LIBERTY TAX SERVICE Franchise Complaints

5,730 thoughts on “LIBERTY TAX SERVICE Franchise Complaints”

• Disgusted Multi site zee & Scammed1: EXCELLENT POSTS. You both hit the nail on the head.

  Dear Thank you: The Liberty name means NOTHING. You can do this yourself. People will come to you because of YOU & the service you give to them. THEY will refer others to come to you. Family members, friends, co-workers…….if you treat people fairly and give outstanding service at a fair price, they will come back & refer others to you! Just be aware the tax business has changed in recent years and Turbo Tax is taking a good part of the business. You still can have a small business, but it may take a few years for you to build up…………BUT it will be yours and no one named Liberty can take it away from you. Good luck.

• PS:
  Ed….I’m nervous for you. Are you going to continue to be a zee? Liberty owns your customers…….you have to keep renewing your contract and paying them all this royalty…….otherwise if you leave, that’s it. You have no way of recouping any of it. If you’re okay with that, then fine.

• Just got done reading Blocks transcript=in a nutshell = transition from high wages, i.e. preparers, increase focus on internet-digital returns, closing more offices to reduce costs. So what does it mean, BLOCK KNOWS that the RETAIL TAX is DEAD!! So if you are thinking about buying a Libety Franchise, the future is BLEAK!!! Next week, SPEWITT will give his half a cent worth, since Liberty has NO online or BIG BOX distribution, let’s see how he pumps up the value of the Brick N Mortar! Good Luck John, I can’t wait to hear it!! I hope he atleast has the BALLS to admit it that the FREE brick and mortars are destroying the industry, but wait, he loves free returns-hahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahah!!!!!

• John loves to spend YOUR money!

• Whatever Screwitt says will be a lie. It always is. He has better spin doctors than half the politicians in Washington. I guess that makes sense, since he owns a few in Virginia.

• We were just online and went to the Rip-off Report to compare other complaints from our customers across the US. Saw where a law office, Johnathon Fortman, LLC is working up a case against LTS and Hewitt. They are asking for zees to contact them if you are interested in joining this lawsuit against the company. We would be interested in knowing what’s happened

• @guest- I talked to them last week, anyone else talk to them and what are your thoughts?

• @Mike – Is it worth while to talk those lawyers. Do they have a case that can be looked out in the court system?

• Nice informative post, Multi-Site-Zee:
  To add to that breakdown of loss you described:
  *Corporate controlled and demanded marketing money you MUST spend to market their brand. Remember, a minimum of 50 business to business visits for a store and you must buy donuts, pizzas, cookies, candy jars etc and place a logo sticker on it and drop business cards and coupons you must also buy. For a little extra, you can print the stickers with your store number instead of the 800# but no guarantee they will come to your store. Results are not higher than the basic 1percent coupon redemption rate regardless of them calling it neighborhood marketing. If you get really personal with these folks (and time is money as well as training others for perfect execution) you may be able to buy everyone’s meal in a restaurant while in your costume and get noticed for celebrating a soldier coming home or a elderly couple wearing Veteran badges. For cheaper, you can be encouraged to hire a bar fly or beg your preparers to tell their facebook families they just landed a real job (although they dont know they won’t be getting many hours after a month so use those tax school students you won’t need to test their marketing reach).
  *Yes, free tax school costs the franchisee money as well way before tax season starts. Let’s not argue about the complexity of jacking the cost of books to recoup for the marketing schemes. You know those people who have no money for books, but 2000 facebook friends, you will let in your Rapid class for free. The other ones who are bad at marketing but great at being a tax pro will pay for their books but they are not needed until late season clients come in with harder tax returns.
  *Another cost addition is all of the basic supplies you must have for visibility from the high priced vendors aside of the basic office setup costs. It is important to have all of the signs and materials to execute the weekly marketing strategies. You cannot just have a sign that says we do taxes, that is for non-franchises. *Another cost-Don’t forget to have your tech person on call with a COD check because you will not get tech support in time to keep your stores flowing when your systems have glitches and everyone has had this problem.
  *Another cost-Misc trainings demanded from Corporate or sending your manager to Effective Operations Training if you cannot manage all hats. After all, you are suppose to be “on it” and not “in it” per their class on delegation.
  *Another cost-Roadside Parties and Publicity to get news and media hits. You may not be good enough to get everything donated from neighboring businesses until you learn sales tactics yourself. Participating in these events will actually land you more support from your Area Developer when you cry out to them for help during disasters so get on their good side and spend to win like a good team player.

