ADA Compliance For Websites – It’s Important
How Can I Determine If My Website Is ADA Compliant?
ADA Website Compliance
Transcript:
Marcelino: Welcome to The Tax Answers Advisor. I’m Marcelino Dodge and we’re on show number 16 and building it’s just been a fine ride we’re really enjoying this and hoping a kick goes on continue we want to send a big thank you out for listening to this show not only here in the US but worldwide. This podcast is listened to in China, Canada, Germany. It’s just such a pleasure and such a privilege to have such a variety of listenership as we continue to grow.
Also, any questions about anything I discussed today or on any of my shows, you can always contact me at Cash Tracks Financial. Email success@cashtracksfinancial.com, or give me a call. It’s 844-394-4287. And we’re on Facebook at Cash Tracks on Facebook. A quick update as from last week, or actually a previous show, just want to remind all about the $300 per return deduction for charitable deductions that is for 2020, then it actually jumps up to $600.
If you’re a married filing joint couple for 2021, which is not much but hey, every little bit we take. And then of course, the big announcement in the last week is tax season will begin on February 12th, when the IRS will be fully accepting tax returns. That’s the latest that has ever been in my 20 plus years of doing taxes. So we’ll see how that works out. And as of right now, we still know tax day is April 15th.
Going to go ahead and jump into our topic of the day, which deals with small businesses and the Americans with Disabilities Act, how that is going to affect small businesses. And then of course, we’ll talk a little bit with our guest here in just a moment here. But this act was originally passed in 1990. I was working in another job at the time when that first came out. And it was interesting because of all of the protections that it provides for discrimination, to protect against discrimination for disabled Americans, many physical locations requires compliance to make sure they have accessibility and so on.
Now something that’s been commonly overlooked, which is what’s going to be talked about today, especially for small business, which is why we’re talking about this is websites need to be accessible to the disabled and that includes accessible to the blind. Today, I’m going to talk to my and this is so exciting. This is my first guest ever on The Tax Answers Advisor, I’m very happy to have David Steckelberg today.
A CPA, who had been working for many years in cash flows investing, borrowing at specialized in mergers and acquisitions, been a CFO for a Texas Jewelry Manufacturer and Retailer, and even work as a controller for the United Insurance Company, then was a Senior Manager and Coordinator with KPMGP Marwick. Also, lately as he’s been turning his focus, which is why we’re going to talk about this topic today been focusing on helping small businesses and websites to comply with ADA requirements, particularly accessibility for the blind. So I’d like to go ahead and welcome at this time, Mr. David Steckelberg there. How you doing there, David?
David Steckelberg: Great. Thank you for the opportunity to be on the show Marcelino, really appreciate it.
Marcelino: Well, we really appreciate it. And as we go through here, and as we’ve already discussed ahead of time, this is very important for small businesses to know about this, especially if they have a website. So I just wanted to check with you real quick here. How did this issue we’re going to talk about even come to your attention?
David Steckelberg: Well, in 2015, The Wall Street Journal ran a small article about this issue of probably two column inches at the most but I guess, by luck happened to read it. And then in 2017, is where it really started coming into focus that a judge ruled against the Winn Dixie stores, and said that all business websites must be accessible to the blind. And that’s what really opened the floodgates for the lawsuits against businesses. Initially, these Activist Attorneys went against the bigger companies, because they were probably pretty easy fish. But now that they’ve covered all those are focusing on small businesses, and that’s where the real problem is due to the extensive cost of the lawsuits that’s kind of the background.
Marcelino: And yeah, we know that. Not every small business can just write a check for like five or $10,000, just pretty low.
David Steckelberg: That’d be you could be looking at 20 grand plus legal fees. So then, make your website in compliant. Yeah, that costs part of the settlement, once you get in the lawsuit, say that the law, the plaintiffs fees or the Attorneys fees, you still have to make your website and compliance in order to distinguish the lawsuit.
Marcelino: Wow. And from some of my initial research that could be very costly to do that on a website, very costly.
David Steckelberg: Well, that’s one of the problems with this, again, for a small business person to do that would be very expensive. And I’ve worked with some technical people to come up with a much less expensive way to do this.
Marcelino: So with as you become aware of it, what did what made you decide that to help with this? I mean, you read the article, you got familiar with it, but then how, what motivated you to go ahead and help small business with this?
