When the time comes to pay your taxes, you can help to ensure that you are compliant by utilizing the BNA/Bloomberg Tax and Accounting Center. The Tax and Accounting Center is an integrated tax planning resource. It is an excellent source for tax and accounting research, related news, practice tools, and guidance for tax attorneys and accountants.
BNA stands for the Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. It was founded in 1929 as a subsidiary of what is now known as U.S. News & World Report. Bloomberg acquired BNA in September, 2011.
The Tax and Accounting center is organized by practice area. Clicking on the tabs located just below the page heading allow the user to access his/her desired practice area. Users can choose which practice areas to subscribe to.
If you prefer to search the Tax and Accounting Center, there are four different ways to do so: (1) quick search; (2) advanced search; (3) guided search; and (4) go to. These search options can be found at the upper right corner of the screen:
To perform a “quick search”, enter any word or phrase into the search box and click “search.” The Tax and Accounting Center will search the practice areas that you are subscribed to and return relevant results.
If your “quick search” returned excessive results, the “Advanced search” feature will allow you to enter additional criteria in an attempt limit the scope of the search. To perform an advanced search, click on the advanced search button just under the search box at the top right of the screen. This link will direct you to another screen where you will be prompted to enter additional search criteria.
If you are truly unfamiliar with your subject matter, a “guided search” might be your best bet. This type of search will present the user with a form to fill in that is appropriate to the collection being searched. For example, if you were interested in searching the practice tools collection, you would be asked to fill in a form to indicate which particular collection you wished to search.
Lastly, the “go to” search option is the choice for those who want to quickly retrieve specific documents. This option allows you to retrieve documents and cases by citation. Additionally, the “go to” option allows you to use dropdowns menus to navigate BNA’s expert analysis portfolios.
This is truly a great resource for students and tax professionals alike.
~Greg Merkel, L’13~
