and sign up for fraud protection.

Watch out for Equifax-related Scams

If you receive a phone call and the person on the other end says, “This is Equifax calling to verify your account information.” Hang up immediately. It’s a scam because Equifax will not call you out of the blue.

Every year, thousands of people lose money to telephone scams from a few dollars to their life savings. Scammers will say anything to cheat people out of money. Some seem very friendly– calling you by your first name, making small talk, and asking about your family. They may claim to work for a company you trust, or they may send email or place ads to convince you to call them.

If you get a call from someone you don’t know who is trying to sell you something you hadn’t planned to buy, say “No thanks.” And, if they pressure you about giving up personal information–like your credit card or Social Security number–don’t give in. Simply hang up.

Tips for recognizing and preventing phone scams and imposter scams:

Don’t give out personal information. Don’t provide any personal or financial information unless you’ve initiated the call and it’s to a phone number that you know is correct.
Don’t trust caller ID either. Scammers can spoof their numbers, so it looks like they are calling from a particular company, even when they’re not.
If you get a robocall, hang up. Don’t press 1 to speak to a live operator or any other key to take your number off the list. If you respond by pressing any number, it will probably just lead to more robocalls.

If you’ve already received a call that you think is fake, report it to the FTC. If you gave your personal information to an imposter, change any compromised passwords, account numbers or security questions immediately. If you’re concerned about identity theft, visit IdentityTheft.gov to learn how you can protect yourself.

Stay safe and take steps to protect your data. If you have any questions or concerns about the Equifax data breach and your taxes help is just a phone call away.

By Leon Clinton
October 5, 2017

Tax Due Dates for October 2017

October 10—————-

Employees who work for tips – If you received $20 or more in tips during September, report them to your employer. You can use Form 4070.

October 16—————-

Individuals – If you have an automatic 6-month extension to file your income tax return for 2016, file Form 1040, 1040A, or 1040EZ and pay any tax, interest, and penalties due.

Electing Large Partnerships – File a 2016 calendar year return (Form 1065-B). This due date applies only if you timely requested a 6-month extension of time to file the return.

Employers Nonpayroll withholding. If the monthly deposit rule applies, deposit the tax for payments in September.

Employers Social Security, Medicare, and withheld income tax. If the monthly deposit rule applies, deposit the tax for payments in September.

October 31———-

Employers – Social Security, Medicare, and withheld income tax. File form 941 for the third quarter of 2017. Deposit any undeposited tax. (If your tax liability is less than $2,500, you can pay it in full with a timely filed return.) If you deposited the tax for the quarter in full and on time, you have until November 10 to file the return.

Certain Small Employers – Deposit any undeposited tax if your tax liability is $2,500 or more for 2017 but less than $2,500 for the third quarter.

Employers – Federal Unemployment Tax. Deposit the tax owed through September if more than $500.

By Leon Clinton
October 2, 2017

What Sales Orders Are and When to Use Them

When you want to document sales that you can’t (or won’t) fulfill immediately, but you plan to do so in the future, you can’t create an invoice just yet. This is where sales orders come in.

You may never need to create a sales order for a customer. Perhaps you have a service-based business, or you never run out of inventory. Or you simply don’t enter an order unless you know you have the item(s) in stock.

But if you plan to use sales orders, you must first make sure QuickBooks is set up to accommodate them. Open the Edit menu and select Preferences, then Sales & Customers. Click the Company Preferences tab to open that window.

Figure 1: Before you can use sales orders, you’ll need to make sure that QuickBooks is set up for them.

Sales Orders Are Required for Some Tasks

There are a few situations where you must use a sales order:

If you have a customer who orders very frequently, you may not want to create an invoice for absolutely every item. You could use a sales order to keep track of these multiple orders, and then send an invoice at the end of the month.
If you’re missing one or more items that a customer wanted, you can create a sales order that includes everything, but only note the in-stock items on an invoice. The sales order will keep track of the portion of the order that wasn’t fulfilled. Both forms will include the back-ordered quantity.

Warning: Working with back orders can be challenging. In fact, working with inventory-tracking itself may be problematic for you. If your business stocks enough of multiple types of items that you want to use those QuickBooks features, let us help you get started to ensure that you understand these rather complex concepts.

Creating a Sales Order

Creating sales orders in QuickBooks is actually quite simple and similar to filling out an invoice. Click the Sales Orders icon on the home page, or open the Customers menu and select Create Sales Orders.

Figure 2: A sales order in QuickBooks looks much like an invoice.

Click the down arrow in the field next to Customer: Job and choose the correct one. If you use Classes, select the correct one from the list that drops down, and change the Template if you’ve created another you’d like to use.

Tip: Templates and Classes are totally optional in QuickBooks. Templates provide alternate views of forms containing different fields and perhaps a different layout. Classes are like categories. You create your own that work for your business; they can be very helpful in reports. Please call the office if you need help understanding these concepts.

If the shipping address is different from the customer’s main address, click the down arrow in the field next to Ship To, and either select an alternate you’ve created or click Add New. Make sure the Date is correct, and enter a purchase order number (P.O. No.) if appropriate.

The rest of the sales order is easy. Click in the fields in the table to make your selections from drop-down lists, and enter data when needed. Pay special attention to the Tax status. If you haven’t set up sales tax and need to, just call.

When everything is correct, save the sales order. When you’re ready to convert it to an invoice, open it and click the Create Invoice icon in the toolbar. QuickBooks will ask whether you want to create an invoice for all the items or just the ones you select. You’ll be able to specify quantities, too, in the window that opens.

Figure 3: When you create an invoice from a sales order, you can select all the items ordered or a subset.

As you can see, sales orders are easy to fill out in QuickBooks but they involve some complex tracking. You may want to call the office to schedule a “how-to” session before you attempt them. As with most things, it’s always better to understand sales orders ahead of time rather than to try to troubleshoot problems later.

Author: Leon Clinton