  @Guests
  The brand can be called Jesus and the results would be the same. A very small percentage show up from a good experience from the brand once they migrated from another city or store. That is still goes both ways, they may not come to the brand because of a bad word or experience from a previous encounter before you. The rest come because you sweated your tail off making personal contact with each and every one of those walk-ins or used all of YOUR personal connections.
  Other new clients may be brought in as “walk-ins”, by wavers or visibility measures who are completely “uninformed consumers”. They have no idea what you are selling and believe all tax returns are created equal when they drive into the parking lot.

  So why does Liberty race to get these clients? Not to keep them. They have the lowest retention rate. What Liberty Tax does is train to “close the sale” (unethical tactics using fear and emotionally charged theatrics to demonstrate that depending on who prepares your taxes, you may get more of a refund or less).

  They instruct you to avoid walkouts, but do not discount until they basically shut their car doors. As compared to the whole season, you charge the highest at first peak. Your prices will drop for your loyal, late season clients who already know the product they are getting (a proper, professional and accurate tax preparation job with no circus) and they expect reasonable lower pricing. This is what lowers your overall average net fee (ANF) for the year. They try to sell value on the first year at a high price. Sorry, but it takes more than free cokes, jokes, a kiddie corner, free pizza and a roadside party to keep them coming back. They may come back until they notice the price getting higher each season instead of lower, regardless of how many forms they have.

  Liberty Area Developers who already fudged your budgets, recommends you fire your tax preps before they can collect unemployment from you as an added expense. But if you are thinking those tax preparers who build relationships are the ticket to returning early season clients in the first place..that is not integrated in “The System”. They will teach that the system of early season tax preparation is not social hour, it is turn and burn time!! There are high paying clients in the waiting room waiting for the preparer to grab a commission from and the owners/franchisees have paid an average of “$43 a head” to get them to walk in the door from marketing efforts. :-/

  They use the closing the sale model to scare the crap out of people by basically taking away forms and showing how to decrease the invoice prices if consumers cry about it…. as if their tax amount is negotiable with and without certain forms. The customer is then put into shock once they see that high priced form sliced their refund amount in half and practically begs you to add it back on there. Lovely. What better way to make a client want to pay higher than to have them beg you? “Closing the Sale” was essential so these people believed their product was not the same as the competitors. A tax return is a tax return is a tax return or it is damn well suppose to be! Liberty Tax knows that newbies do not realize this and they focus on getting those new early clients to jack high prices and fast referrals from the UNINFORMED CONSUMERS!! You can get referrals (paying a bounty for them of $20-$50 cash) while they wait on that refund check, but you can also get plenty of money back guarantee demands. These people are not patient and of low tolerance for every passing day they don’t get their check. It is all a balance circus and has nothing to do with accuracy of a tax return. As a matter of fact, you do not turn your ACCURACY GUARANTEED SIGN around until the last week of Feb to attract the real clients when you put your higher level tax preparer group to work after dumping the first level one group.

  Not everyone practiced this way because oh wait the record still stands that:
  ” NOT ONE FRANCHISEE HAS EVER COMPLETELY FOLLOWED “THE SYSTEM” – John Hewitt ( boasts as to why no owner has ever been completely sucessful in all his years). Nobody ever listens to John……right.

