Calculations takes clients from planning to payroll

Houlton Pioneer Times Photo/Elna Seabrooks
CALCULATING WOMAN — Mellissa McAvoy Edwards is a CPA and owner of Calculations, Inc in Patten. The business is a full service tax, accounting and business consulting firm that covers a wide-spectrum of client needs from planning to payroll.
By Elna Seabrooks
Staff Writer
    PATTEN — Tax time really isn’t too far off, especially if you’re a CPA and not one of those late, last-minute people who rushes into an accountant’s office April 13 with a box or shopping bag of receipts.  
    Mellissa McAvoy Edwards, is a CPA and the owner of Calculations, Inc. in Patten. She said she’s busy all year long keeping track of taxes, finances and payrolls for various corporate and individual client accounts.
    “It’s nicer to start in October or November instead of April,” said McAvoy Edwards referring to the prep time that goes into compiling records. In addition to a base fee, she charges for the number of hours she has to work on an account. “If they bring their records to us in garbage bags, it’s more expensive.”
    McAvoy Edwards bought the business in May 2000 and says her clients are very loyal. Calculations was established 25 years ago and in addition to expanding the original base, she said the business has grown since she took over 10 years ago. According to McAvoy Edwards, the business has about 450 clients.
Wide range of services
     “We are a full service tax, accounting and business consulting firm. We do bookkeeping, business consulting, tax consulting, truck licensing and reporting, fuel taxes and annual registrations as well as full service payroll.” She employs three people full-time in Patten and one on a part-time basis in Presque Isle.
    When she detailed the services, she said: “There are very few things that clients come in and ask me to do that I couldn’t figure out. I can review (a prospective client’s) business processes and come up with a business plan for new businesses. You have to be diversified to be able to stay here. I guess that would be the biggest development over the last 10 years. We do a lot of things now that we didn’t do then. We didn’t do business planning when I started. It was pretty much tax preparation, bookkeeping and payroll when I started.”
    As things evolved, McAvoy Edwards “helped more and more of her clients with strategies on how to position themselves in a market to make their services desirable.” She also said she helps business owners and entrepreneurs consider what their market is, who the target audience is, how to differentiate themselves from the competition, how to get funding and how to manage cash flow.
    “You have to have a plan not for tomorrow, but for the short-term — one-year plan. You also need a five-year plan and where you are going to be five years from now.” McAvoy Edwards added that “when you make someone put a pen to paper, they are always surprised at how different the plan comes out when it’s on paper. And, it’s better. A lot of the banks won’t let you borrow money for a start-up business anymore without a business plan.”
    For more information, contact Calculations, Inc., 28 Main St, Patten, 528-2306.