David Steckelberg: Well, up until this past year, I had my own tech practice, which I focused on helping small businesses best way to be filing, how to reduce their taxes, savings plans, they’ll set plans and so forth. And I guess you’d say it was very upsetting to me, that we’re seeing these attorneys out here attacking these small businesses, and getting fees from them. That, in my opinion, they didn’t really deserve. I mean, that’s questionable, but that was my take on it. And I kept working on this idea. How can we make this an affordable way for small business people to avoid the lawsuit? That was basically the emphasis on it.
Marcelino: So is that what led you to, to start your organization, your internet access for Disabled Americans to help businesses?
David Steckelberg: Exactly, right. Yeah, the particularly, what really got me going was the 2019, Wall Street Journal, it said lawsuit surge over website access for the blind. And that article is quite lengthy. He went on to explain all the problems that this was causing. And to give you an example, how bad has gotten, there was a 23% increase in the number of accessibility lawsuits in 20, over 2019. So it’s growing at a rapid rate. When you’re turning the barrel is, you’re going to get caught?
Marcelino: Well, I guess the people had a lot of time to stay at home in 2020. And look for this thing with this pandemic going on.
David Steckelberg: I suppose that part of it.
Marcelino: It could be part of it. Yeah, there. So then, as you progressed in this and looked at this, and then just kind of probably to emphasize this point, what has made this become such a large concern for small businesses with websites.
David Steckelberg: Well, is a previously mentioned, minimum of 10 grand on these lawsuits, and most of them 20 plus the legal fees, okay. And the hassle of dealing with a lawsuit, if you’ve ever didn’t do that, that’s disturbing, and distracting. And for your listeners, in the state of California, there’s something new that’s come on the rise as of July 1 2020, they now as the California Consumer Privacy Act, that will find a business $7,500 for each violation of the accessibility for the blind on a website.
So, one violation 7500 a second violation, another 7500, and so on. And then people say add insult to injury. California also has another regulation that provides for a $4,000 debt fine or damages for each violation on a website. So potentially, you can be hit $11,500 in California, for one violation of your website. And that would be significant.
Marcelino: Yeah, significant and that would then also then be in addition to perhaps the demand letter you’re getting from an attorney. Right and that accessibility.
David Steckelberg: It easily put a lot of small businesses out of business into bankruptcy. California is really, has a very onerous regulations there that’s going to hurt a lot of businesses. The attorneys are going to take advantage of this.
Marcelino: Yeah, unfortunately, that’s what we see many attorneys doing there. So we’ve seen how this problem has developed, there’s a huge challenge for small businesses. And, and what’s really sad, at least in a lot of this is that none of these small businesses are doing this out of there doing it more out of ignorance.
David Steckelberg: I don’t know anything else that’s unaware, nobody’s talking about it to any great extent.
Marcelino: Yeah, until they get the little notice, like you. We previously discussed about that winery in Denver that was just trying to reopen from the shutdown regarding from the virus. And next thing, you know, he has a notice, or this demand from or get served with this demand for his website. Not being accessible. And he’s already struggling to get open all of a sudden he’s desert 1000s of dollars. So it’s definitely, definitely a big challenge for them.
David Steckelberg: Significant increase, they need lawsuits in the State of Colorado in the last year.
Marcelino: Yes. That’s why I’m looking at this very seriously for my own schedule a tax clients, because this is something because that’s just what we don’t none of them need this, especially now. As we’re going to look at this, and as we see this year, we’re going to ask how does the small business then address this challenge?
David Steckelberg: Well, my first recommendation would be to talk to your web designer, or webmaster, wherever you want to call him. And number one, ask him, is he aware of this problem? My experience with talking to him is a lot of them are not aware of this problem, okay? Then tell him that you want to get a proposal, estimate the cost and making your website accessible to the blind and visually impaired.
And that is excessive amount of money, which it might be, then consider going online and look at an AI program for Internet access. It’s the addresses I for DA.org. It’s IA the number four da.org. And look at our program. And that’s what’s called the alternative method under the Americans with Disabilities Act, providing accessibility to the blind. It’s a simplified method, but it meets the requirements.
Marcelino: So if a business has a website, and most businesses do, or many or many are even considering going online, because you see, I mean, I see these ads constantly still going on. Recommending visits, if you haven’t set up your website, which, obviously, there’s several that haven’t yet, but they need to be thinking about this if they’re going to set up a website for their small business. And now this is an additional question that they need to ask in addition to everything else that you ask, you got to ask about accessibility for the blind.
