You get hired as a tax professional and then find out you are really a salesperson. First, Block does not believe in hiring a marketing team so they have us deliver flyers. They want us to call every client the first couple of weeks and make them all set up appointments. If they don't, we have to keep calling them back until they do. If that's not bad enough, Block runs a call center in some foreign country that calls the clients more than we do, sets up appointments in the wrong office or when someone isn't working, which means we have an irate client on our hands and we get blamed for it.
When we finally get to do taxes, the push is to sell extras, not just do taxes. Block used to say we wanted to help our clients meet their financial goals by helping them hold on to their refund. Now we want to get every dime out of that refund by letting them have fees come out of it - for an extra price, and sell audit protection that pays their taxes - which rarely does since most mistakes are on their part for not bringing documents in or being honest about dependents. But wait, there's more! Every year they make preparers do free 1040EZ returns and Second Looks reviews to get clients in the door, and not only do preparers not get paid to do these things, it takes time away from working with paying clients. Since it is a full commission job and time is money, it costs us money to do these things for free. Do it if you love doing taxes and helping people. Otherwise there are a lot better employers out there.