H&R Block reviews

Lack of training given to new hires. H&R Block teaches only the basics in tax theory, and you pretty much have to learn more difficult tax subjects on your own. Can be hard on new hires, when a customer comes in with a difficult return that they don't know how to do, leading to a dissatisfied customer, or worse (inaccurate completed return). To be fair, there are usually some tax pros with lots of years of experience in each office, but through lack of employee retention (since it's only a seasonal job) most tax pros have limited experience. Hours are pretty terrible, there's two short peak seasons (early February and April) where you can get full-time hours, but between those dates a first year hire can only expect 10 hours a week at the most. Also, the concept of doing personal returns at a retail shop like H&R Block has been dying a slow death for years now with the releases of powerful and intuitive personal tax software and e-filing. So every year, the company suffers more and more customer loss, leading to a lot of stress on management and office leaders since they can't meet their number goals. H&R Block can only grow through attrition, meaning the death of mom & pop tax shops and hopefully their main competitors like Liberty and Jackson Hewitt.

Most office managers have zero training in preparing tax returns; are of no help with client tax issues. You may get stuck with a manager who's style is archaic, pedantic and characterized by a personality that is temperamental. If you are trying to feed your family, good luck! The hourly pay is dismal. Commissions help, but you are better off spending time actually learning how to prepare tax returns - not learning the HR Block system that gives you little actual tax knowledge.