David Steckelberg: I would go back to original source first, and see how you make that happen in the cost and that too excessive, then have your webmaster do it. But if you’ve got and figure out that way beyond your budget, then I would recommend you consider our program and see how that would work for you.
Marcelino: Yeah, this program that we’re going to discuss a little bit more here is, is really from what I’ve already looked at a very, very good, very cost effective program plus some other benefits, which is why we brought it into this show related to tax. So what we’re going to we’re going to take a little break here just so everybody can catch their breath because this has been a very interesting topic here.
And we’re going to go ahead and come back in a couple minutes to discuss more of this challenge that businesses have with accessibility for their blind, for the blind on their websites there. So, look forward to talking to you again in a couple minutes. This is The Tax Answers Advisor with Marcelino Dodge on The Voice America Business Channel.
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Are you wanting to grow wealth faster, save time and build a nest egg? Hire a tax pro who makes you money and does more than just file your tax return? Marcelino Dodge of Cash Tracks Financial identifies your key numbers, works year-round to improve your numbers, and keeps you compliant and helps you achieve goals faster. Call Marcelino Dodge today, 719-336-8739 to schedule your free tax strategy review. Call 336-8739 or visit cashtracksfinancial.com.
Many people want to build wealth or grow their business faster, but do not know what specific numbers to look at that actually helped build monthly cash flow. Hire a tax pro who makes you money and does more than just file your tax return. Marcelino Dodge of Cash Tracks Financial identifies your key numbers, works year-round to improve your numbers, keeps you compliant and helps you achieve goals faster. Schedule your free tax strategy review by calling 719-336-8739 or visit cashtracksfinancial.com.
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This is The Tax Answers Advisor with host, Marcelino Dodge. To reach our program today please call in the number is 1-866-472-5790. That’s 1-866-472-5790. You may also send an email to success@cashtracksfinancial.com. Now, back to The Tax Answers Advisor.
Marcelino: Welcome back to The Tax Answers Advisor. This is Marcelino Dodge, certainly appreciate you listening to the program today as we are addressing a very vital topic for small businesses regarding website accessibility to the blind. Have my guest here, David Steckelberg, we’re gonna take a little bit closer look at now how we, as small businesses because I’m a small business man just as David’s a small businessman. How we all can address this challenge to make sure our websites are accessible for the blind?
So we’re going to take a little bit closer look here, because one of the things I had noticed, David, is that a website needs to be accessible, as we’ve discussed for the blind. But yet, many don’t know that it needs to be done. So then how does your organization that IA4DA.org? What’s the services that that helps ones to really, really to see that to help them to address that issue? If they can’t do it on the with their initial website designer, or it’s just not cost effective for them to do it that way?
David Steckelberg: Let me explain first, why there is an issue here. Individuals, Disabled Americans that use the sense of blind and visually impaired, use what are called screen readers to read the internet, what that is a fancy name for software that they have on their computer, that will look at a website and read them to text. Now the problem with most websites, which is one of their big selling points, is they have pictures, video, maybe fancy type, all these unusual descriptions that they’re advertising and trying to portray that screen readers cannot interpret.
They cannot read it. So when the software is moving across that web page, when it starts to do run into this type of stuff, pictures and graphics, so forth, is not going to function properly. What the screen reader can only read is text letters. And what I came, I didn’t come up with someone else’s a technical person’s idea was to link that website to another website that we provide. That’s strictly in text. And it’s all just simple letters.
Now the screen reader software can very easily move through that webpage and read all that information to the blind person. And you can put on these, way up to four pages. Most people two is the most, all the information that you want to give about your business. I mean you can start with the name, address, location, telephone number, contact person, whatever you think is really pertinent to a blind person, and also giving detailed description of what your products and services are.
In that way blind person will hear all of that information very readily, very easily. And clearly. There won’t be any disruption from pictures and graphics and other information that doesn’t fit their software logic. It makes sense that.
Marcelino: No, that makes sense. Yeah. Basically, it takes it from the photos and the pictures, and you get down to base to the text so the readers can read it there. So basically, it makes it accessible which is as what you say is what you’re saying there. Which is really what we want to do.
David Steckelberg: I have to thank for that idea, because he referred me to the technician that understood how all this work. And he developed this program for me.
Marcelino: That’s one of the reasons I love our clients. That right times, they can find technical people for something like this, that usually we don’t deal with and dealing with taxes, but dealing with helping to help our clients to be able to not have these lawsuits or these demand letters for having a website that’s not accessible to the blind, then it’s good to have clients and I’ve used clients for various referrals as well for other items.
