Merchants Accounting Services

I know it may sound crazy, but I love tax-time!  Our CPA, Ted Barben (a.k.a. the Tax Accountant Extraordinaire) of Merchants Accounting Services in Oakland, is the reason.  He has been our CPA at Merchants since 2012 or 2013 (time flies) and he has been great. We were worried that we'd need to find a new CPA when we moved to Honolulu in late 2013, but Ted is licensed to do Hawaii returns :)You can tell Ted is passionate about his work by the excitement and enthusiasm in his voice while explaining things - yes, about taxes!  And, it is remarkable how despite his heavy workload he returns calls and emails so quickly - often within minutes - to get his clients the information they need.  How many businesses in general even do that?   I never cease to be impressed by Ted's attention to detail regarding all the millions of tax laws.  He used to work for the IRS as a tax examiner, so I always feel great when we sign our returns.  The last thing anyone wants is to have one's CPA screw up.We've been with Merchants since 2009 thanks to a friend's recommendation.  Our former CPA retired and sold her business to a CPA out in Concord who couldn't find her way out of a Turbo Tax software box to save herself.  Two friends of ours were also transferred to the same overwhelmed and incompetent woman whose office also supposedly did payroll.  Their business ended up being penalized because a payroll form was not filed and the woman refused to own the mistake.  Long story short - with Sarah Neider doing their returns and Ted doing ours, we are all now very happy to be at Merchants! More...

Reviewed on Yelp

My business has been using Merchants Accounting for our book keeping and accounting for about a year now. I have worked with various companies over the past 16 years and Merchants is BY FAR the best company I've worked with. They are on top of every detail and its really so refreshing to work with such a thorough and professional team. I was referred to Merchants by another restaurant owner who also previously and for many years had a hard time finding an excellent accounting company. Highly recommended! No complaints here... Thank you Merchants! Ill send people your way whenever I have the opportunity. More...

Reviewed on Yelp

Roger & Charanjit have been super successful in getting our business up and running.  We've had lots of questions along the way and their responses, along with those of the crew doing lost of the direct bookkeeping work, have always been timely, helpful and friendly.  In the past I've worked with multiple companies and/or internal bookkeepers for bookkeeping and taxes - I'm particularly happy it's now all under one comprehensive roof.  Finally for us their deep understanding and experience with restaurants is terrific though I would trust them with any business I owned or was managing. More...

Reviewed on Yelp

MAS has been expertly handling our business's accounting for the past 6 months.  We had previously worked with the same accountant for 14 years, so we were anxious about making such a large change.  We have a restaurant and a separate catering business which makes us two clients in one.   Our first contact with Mike set the stage for an overall great impression.  We later met with the owner (Charanjit) to discuss our business's needs. He assigned John as our Accountant and I couldn't be happier with his attentive, knowledgeable and precise accounting practices. MAS is partnered with an annual CPA who we are in the process of switching to.....and they also provide analytical business consulting which makes them a one stop shop!  Restaurants have special accounting needs in my opinion.  MAS has expert experience in this field.  I highly recommend them for hospitality accounting or any other business. More...

Reviewed on Yelp

I've been using Mechants Tax services for 4 years. I am self-employed with various streams of income and my deductions can get convoluted. They have handled my tax returns in a timely, professional, and favorable manner every time. When I met with my accountant this year, he remembered my personal situation. I liked that. And he got the taxes done by the very next day! More...

Reviewed on Yelp