The efficacy of financial forecasts or projections that are used by an expert when they are making a valuation in a litigation proceeding is a point that can be missed. If these forecasts are off, they can be the cause of a large difference between experts. It’s important for an attorney and an expert to  Continue Reading »

There is a growing need for valuation services among small businesses. There is a variety of reasons why business owners need to know the value of businesses, business interests and intangible assets, including sales transactions, financing, taxation, financial reporting and litigation. It’s critical for these business owners to use an appraiser who follows professional standards and guidelines, so  Continue Reading »

American Eagle Waste Industries, LLC v. St. Louis County, 2015 Mo. App. LEXIS 168 (Feb. 24, 2015) The latest dispute in the long-running litigation between several garbage disposal companies and a Missouri county focused on the trial court’s damages findings. The county argued damages were based on inadmissible and unreliable lost profits testimony from the  Continue Reading »

In re Mauer, 2015 Iowa App. LEXIS 172 (Feb. 25, 2015) Double counting remains a preoccupation for divorce courts across all jurisdictions. Recently, the Iowa Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s decision to circumvent the problem by endorsing one expert’s use of the asset approach to value the owner spouse’s eye clinics. Using an  Continue Reading »

There are some tax breaks out there that may be available to small business owners. However, business owners may only qualify if their adjusted gross income is under a certain amount. If a small business owners could qualify, but their income was a little too high, they might lose access to tax breaks like higher  Continue Reading »

Many small business owners dread traditional performance reviews. They can be enormously time-consuming, and usually require a lot of paperwork. Due to a variety of performance criterial and various numeric ranking systems, managers can spend hours and hours per year on the performance evaluation process. Additionally, employees themselves spend on average a week preparing for  Continue Reading »

Small businesses have to maintain payroll for their employees. This means that business owners cannot avoid collecting and maintaining personal information about their employees, both current and former. For long established business, it’s possible that there are boxes of old personnel files in storage somewhere. The data contained in those records makes the business and  Continue Reading »

Russell v. Allianze Life Insurance Co. of North America, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1946 (Jan. 8, 2015)  “Trust, but verify,” is a motto that has stood politicians in good stead. Valuators should take it to heart as well, as illustrated by a Daubert case in which an experienced expert abandoned his standard operating procedure to  Continue Reading »

The United States District Court for the District of Wyoming dismissed a lawsuit seeking to declare Indian tribes exempt from employer penalties under the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA’s) shared responsibility provisions. The tribe argued that Congress didn’t intend to cover tribal employers. Facts of the case The Northern Arapaho Tribe, a federally recognized Indian tribe,  Continue Reading »

Business owners can easily get so caught up in leading their organization that they lose sight of what’s going with other employees. Sometimes there is frustration and dysfunction among lower level employees, but the owner only hears upbeat reports. Managers might be surprised to find out that some employees feel like the workplace is a  Continue Reading »