  All you need to be successful at Liberty are some stripper clients who file schedule C’s, some ex- used car lot sales people to train to prepare tax returns, keep your Area Developer happy by spending all the financing they throw you for marketing and scouting so you can be at 190percent debt to net ratio and you ARE THE PERFECT FRANCHISEE who works for free. Sounds like a turn-key? Sound like a system you can build on? Not even close. Open your own and never think you are clever to win the prize eventually…the only result you will get is a divorce, bankrupcy or if you are lucky..a crazed early season client with an addiction will put a knife in your head before your 5th-6th year of slavery.

  -Trisha

• @Franchizee: not sure what you mean if it is worthwhile, if any justice can be done, it is moret than worthwhile.

• @Mike – Does it seem justice can be served through them? Thanks

• @Trisha – If this system – Screwitt system is so successful, why is Johnny boy not a franchisee? Would he do all the steps it takes to be successful or would he run out of energy and money prior to completing the system.

  What is the story behind so many workers in Virginia Beach who were “successful” franchisees and now work in the home office?

• @All, don’t forget tomorrow is liberty’s Earnings call, I can’t wait to hear Hewitts Spewitt’ “heyyyyy sexy lady, whoop, whoop johndonecallem wrong!!!”

• Liberty down -3.5% in Retail returns, up 38.1% in Online returns, down -1.4% overall through Feb 28th

• Well, earnings call is out and it’s not pretty. Revenues down and expenses up for 3rd quarter. Don’t let the headline fool you when it says system revenues are up 5.2% through Feb 28th. Revenues are not synonymous with profit and Feb 28th is not even their reporting period. I understand that tax season got delayed so naturally revenue that normally would have been recorded in January was pushed out to February – I accept that. However, if you read the full report they have lowered their guidance (projections) for the rest of the year and beyond. They cite the fact that growth has stalled and while they say there are many “new” franchisees, those “new” franchisees have acquired existing territories rather than develop new locations. So you have existing territories with new owners is all they have because the old owners (like us) are smart enough to know when to get out. My guess is that all is not well at Liberty HQ.

• “My guess is that all is not well at Liberty HQ”.

  YAYAYAYAYAY

  I sincerely hope that this is the beginning of the downfall of JTH and LTS. He is a despicable human being and I hope they whole HQ goes to jail for fraud, racketeering and everything else the IRS can think of. This news is awesome!

  Hope LOTS of people reading this thread and are considering joining the Liberty Tax franchise…………D-O-N-‘T………..you’ll lose your money, your shirt off your back, your dignity, your firstborn, EVERYTHING.

  This company has been a fraud since day 1. Their teachings, their practices, their phony promises, their spyware………..all fraud.

  He was kicked out of H& R Block, he was kicked out of Jackson-Hewitt, now he should not only get kicked out of LTS, but they should throw him in jail and shutdown the whole damn company. Oh I forgot, he made it a stock company…..well anyone with LTS holdings should sell, sell, sell.

  I can’t wait till 60 minutes or Dateline NBC or 20/20 does a story on his downfall and calls to interview me. I’ll hop on a plane so fast and divulge his company secrets. He is the most despicable man in the universe. He is playing with real people’s lives, investments and reputations. Unfortunately the end is not happening fast enough.

• @Franchizee,

  I am not sure how he coaches these people to walking into Corporate as an employee, but the ex Corp employees I spoke with are under orders to keep their mouths shut, they get paid from stock options more than actual payroll (remind ya of facebook?) and their severance packages are threatened when they want out. I have only had info from a couple who says the things they know and hear are appalling in their practices. They work under John as leverage for John to own them even more and keep control and a fake retention gimmick.

  I refused to work for him doing public speaking with his son, which turned out to be Annie Fuller’s job a week later. Let’s not forget he sleeps with the females on payroll. His love child’s mother sued him for sexual harrassment, then he knocked her up. How interesting of a way to drop a case since she was a lawyer. He slept with Annie, people started noticing….people did not care because he trashed her as if she was a rogue employee. He slept with Martha, of course she has vested interest since she picked him up when Jackson Hewitt Company tossed him on the sofa in a 9month depression. He owes her and he keeps her quiet as well. Why these women feel they need to get their money from him by sleeping with him is beyond me. As Danny said, when he falls…does he seriously think all his girlfriends will come running? Well I think the answer is yes, because he has been hiding money a long time and keeps score. I have testimony of Annie Fuller and texts. She did admit she had to sleep with him to keep her job. She said he is disgusting.