But this is very, very, this is probably the most important thing right now for small businesses. And you found a good thing, you found a client that had a referral that knew where to go. That’s great. So then, as we see here, worked out really good there. So the website, then I’ve seen in some instances now your little video that’s on your website, mentioned about how you need to check with your website designer, but yet you can also have your website audited, if it’s compliant there. Now, some places charged to do that, don’t they?
David Steckelberg: Yes, yes, it can be audited. With screen reader software, you can check to make sure that it works properly. And it can be done for you. It’s not a difficult thing.
Marcelino: Yeah, it’s not a difficult thing. But I know some places charge for it. But does the IA4ADA.org charge to do that for you?
David Steckelberg: No, no, we do not.
Marcelino: Yeah. And so that’s, that’s a very fine service that provides an addition, they can help you ahead of time to know if you’re in compliance and then check for you at no charge if you are compliant. And then of course, help you to be compliant. If it’s out of the price range for you’re out of your budget after you check with your website designer, which some of them just may not. Some of them may or may not be up to the task and doing it, we I mean, we don’t know. But that’s where you have to check with them and see.
David Steckelberg: What website, how complicated it is, and so forth.
Marcelino: Yeah, it depends how many pages you have, it depends. And I can see where it could be a little costly for those, especially if they’re selling a lot of products online, or selling inventory online, those kind items, a lot of items were like a website I have, doesn’t have a lot of pages, no not selling anything, but my services. So obviously, wouldn’t be as much. So we’ve talked about some of the costs that are going to be involved in this, but yet, how does one or what’s the cost gonna be to do this?
If you’re not able to do it through your website designer, it’s out of your budget. And we’ve talked about how much those costs can be. What, through IA4AdA, what’s going to be the cost to get you compliant to do with your website, as well as we look at implementation and maintenance to be able to keep your website compliant there.
David Steckelberg: Well, our program has a fee of $15,000, $1,500 each year and each year you can just automatically re-enroll for the $15,000. Now some people out there think that’s gonna cost a lot of money eventually, well not really because this program, now your business qualifies or disabled access tax credit. In the tax credit will you be used to offset the cost of that $15,000 each year. The little technical, I don’t know if it’s something we want to go to show here. But that’s what reduces your cost significantly with this program.
Marcelino: Well, that’s why we brought this on here because it does have a benefit for small businesses tax wise, not just legal wise but tax wise. On the tax return, it has that purpose form which is why I wanted to cover it on this podcast, because we do have a tax benefit and that’s our whole purpose of this show is to help small businesses to minimize taxes and in this way with this particular program we have that opportunity to do so. As well as have you be protected as a business against these people out there.
David Steckelberg: With this, what we figured out how to do the technical part of it then figure out how small business could pay for this without being huge amount of money out of pocket and that’s what we came up with this system we have for the tax credit.
Marcelino: Yes, and that tax credit can be very useful and depending on the size of the business it could, it does pay for it but then it could also help reduce other taxes as well which is very, very good for those small businessman as we know we’re always trying to help them to save money on their taxes through various means on this program. Now, that $1,500 you’re talking about though, is that just a one time or is that would that be like an annual fee or anything in that?
David Steckelberg: Each year you pay $1,500, but each year you re-enrolled to keep them accessible you get the tax credit.
Marcelino: So, unlike some tax credits that like because it does provide tax credits, you get tax credits for accessibility to the disabled for various improvements you make on your buildings and other areas so that they have accessibility or to improve your bathrooms which those are usually big but they usually one time credits.
David Steckelberg: Yes. This would be annual.
Marcelino: This credit though, so each year you pay the 1500 you get your tax credit back so essentially for the small business person when you file your tax return basically, you’re getting it back. So basically, in the end it comes out pretty much no cost, tax wise and you can even maybe come out a little bit ahead.
David Steckelberg: That is correct.
Marcelino: So I look at this as a win-win for small businesses because there’s so many challenge are having to experience today because of circumstances and the last thing we need or any small business needs is they’re struggling and that’s the only way some small business are doing business right now is through their websites online because of just circumstances in their state’s or the requirements in their state so they’re shipping stuff out. They don’t need this type of worry and they don’t need this type of concern coming back?
Or even be have to be worried about it because they’re already trying to struggle then to get a letter saying oh, by the way your website is accessible, because to the blind. Now, because of this wanting to settle for these 1000s of dollars and if you don’t, we’re going to sue you, and then business just can’t do that so we make it real simple here with this.
