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Super
CPAs
Corporate taxation
Carl H. Wyatt
Frederick B. Hill & Co.
by Paula
C. Squires
Carl H. Wyatt tends to bore easily.
So, he wanted a career that wouldn't be predictable.
He found one in the deadline-sensitive world of accounting.
Wyatt specializes in corporate taxation, serving clients
large and small and keeping his company up to speed
on tax laws that change with the whims of presidential
administrations.
 "In
taxation, every day is different. You don't know what
client is going to call with what issue. There's nothing
routine about what I do," says Wyatt. And as for
following abstruse permutations in tax law, colleagues
say that's one of Wyatt's strengths. "I've always
considered him our walking, talking tax code,"
says Lauren Wolcott, a certified public accountant who
works with Wyatt at the firm of Frederick B. Hill &
Co. in Norfolk. "His technical proficiency in taxation
matters and research capabilities provides a valuable
resource for our clients ..." she adds.
Wyatt juggles many balls at 92-year-old Frederick B.
Hill, one of Norfolk's oldest accounting firms. Besides
managing tax and retirement plan administration and
the information technology department, the 54-year-old
CPA conducts in-house continuing education for the company's
other accountants. To keep up with tax code changes,
"you have to read a lot," he says with typical
understatement. For Wyatt that means weekly updates
from tax services and daily e-mails from commerce clearing
houses on everything from legislative actions to court
decisions. Plus Wyatt attends weeklong conferences,
such as a recent one in which a speaker spent two days
talking about estate and gift taxes.
What might be boring to a non accountant whets Wyatt's
appetite for the technically obscure. His ability to
grasp difficult concepts and to explain them in plain
English to colleagues and clients garners praise. Nancy
Papadopulos, a tax manager in the Newport News office
of Eggleston Smith says, "Carl can undertake complicated
tax concepts and is able to convey them in a logical,
simple way. He's an excellent teacher and researcher
on heavy, technical issues."
Wyatt, a native of Newport News, decided to pursue accounting
after serving with the Army during the Vietnam War.
When he returned home from the war in 1969, Wyatt initially
worked at the Newport News shipyard as a clerical staff
member in the nuclear quality inspection department.
After several years there, he resumed an earlier start
at a college education, returning to Christopher Newport
College where he earned his accounting degree. His first
job out of school was with Coopers & Lybrand in
Norfolk where he worked for 10 years. He left to become
tax manager at the much smaller firm of Eggleston Smith,
a change Wyatt says he liked. "It gave me the opportunity
to bring some things to those clients that they might
not have ordinarily gotten. "After two years in
Eggleston Smith's Williamsburg office, Wyatt joined
Frederick B. Hill where he has worked as the tax manager
since 1990.
Today, he advises clients from the Eastern Shore of
Virginia to northeastern North Carolina. Clients range
from small mom and pop operations to large, closely
held corporations. The two most hectic times of the
year are March 15 - the deadline for corporate filings
- and April 15, a hair-pulling day for individual tax
filers and their advisors. Wyatt admits that during
these times clients can get anxious. "You have
to learn how to deal with it, to plan your work out.
... The worst tax season I can think of I had to put
in 75 to 80 hours a week for several weeks."
To relax during his off hours, Carl and his wife travel
to NASCAR races and professional ice hockey games. His
favorite track is Martinsville, Va. - "a small
track, and you can see what's going on," he says.
He also spends time as a member of the Virginia Group
of CPA Firms, serving on several of its committees.
To avoid tax headaches, Wyatt says individual and corporate
clients alike shouldn't do a major transaction before
talking to a tax adviser. "Once a transaction has
occurred, it's difficult to fix it or make it tax efficient.
Talk to us ahead of time so we can plan the transaction
properly." Proof that it doesn't hurt and can help
to spend a little time under the caution flag.
Return
to Virginia Business - November 2001
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