  You guys should check out the Louisville news stories about to break tomorrow from several locations. Forgery, fraud returns, not honoring the written guarantee, not using due diligence. I am tired of getting the calls so now the media gets them. They like these media hits lately. Even Martha sounds like an idiot as a spokesperson on trouble on the Coast. It is as though their are purposely tanking the stores. You all know as well as I do, owners had to pay up for Corp policies right or wrong, now they do not because they are not giving loans to those who have to crawl for FAC or fee intercept requests now. Things sure have changed for the worse with this entire brand and John knows everything and unless he has cancer or illness, there is no excuse to let the franchisees down so badly this year. The customers are leaving because of Coporate not caring and insane pricing with low quality leaders. All the good ones are gone. They have lost their focus at what they were once good at and they lost us.

  -Trisha

• @All, I guess it is time to come clean….I am EVERYONE on this board, yes I am Trish, San Fran, Bill, Frustrated, Balance, Franchizee, and every Guest…I say this because, the gigs up… John said yesterday on the conference call that he has a 90% franchisee retention rate…. so I am the only one posting on this board, all the other zees are making money…..ahahahahahhaha, what a LOSER!!

  if they are down now, expect that decrease to INCREASE, it always has and always will, the MOST EXPERIENCED MORON HASN’T worked in a tax office in years! HE DOESN’T HAVE A CLUE ABOUT THE INDUSTRY!! 90% of Liberty offices are in low income high EIC areas, do you think for a minute that the last week of the season will save some of the tax return growth? DON’T think that for a minute, higher than avg earners are going to flock to low income inner city offices.

  I loved that call, IT IS THE BEGINNING OF THE END!!! THE FASTEST DECLINING EVER, well is DECLINING!! hahahahahah!! DID YOU LISTEN TO THE BLAME, it is the FISCAL CLIFFS fault!! Wait til next call, he will likely blame all of the EX AND CURRENT FRANCHISEES AND EX EMPLOYEES BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T FOLLOW THE SYSTEM!! DAMN YOU ALL FOR BRINGING THIS OUTSTANDING COMPANY TO IT’S KNEES!!

  I can only say, GOD BLESS us ALL!!

• My wife financed CIF. She paid them off during fee intercept for the month of February, and now we are having a tough time paying the royalties, can they start fee intercepting again? My wife was told to read her franchise agreement. Of course, she has misplaced it at the time being, but thought maybe someone out there could help us. Guess I don’t have to detail further that her office is being fee intercepted again now. No more funds going into our bank….again.

• Guest, sorry to know you are struggling. If you owe Liberty money, they will fee intercept. The IRS gets paid first, then Liberty and if there is anything left, which is unlikely, then you get paid.

  Get out now before you wind up bankrupt and or divorced is my best advice to you. This business is a dead end road with a bleak future. You see the writing on the wall now, you need to act.

  Also, I am Mike…smile

• @guest – I suspect there are multiple agreement’s out there depending when you signed on this company. I was wondering how one pays for the royalties if all the money is being fee intercepted.

  I believe according to my agreement, if you owe them any money due to them be it royalties or any form of lending, they have the right to fee intercept, in spite of you not being able to pay anything else. It is truly the strangest set up of a company or most likely a scheme, I have ever been involved. I have not borrowed a dime from them, but did they want me to.

• Best not to borrow if you can avoid. Ask for fee release so you can pay your bills. Try to get March/April customers to pay out of pocket.

• Try to get the late customers to pay up front. You can always count them as “Free”.

• Give them a massive discount, whatever you need to get cash. If you are doing $25 dollar returns, it’s atleast going to help cover payroll. Remember, 25, 50, 75 150 or whatever you can get from the client is more than you are going to get from Liberty!!

• Agree with Mike, thats what I would do, offer special discounts for those that pay upfront. It will help with the cash flow, but they still get you on the back-end with the Royalty.