David Steckelberg: Certain from my readings. It appears that disabled people find a website that’s easy for them to use, serve their purpose. Now you have a loyal customer. Because he knows he can get what he wants there. They know how to use it. Keep coming back, keep coming back as long as you take good care of him and there’s a lot of disabled people in this country.
Marcelino: Yeah, yeah, there’s a lot of disabled, and we want to serve them and we would be wise to serve them and to help them. And so as we look at this, we’ve talked about the challenge. We’ve talked about how we can fix it. And then of course the tax benefit that you can get as a business to do it, getting your tax credit. And now, we’re at the point where we’ve made our network website accessible. We’ve basically opened up a whole new set of potential clients and customers for us as well.
David Steckelberg: There’s an excess of 7 million blind in the US today, but there’s far more people that are visually impaired, or have declining eyesight, becoming more and more difficult them to read a screen. So, it’s growing population, it’s just difficult for them to do all their purchasing online.
Marcelino: And those people are consumers, just as anybody else is. And so that’s an additional benefit or additional help to a small business and to their bottom line, you got to find customers wherever you can. And so a little bit of investment in this to initially get started. Get the tax benefit, and then you have a whole another client base, which like, like in my own business, um, that’s why I do this programs, because I want to talk, I want to do I want to do taxes for anybody that’s doing a US tax return.
And so, and the same as this. And so the same as small businesses, I mean, you want to reach out to as many people as you can, this gives you a whole another clientele to possibly reach in you might in your, in whatever your particular business is. I mean, you could get some good loyal customers, because they may not have access to other sites, because some people and I know I’ll be coming this way is I’ve kind of, I’ve tried to go away from some of the large online marketplaces.
I will call them. I’m not going to mention any by name, but large online marketplaces, and look for a small business website. And for me, I look at it like I want to benefit just that small business, if I can, maybe pay a little bit more, if I put if I get a good quality stuff. But one thing I know when I pay that to that small business, they get all of that. Unlike these marketplaces, online, that they take a small percentage, but they still take a percentage.
David Steckelberg: That’s exactly right.
Marcelino: And so, if I can help small businesses do that, it’s like I, I’ll just say I just I ordered some socks the other day, instead of looking at one of the online marketplace, I just kind of did a search online for some socks and they found this neat little place. It looks like they got some good quality stuff. So you know, and I haven’t seen them yet. But of course, they look very nice online. So hopefully they’ll turn out as good as look. But that I mean, that’s what I’m personally looking for. And that’s what we want all small businesses to be able to do. Because I don’t know how many blind people would ever make a sharp shop these marketplaces, but if you can make your individual website more accessible, that could be more money into your pocket right there because you’re not posting stuff on these online marketplaces and you’re marketing to these crowd, let me see your marketing to them.
Open up your website to them, you get a tax credit for opening it up to them. And you’re doing quite a bit there, so you’re doing quite a bit for reaching out to a whole new clientele there which is beautiful, which is what we all want is more clients and customers, people are going to need them, people are struggling now. Small business is struggling now in these circumstances, but we do know that some government, the government may put out more stimulus, who knows. Let’s wait and see.
But, what we do know is that people still need access. And some people are still out spending money and so we want to help them, and certainly this program will help them to be able to do that now. In fact I was so excited when I first talked to David about this, that this is going to become part of what I’m going to talk to my clients about and which is why I’m having it on this program is just for the fact that I want to talk to people about this.
David Steckelberg: Thank you, appreciate that.
Marcelino: And so, part of my services is gonna be to just even become, I’m not going to become as familiar with you, and David of course, because you’ve been doing this for years, but I’m going to study it more and, I want to work with you on this, so we can help more people and get this podcast out there and share some people know about this and part of my business and part of my websites going to talk about this and so I can help people so they can whether they go to IA4ADA.org.
Of course, they get all information there but also through my website cashtracksfinancial.com. I’m going to be talking about it there, I don’t have it there yet, but we’re going to be talking about it’s going to be part of my offerings as well to share this because I feel this is so important for all small businesses to do in the region.
David Steckelberg: Just search the internet website accessibility for the blind or just website accessibility. And there will be more information out there than they’ll ever want to read. It’s been covered heavily by the Wall Street Journal, LA Time, New York Times, so forth. The major newspapers have covered these problems and articles regarding it.
