Jan Zobel

Hi. I’m Jan Zobel. As a tax preparer, I’ve been busy learning the details about recent tax law changes. Not only do I want to keep my clients informed about how changes in the law might affect them, but I am also updating a tax book I wrote. And, I’m teaching small business owners about the new laws.

I have always seen myself as an educator. Although trained as an elementary school teacher, I have spent little time teaching at that level. Most of my focus has been passing the skills and knowledge I’ve learned onto other adults.

In the early 70s I moved to the Bay Area after working as a VISTA volunteer in New York and earning my master's degree at the University of Chicago. As I became acquainted with Bay Area resources, I collaborated with 4 other women to create the widely-read San Francisco Bay Area People's Yellow Pages. For ten years I edited this residents' guidebook and shared my favorite parts of living in the Bay Area with readers.

In 1978, seeking a more stable source of income, I began doing bookkeeping and tax preparation. It didn't take long before I realized that the dearth of easily-understood tax information available to small business owners was causing many unnecessary and expensive tax problems.

After consulting with hundreds of small business owners, I realized they were all having trouble finding the information they needed. Whether in business as a psychotherapist, a jewelry maker, or a restaurant
owner, they all had similar questions such as:

• How do I set up a recordkeeping system?
• How do I calculate quarterly estimated tax payments?
• What expenses can I deduct?
• How do I avoid being audited?

Following my own tradition of passing on the knowledge I have collected, I created a 5-hour class called Basic Tax and Recordkeeping Information For Self-Employed People. I have been teaching this class throughout the western United States for the past 16 years. In addition to teaching through the universities of California, Hawaii, New Mexico, and Arizona, I teach at small business development centers around Oregon and Northern California. I was part of a small business panel at the 2000 PBWC and have spoken at many other business women's conferences. I was flattered when I was named the Small Business Administrations' Accountant Advocate of the Year in 1983.

It was also in 1983 that I sat for and passed the IRS' enrolled agent exam — an exhaustive 2-day test on taxes that is passed on the first try by fewer than 30% of those who take it. As an enrolled agent, I am able to represent taxpayers in IRS related matters including audits.

Although attending audits, preparing tax returns, consulting with small business owners, and teaching tax classes fill my time, I have always wanted to write a book to pass along the information that small business owners were seeking. When someone casually suggested that I gear the book to the growing number of women business owners, I jumped on the idea. Minding her Own Business: The Self-Employed Woman's Guide to Taxes and Recordkeeping was published by EastHill Press in January 1997. While current in regards to tax laws affecting 1997 tax returns, I am busy working on an updated edition containing 1998 changes.

Nationally syndicated small business columnist Jane Applegate praised my book in one of her columns, writing "Zobel has the ability to explain financial issues in a clear and understandable manner." Others apparently agree as I was recently hired by Microsoft to write an article on tax law changes for the software company's small business Web site.

Meanwhile, I continue to wade through the 800 recent amendments and 300 new provisions of the Internal Revenue Code in order to be able to pass on to others an understandable version of the tax law changes.
If you’d like to learn more about my tax preparation and consultation services, my upcoming small business tax and recordkeeping seminars, or my book: Minding Her Own Business, feel free to call me at my San Francisco office at 415-821-1015, my Oakland office at 510-482-1015 or e-mailme at JanZtax@aol.com.

This page is preserved from the original PBWC website. It is part of Resource Center (archive) in the PBWC Website Archive 1996–2015.