Recommend avoid. Does not meet deadlines, fails to properly file multiple times, does not communicate.

As a long time Counting House client, I felt compelled to write a review, especially given the negative reviews posted, which show an unfairly slanted perspective of the company. I came to Counting House as an "angry refugee" from another accounting firm, one which had pretty much ignored my issues and allowed me to fall into a fairly significant personal debt to the IRS. Counting House helped bail me out and put me on the right path to a more stable and predictable tax situation. It wasn't long before I transferred my payroll services to Counting Hosue, to save me even more trouble in my day to day business transactions. While our years together haven't been flawless, per se, I can safely say that Counting House does their best to take care of all of my accounting, tax, and payroll needs. I feel I'd be remiss if I didn't address the previous negative reviews. The write up by Rachael C seems to indicate that although her boyfriend had "mildly complicated taxes" a cursory reading shows that these issues sound anything but mild. It seems like consultation of a tax attorney would be a requisite for this situation and it seems that no harm was done, given that they ended up resolving the situation. if you find yourself allegedly owing $21,000, of COURSE you get a 2nd opinion. One can't expect every professional to provide every service. I find this to be true in my own business and as such, feel this review is hardly an indictment of the service in question. The other review, by Dave A, is even more unfair. Dave says that he worked with Counting house for 14 months and complains of dealing with 3 account executives. Having been with the company for much longer than that, I know exactly what happened here. The first account rep had been there for a long time. She retired. The firm hired a replacement who, for whatever reason, simply didn't work out. This is a situation to which EVERY small business owner can relate. So after SHE left, they hired another replacement who is still with the company. So due to circumstances beyond the company's control, you end up with 3 employees in 14 months. It's unfortunate that Dave A was caught in the gears of this transition, but it hugely unfair and inaccurate to portray Counting House as having some kind of revolving door. I've been as pleased as I can expect with the many services CH provides, and consistently happy with the personal attention I get whenever needed. They are an excellent firm, especially given their passion for working with small businesses like mine. read more

My experience with Counting House has been stressful, frustrating and disappointing. I came to Counting House after moving to NH from CA, and explained the needs of my small business. The owner promised me to help me organize my finances, file my taxes and help me grow my business. Rather than deliver on these fairly straightforward promises, the owner and his team spent most of our working relationship ignoring my emails, giving me incorrect or vague information and then lip service when I called out their incompetence. The owner and my assigned Accountant seemed to be on vacation more often than not and my Accountant even took a 2 week vacation in late April without finishing my 2016 tax returns or any of the Q1 or Q2 P & L statements - all of which I had paid for months in advance. I have paid Counting House over $6,000 in addition to wasting countless hours trying to get them to deliver the work I have already paid for. Very frustrating and not a good use of anyone's time. read more

As the owner of Fitness Together Newburyport & Fitness Together Portsmouth, keeping track of everything was becoming difficult. I really wish I started with them sooner. Great place, with friendly people that know what they are doing. I do not know where I would be without them. They help me keep track of the back end part of the business so I can focus on the stuff I love to do. read more

I have been hedging writing this review for sometime as I don't like to be negative, but it's been eating away at me and I feel that I must warn people. I recommended Counting House Assoc. to my better half, during my days with BNI in Hampton, NH. Since they are part of BNI, I felt comfortable recommending them. My boyfriend has mildly complicated taxes due to the fact that he owned a rental property. He stayed with them for years until this happened.... He was able to proceed with a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure on this property. He checked, rechecked and confirmed with the account executive at Counting House and his local bank, that there would be no taxable income for the forgiven debt on this home. There was an error made by the bank when they filled out the 1099 form, which made it appear that he was, in fact, liable and the forgiven debt would be taxable. Rather than investigating this situation, the account exec told him that he would be responsible for the tax liability to the tune of $21,000! She was unyielding and told him that he could take his business somewhere else and that he WAS responsible. We hired a tax attorney, not knowing what else to do. We were in trouble. It took this attorney 15 minutes to determine that the 1099 was incorrect. Thank goodness we hired him. We'd still be trying to figure out how to pay the IRS the $21K. As professionals, the account executive and team should have known that something was wrong with the 1099 and at the very least looked into this. We wrote a letter to Van at Counting House and while he was apologetic, he offered no assistance with the attorney's bill. I believe this is bad business. If you want mediocre, Counting House is adequate, but don't rely on them for anything that requires troubleshooting or basic knowledge of tax forms or tax law. read more

On the website, in the literature, and especially when you meet with the leader Van, you get the feeling that this accounting and bookkeeping firm is exactly what your small business needs if you don't exactly have traditional business background. They make promises to pay individual attention to your business and help it to grow. Unfortunately, none of that happened after my first meeting with Van. Your fate is really left up to the account executive assigned to your case, and in the 14 months I was with the firm, I had 3 account executives. I won't go into detail as to why, but as you can imagine , the result was as soon as someone got to know my business, they were gone. If the weekly fees were slightly more reasonable , I might have stayed on a little longer. Their charges might be worth it if you had an account executive who was really doing what they promised. I can honestly say in 14 months I did not get a single piece of advice that helps me to grow my business. In fairness, they did straighten out tax situation that was extremely messed up from a previous accountant. Anyway, My Hope was that when I expressed my disappointment to Van, I might be offered a refund or a discounted rate for an amount of time. However, when I got an envelope in the mail from them, instead it described a rate increase. At that point I knew it was definitely time to leave. read more