Marcelino: They definitely have their, but we’re gonna find out that the problem is there, but I don’t know how many of those articles that you cited offer what the solution is other than some of these other expensive options, but, we’ve found a way.
David Steckelberg: Assuming the other at least there’s something, there’s other people out there trying to solve this problem, I just take a little different approach so, I’m not alone in business.
Marcelino: Oh, I’m sure it is there’s. I’m sure you’re not, but there’s others out there and others going differently.
David Steckelberg: I want to pass to your listeners that at all costs they should try to avoid federal lawsuit against their business, I mean the distraction for your business. The time away the costs, that Attorney fees and so forth. You’re much better to get ahead of this problem, than to wait until it comes around and bite you strongly encourage that.
Marcelino: Okay, yeah that’s definitely what we want them to be able to do there. Do we have much more to cover here David? Do we think we got it well covered there?
David Steckelberg: I think we covered pretty much this pertinent points here.
Marcelino: Okay, yeah, good, good, because as it looks like I thought maybe we did but I wanted to make sure we didn’t miss anything, but I’m going to go ahead and take a break. I’ll go ahead and let you go, David, I really appreciate your time today in covering this.
David Steckelberg: Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity.
Marcelino: And we want to share this podcast, as much as we can with everyone so the thing come to know how they can address this issue and make sure their websites get accessible for the blind, so you have a good there David, I appreciate your time today.
David Steckelberg: You’re welcome!
Marcelino: And I appreciate everybody’s time we’ll be back in a couple minutes here on The Voice America Business Channel.
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Are you wanting to grow wealth faster, save time and build the next egg? Hire a tax pro who makes you money and does more than just file your tax return? Marcelino Dodge of Cash Tracks Financial identifies your key numbers, works year-round to improve your numbers, and keeps you compliant and helps you achieve goals faster. Call Marcelino Dodge today, 719-336-8739 to schedule your free tax strategy review. Call 336-8739 or visit cashtracksfinancial.com.
Many people want to build wealth or grow their business faster, but do not know what specific numbers to look at that actually helped build monthly cash flow. Hire a tax pro who makes you money and does more than just file your tax return. Marcelino Dodge of Cash Tracks Financial identifies your key numbers, works a year-round to improve your numbers, keeps you compliant and helps you achieve goals faster. Schedule your free tax strategy review by calling 719-336-8739 or visit cashtracksfinancial.com.
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When it comes to business, you’ll find the experts here. Voice America Business Network.
This is The Tax Answers Advisor with host, Marcelino Dodge. To reach our program today, please call in the number is 1-866-472-5790. That’s 1-866-472-5790. You may also send an email to success@cashtracksfinancial.com. Now, back to The Tax Answers Advisor.
Marcelino: Welcome back to The Tax Answers Advisor. This is Marcelino Dodge, appreciate you tuning into this program today where we have covered a very, very vital topic about website compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act appearance, focusing particularly on accessibility to the blind. I really appreciate David Steckel being with me, Stechelberg, I’m sorry it’s David Steckelberg being with me today on this because he’s working with the organization IA4ADA.org, which is helping small businesses to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act because there’s a string of lawsuits against small businesses, for not having accessibility to the blind on their websites.
And this is a huge, this is an ongoing issue. Now it is always encouraged as David mentioned ones to check with their website developer, see what they can do to get it accessible to the blind. And of course, the program that he developed that we’re also going to be sharing and discussing with people through the IA4ADA.org, which helps businesses to have their websites into compliance with the ADA so that the lawsuits, can be avoided, as well as opening up your business to even more potential customers and clients.
Now also with this, as with many of the issues, or many of the improvements ones due to their businesses to make sure they’re accessible to the blind, is that you get a tax credit. When you enroll in this program to have your website be accessible to the blind, and with the $1500 a year, you would get that tax credit, each year, which is why we discussed it on this program today’s because you can get a tax credit for doing this and setting up your website and making sure your website is compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. And such items as this is what we’re looking at today, with the accessibility of our websites to the blind.
What we’re looking at in our whole planning process here at Cash Tracks Financial when we look at an individual or in this particular we’re looking at business, small business goals because we work with small businesses of all types, whether they’re a sole-proprietorship, an S-Corporation, a C-Corporation, a Partnership, and LLC. And you’re a business that has a website this is now going to become one of the questions we discuss in our exploratory process with our clients is, is your website accessible to the blind, do you know if your website’s accessible to the blind?