  Like others have said, Get Out Now! It can only get worst! If I stuck around this tax season my losses would be triple what it was only 6 months ago!

• Start with St. Patty’s day special: $97.00 for basic 1040 with basic schedule a. Make a large window sign and some cheap flyers. 3 days only, saturday, sunday, monday. $17.00 for extra forms.

• Most customers will then pay around $117.00; cash, check or charge. Use your best preparers.

• SPREAD THE WORD……………THIS IS A PIECE OF SHIT COMPANY. ANYONE READING THIS MESSAGE BOARD AND STILL SIGNING ON TO THIS FRANCHISE SHOULD HAVE THEIR HEAD EXAMINED.

  YOUR TROUBLES GET WAAAAYYY WORSE AFTER YOUR 5 YEAR CONTRACT ENDS…………THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO WAY FROM COMING OUT OF THAT COMPANY UNSCATHED. THEY WILL KICK YOU WHEN YOU ARE DOWN, THEY WILL GET EVERY LAST RED CENT YOU OWN, THEY WILL STEAL E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G AWAY FROM YOU, THEY WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO COLLECT EVERY LITTLE PENNY OWED. THEY WILL NOT STOP UNTIL THEY HAVE RUINED YOU. FINANCIALLY, PROFESSIONALLY AND EVERY WHICH WAY POSSIBLE.

  ANYONE WHO WANTS TO LEAVE, DO IT NOW. DON’T LOOK BACK, CUT YOUR LOSSES AND MOVE ON. HE WILL STEAL EVERYTHING FROM YOU. WHY ELSE WOULD THE HQ BE FILLED WITH NOTHING ELSE BUT LAWYERS?

  JERRY ARRINGTON: PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE WORK AS FAST AS YOU CAN TO PUT THAT PUNK AWAY FOR GOOD.

• SanFran: Looks like you had the same experiences that I have had with these crooks. I empathize with your bad experience with them. They squeeze every penny out of you wherever and whenever they can. These guys make lawyers look good! oops, they are all lawyers at corporate! I really hope that justice will be served upon these scavengers. They are the worst form of entities that exist- they take all they can and leave you without house and home. They have the corrupt court to back them up and probably a few politicians as well.

  The best advice to anyone is to stay away from these crooks. You can always tell when John Hewitt is lying: His lips are moving.

• Looks like this case got thrown out. haha….

  South Carolina Federal Judge Refuses To Certify Class In Tax Preparation Dispute
  Posted byLexisNexis® Mealey’s™ Class Actions Legal News

  CHARLESTON, S.C. – A South Carolina federal judge on Feb. 5 denied a motion for class certification in a lawsuit filed by tax payers accusing their tax preparers of defrauding federal and state governments and ultimately causing their clients economic harm (Kenneth Martin, et al. v. JTH Tax, Inc., d/b/a Liberty Tax Service, et al., JTH Tax, Inc., d/b/a Liberty Tax Service v. Annie Fuller, No. 10-3016, D. S.C.; 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15512)

• What happens after 5 years? we have read that LTS will sever ties, yet, how can they legally do this? We hope to have her debt paid and her numbers are fairly decent. If they do sever ties, how do we sell it? Will they purchase this from my wife? Now I am worried for her, for us. Please detail what happens and when does this news come our way? Thank you

• The venom and the language on this site has gotten pretty bad. Maybe because the case was thrown out. No longer giving help to people asking for advice.

• Wow love all those comments on the yahoo board under TAX, wondering if John is SCHIAATIING himself?

• I’m sure John is having a baby over those posts! Or, should I say that some of his girlfriends are as well. Thanks Mike!

• Is that why it has been quiet on this side of the fence?

• The information that you guys are giving out is invaluable and insightful. Your sharing of your experiences has led me to look at things more closely. And I have noticed that most franchises do not succeed. Also, your numbers alert the prudent investors that this business is probably not viable. And to the people who brag about how successful they are and blame the unfortunate people for not making it, the purpose of a franchise is to get assistance in succeeding; Also, to the people who brag, your “success” stories are hard to believe.

