ASCPA Focus
Staying Out of Trouble
Cindie Hubiak, President & CEO
When people don’t understand the work I do, I summarize by saying “I help 5,500 CPAs succeed every day.” Several years ago, I started wondering what success meant to our members.
We talked about this at a Board meeting, and I started asking every CPA I encountered how they defined success. CPAs mentioned good health, making lots of money, being happy or having balance in their lives.
One CPA made a statement that has stayed with me for the past four years. She said, “Success is staying out of trouble.” Success to this CPA was keeping her CPA license in good standing with the Arizona State Board of Accountancy.
Over time, I understood how important her comment was to helping our members succeed. If a CPA’s license becomes jeopardized, it impacts all other definitions of success. The status of a person’s CPA license can impact their earnings. It can take a lot of work to bring a license back into good standing, causing a heavier workload and extra stress. As we feel more stress, our health is negatively impacted.
Historically, most of the CPAs who get in trouble are not members of the Society. Recently, we have seen a few of our members in trouble.
We talked about this at a Society staff meeting and brainstormed ways CPAs can stay out of trouble. We identified the following items:
1. Change your address with the Accountancy Board when you move your home or office. We’ll continue reminding you in our publications. Additionally, we’ll remind you when you let the Society know of an address change.
2. Make sure your annual renewal form arrives at the Accountancy Board on time. Send it over-night or hand-deliver it, if necessary.
3. Be sure to complete the entire renewal form to make sure your renewal is processed timely and with minimal disruption.
4. For those members needing a peer review every three years, please schedule it now, even if it’s not due for a while. CPAs who perform peer reviews are in high-demand and their schedules fill up quickly. Peer reviews take time to perform and to be reviewed. We’ve seen too many CPAs become suspended and pay civil penalties because they were late with their peer review.
5. Respond immediately to any correspondence from the Arizona State Board of Accountancy. A timely response can keep you out of trouble.
6. Plan ahead to get your CPE hours before your registration renewal is due.
It’s easy to remember when your Arizona CPA registration renewal is due to the Accountancy Board. I learned this little known fact several years ago.
Our renewals are due by the end of our birth month every other year. If you were born in an even year, your renewal is due every even year. Conversely, if you were born in an odd year, you renew every odd year. I was born in June 1959, so I know my next renewal is due on
At each birthday, make it a habit to check your CPE hours. I know that doesn’t sound like fun, but just like filing our tax returns or going to the dentist, we need to find a way to accomplish important tasks. I just added a task in my Outlook to help me remember.
Because you probably haven’t reviewed your CPE hours lately, stop and check your records now. Verify that you have enough hours for where you are in the renewal cycle and that you have fulfilled your ethics requirement. In the likely case that you need more hours, go to our Web site where you’ll find a number of live, self-study and virtual courses.
The Society tracks all the live CPE courses you take with us. You can verify your records in your member information on our Web site. If we have your birthday on file, we send you a CPE transcript of the classes you have taken with us about two months before your renewal date.
Members let me know this letter has helped them stay out of trouble. If you take classes with us and we don’t have your birthday, we’ll be calling you to obtain that information so we can send you a CPE transcript.
After I wrote this, I checked my CPE records and discovered I have not taken my ethics course yet. I just registered to take a class this month. Start the year off right by reviewing your CPE requirements and making a reminder to complete your CPA renewal.
The Society is here to help you succeed, and stay out of trouble. If you have other ideas as to how we can do that, please let me know at (602) 324-2888, 1-888-237-0700, ext. 203 or chubiak@ascpa.com.
AZ CPA – January 2007