And then we can help you to solve that issue. Among the many goals as part of our intelligence solutions program that we offer here. We do want to help businesses in particular we’re focusing today to have solutions based on their goals, and of course a goal of a business is to reach as many clients and customers as possible in this time period that we are in. Where so many people are having to work from home or you’re offering products, you’re offering services, you’re having to work from home, your goal is to win your big goals of course is to reach as many people as you possibly can.
And by opening up and having your website compliant and then readable by these readers that the blind use to have internet access is just another indicator of how your business can make more money, even in these times as you’re reaching out to a whole new group of people. And as David mentioned, see it’s not just the blind but there’s also others who are getting more visually impaired and who have difficulty reading a screen.
And it’s a growing population. So again, it’s a wise move to make. And as we do that here, we work with you to help to establish that with your website and so on as well as we’re going to work together with David. And the IA4ADA.org program, so that if your website designer has a way to do it, and they can do it cost effective within your budget. We certainly encourage you to do that. But if, if it’s not cost effective for you.
We have this alternative that you can certainly use to be able to do that and have your website compliant and then have the tax credit as well we really see the importance of it and the vital of it to help our clients and to help you as a small business, not to have to deal with notice letters and so on. With these lawsuits that just keep popping up all over this all over the country, and then even as he cited in the State of California.
Adding insult to injury, then you could possibly even have fines from the state as well for not having a compliant website so you could be dealing with 10s of $1,000. And for a $1500 a year investment plus a tax credit, which then basically covered it so it’s almost like zero cost to you. You can be fully compliant and not have any of those worries and have all of that done, and you can just focus on taking care of business.
And so yes we help you. And this is one of the solutions that we help with here Cash Tracks Financial. Yes, you can contact us at 844-394-4287, and email me at success@cashtracksfinancial.com because as we look for solutions everybody’s looking for solutions to help, help you reach your goals. Because as we know there’s goals out there, there’s apps out there to help you to do this, but yet still the personal touch is very important, which is why we schedule web meetings with individuals to be able to do see them face to face through like a Zoom meeting so that we can discuss with you, help you to establish your goals.
Get to know your finances, your business finances, your personal finances, to gather all that key data, get it all in one place, then we look at threats, we analyze any threats that you have, maybe it’s a little help on insurance, maybe you need little life insurance or other types of insurance maybe disability type insurance, other types of insurance just to know what some of these threats that you have are, and then help to clearly establish goals.
Yes, as we establish those goals and where you want to be three months from now, six months from now, a year from now, five years from now, just develop those and be able to have you to do that and then as a whole part of the process, have you have priority items, and then have an action plan that we implement, help you to implement so that you can reach your goals and reach them faster, which is what everybody wants to do is to reach their goals and reach them so much faster.
And, as well as work year around, see that’s what makes, makes me here Marcelino Dodge, and Cash Tracks Financial different than many tax preparation places, and many accounting offices, is that we’re available year around for our clients. And when you enroll in our one of our packages, either personal or business success packages, you have access to me, year-round. Our office is open year-round is not just opened during the busy tax time but it’s open year-round, so that you can easily get your tax work done, and when you enroll in one of our programs, business, or individual success programs, then you have access to the team, year around and you’re able to get your work done.
If you get any of those IRS letters which nobody likes to get an IRS letter, but yet we help you to solve those issues help you to do all of the appropriate planning. Also there, so please keep this in mind as we look at this. And as we think about the upcoming tax season we’ve discussed in the prior show about the importance of wisely picking your tax preparer, we certainly encourage you to look at that, or to listen to that podcast and see many the important qualities you need to see because you just can’t use anybody. And as we think about the times coming up February 12th for the beginning of tax season. It’s important also with that to keep in mind that there’s tax returns, especially ones that have the earned income tax credit and the additional child tax credit on it.
Many of those refunds are not even planned to be issued out until early March, be from that goes back from the path act where those delays are in there. So just, just be aware that those aren’t going to quite run as quickly as we were accustomed to in the past, so that extra delay is going to be there. So keep that in mind, as well even with tax season beginning late. Now it’s going to be interesting to see how this goes because I’ve never had a tax season begin so late and in my 20 plus years of doing taxes, but we’ll see how it goes because at least currently April 15th is still the day the tax returns are due.
