Susan
This City,#2Consumer Suggestion
Mon, August 15, 2011
You said " I was told that they did file for us, without the w2, without our consent, and we had to be charged that for their convenience fee, and the RAL WHAT RAL? is taxes came 3 weeks later, the same time it would have taken me to file my taxes myself for FREE!!!!!! "
Did they send you a copy of the tax return you supposedly signed? This was January 15th, IF income was the only thing to report the IRS FreeFile would have worked and with a a bank account you would have had your refund in days.
If more than just income, you probably jumped the gun.
Joseph
New Orleans,#3Consumer Comment
Mon, August 15, 2011
Not to beat a dead horse, but you know never to go back to this company again.
With that said, the IRS is trying to steer companies away from offering RALS because of the high cost of interest associated with them. They also prohibit the use of last pay stubs, but want companies to use valid W2s instead.
The probably is that you did authorize the company to file your tax return because they cannot offer a RAL or RAC without first having some indicator of how much you would get in a refund. You may not have known you were doing this becuase the company representative did nto properly advise you of this.
You should not have complained to the BBB because they are not really going to do anything to help correct this. They would only get a statement from the company's owner and resolve the complain. It is basically a He Said, She Said situation.
The better place to go to file a complaint of this nature is with the IRS. They investigate companies that engage in questionable or illegal tax practices. I suggest you file a complaint with the IRS. It will not resolve your tax issues with the RAL, but it will serve notice to this company to clean up their act or lose the right to file taxes.