• Also, I followed you guys to the Yahoo site. (I am waiting for more posts so that I can glean more information on the practices, methods, and pricing–of the tax business.)

• How exactly do you find the Yahoo site? I looked but couldn’t find anything.

• Go to yahoo.com then on left got to finance under stock symbol, put inTAX for Liberty, then go on left look on Message board. Post away! love it!

• @Trisha Grabert

  Can you provide a link to the Louisville news stories you referred to last week? I can’t find anything.

• The story is still being worked through with so many clients from different stores interviewing. I will post when it airs. The troubleshooter is digging pretty deep and also reading this board. Please do share how they get $400 fees out of people who make less than $4000 a year with no dependents and why Corporate refuses to honor money back guarantees as it is so hard to get any fee release requests for any franchisee to even honor the system written guarantee. :-/

  -Trisha Grabert

• Here is a recent one: http://m.newschannel9.com/article?id=9264182

• @balancetrend – Did she get a refund from the IRS? It sounds like nothing went through, so there would not be a refund of services since the taxes are unfiled? But $623 in fees is way out of line…..

• Guest: Sorry you don’t like my venom. I have been involved (or I just say entangled) with this co. for far toooo long. I cannot say what has been going on but suffice it to say it has been a real eye opener. I cannot wait to be free from them once & for all. Sorry you or any of you are offended by my comments toward this co. and that man. They have made our lives a living hell and believe me, once it’s over I can share info.

  We were an “early” franchise and I can only say from our experience there was NO support, training or guidance. In spite of that we did very well because of our own efforts, not theirs at all. However we dealt with soap opera like experiences at every twist and turn……..and there were many.

  Whatever negative press comes their way is awesome. They do not care one i-ota about any franchisee or their prior experience………as long as they have the down payment for a territory, that’s all that matters. Their conventions were a joke, their AD’s are a joke, their training(???), their software, their advertising (???) all a huge joke. How does anyone take them seriously???

  This was the biggest mistake of our lives and we just want justice to be done once & for all asap.

• @SanFran – I think people are not aware that this is called “unhappy” franchisee not “happy”. If they are looking for happy people, go to a Liberty controlled message board. Like Duh!

  It is nice to notice that our experience is par for the course. Can Liberty send a notice to cure after you have left them?

• @franchizee – I have no idea, I’m not connected to the story other than seeing the video. I just thought it was funny when the office says, there is nothing we can do about it. Duh, offer to amend her return for free! Customer service!!!’

• @balancetrend – I know, that would make perfect sense if you forgot something about amending for free…..In my area, zee’s have been closing earlier than in year’s past, so it is not all well in paradise.

• @trisha
  If you decide you want to work in a private owned business….come down south a couple or 3 hundred miles. I’d be proud to hire someone with your intestinal fortitude

• To all;

  I just wish we could get more than just a local news station to start looking into this horrible scam of a company. The numbers don’t add up, and they never have. I like most of you blindly invested in this franchise not realizing what was ahead. I am just glad I made provisions that didn’t allow them to completely put me under financially. They will go after every red cent they can get. I have watched as store after store in my area has gone out of business. They open, they close, never to return. I see stores in houses even though that is supposedly not allowed, I see stores close from May through December even though that is not allowed, I talk to the owners and they all tell me their franchise is for sale. Few if any see any return. Most lose their shirts and quit.

  Let’s see if we can find a national news program to start paying attention. Anyone connected to someone from CNN, Fox or MSNBC ?

• ^^^BINGO, F & D……THANK YOU. My sentiments exactly. I mentioned 60 minutes, Dateline NBC or 20/20, but I will gladly take CNN, Fox, or MSNBC too.

  Any one of those news organizations would love to know what really goes on behind closed doors at this company. Or franchises in general. The person buying into the franchise has the card deck stacked against him from the beginning. So why bother signing a franchise agreement? You’re basically signing over your entire life savings, you’re freedom and your freedom of speech too.