Now, as Cash Tracks Financial here, we’re very aware of all the concerns individuals have, and we’re certainly looking to help ones through various online means. Yes, we have precautions in place but yet we expect to see a lot of people and we certainly welcome once to either call the office that’s, 844-394-4287 you can call the office. We can schedule an online appointment, very easily.
To help you to do that and get some basic information, we can set you up a web portal, so you can put all of your documents into the web portal so that you can easily have them accessible and then we can easily access them. We need things like IDs uploaded as well. And what’s really nice is that we can prepare your tax return, we can have a face to face, through an online chat, which is what I would love to do and I like doing that.
I like visiting with my clients, getting to know them, not just what the paperwork says but getting to know them a little bit more. And then what we do is we can get the tax return, we have e-signature options, which allows us to send a secure email to you, to be able to sign your tax return, and other documents that are available, so that you can get them back, and we can get your tax return electronically filed.
We have online payment options, which is really nice because many people want no touch options we have those available we can invoice send you the invoice right through the email you can pay it directly on our website or you can just respond to that email that we send it has the amount put in your credit card or your bank account information, whatever you want to use. We never see the information when you do it that way, which is, frankly, a way that I love it that keeps your information as secure as possible and then you have a full electronic copy of your tax return available in our web portal for you, it’s secure. And we use double authentication on it so that does not just a password, but we also have to do app through our phone to access the portal so we really try, we really work to keep that secure as well as other means we take within the office from items such as drive encryption, as well as all of the hard drives on the computer so that everyone’s information is kept completely safe.
And we certainly welcome you to and invite you to just call and visit with us, learn about our programs do our mutual exploration CFR, personal or business success programs would be right for you, which many people they will because we look at numbers, we help set goals and we want you to be successful as we look at your key data. So we’re going to go ahead and again, express our gratitude to David Steckelberg, for being with us today on The Tax Answers Advisor.
He gave us some wonderful information on the importance of having your website compliant with the ADA, as well as not just seeing that it needs to be done, but also having a solution, and Cash Tracks Financial is here to help you with that solution as well. You can visit us cashtracksfinancial.com, or call 844-394-4287. Next week, we’re going to look forward to speaking to you again, as we’re going to talk this time about, “Protect yourself from the Drought! Taxes for Farmers.”
Would be very timely, next week we’ll look forward to visiting with you at 9am Pacific. Thanks for listening to The Tax Answers Advisor, I am Marcelino Dodge on the Voice America Business Channel.
Thank you for listening to The Tax Answers Advisor with host, Marcelino Dodge. We’ll be back again next Thursday at 12 noon Eastern time, and 9am Pacific time, on The Voice America Business Channel. We’ll have more to share next week.
Cash Tracks Financial Inc.
117 W Beech St
Lamar, CO 81052
Office:(719) 336-8739
Toll Free: (844) 394-4287
Fax: (719) 336-8799
Email: success@cashtracksfinancial.com
Quick Contact
Phone: (719) 336-8739
Toll-Free: (844) 394-4287
Fax: (719) 336-8799
Email: success@cashtracksfinancial.com
Resources
Resources & Articles For Managing Your Finances On Your Own
Is Your Website ADA Compliant? A Tax Credit Can Help You!
ADA compliance for Websites – it’s important! How can I determine if my website is ADA compliant? ADA Website Compliance from the transcript of Tax Answers Advisor with Marcelino Dodge, Get more information at the ADA Website Compliance page.
Tax Impact Of Scams From Tax Experts Cash Tracks Financial
Tax scams are here to stay, so watch out for the IRS Dirty Dozen! Article from the Tax Advisor’ answers transcript with host Marcelino Dodge, owner of Cash Tracks Financial Inc. Get more information at the Taxes and Scams web page.
Natural Disasters & Tax Scams In Colorado Springs – How Ready Are You?
Avoid Tax Scams Following Natural Disaster Information About Tax Scams After a Natural Disaster The following information is a transcript from the Marcelino Dodge Tax Answers Advisor podcast on VoiceAmerica. We want to also remind you that if you want to learn more...
Contact Us
When you need help to prepare your tax return or to solve your tax issues contact Cash Tracks Financial Inc., serving Lamar, Colorado and Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Lamar CALL: (719) 336-8739 TOLL FREE: (844) 394-4287 FAX: (719) 336-8799
117 W Beech St, Lamar, CO 81052, USA
Colorado Springs CALL: (719) 359-8789 TOLL FREE: (844) 394-4287 FAX: (719) 336-8799
525 N Cascade Ave, #200, Colorado Springs, CO 80903 USA
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