H&R Block 324 Chapel Street, Prahran, Victoria 3181

"I booked a consultation to maximise my tax refund. The phone appointment was 10 minutes late, was constantly put on hold abruptly. 90% of the phone call was just horrible breathing noises. the other 10% was questions asked rudely. When I tried to ask for advice on my tax calculations, I was bluntly told that they only do do tax processing and charge fees. Absolutely not! They were not there to help. $154 of just breathing noises and terrible service. Not surprisingly, I could not process under the circumstances."

"I can speak for myself and based on my experience with them, they were very UNPROFESSIONAL and DISRESPECTFUL. I felt like I wasn't treated as equally as other clients. I had an appointment with their Prahran office to do my tax return. When I went back they said they had to reschedule because they were too busy and literally canceled the appointment they had given me 3 hours earlier on the same day. The person I was scheduled with, Mammen, who is also the Office Manager!!! had accepted another client just before me whereas I had to be sitting at his desk to do my affair. I filed a complaint with their head office and had the regional manager call me for an apology. She did apalogize but only gave me excuses about how understaffed they are which was obviously not convincing to me. What's disappointing is they weren't even trying to keep their first-time client happy so I would leave what had happened behind and choose to stay with them. I am not going back to any of their offices again."

"Were 20 minutes late to call me for my phone appointment. Had to call them, receptionist (?) sounded way too tired to be there, couldn't even finish saying the opening welcome line, attempted it a few times, cutting me off and me cutting him off, which made it awkward to know when I was meant to talk. They couldn't find any evidence of my appointment, ignored me stating who my appointment was meant to be with. Put me through to another person, took about 15 minutes to get through what my TFN, account details and birthday were, then asked me if I'd be paying the fees, refused to tell me what the fees would be at all, and we hadn't even gotten to the part of the tax lodgement I needed help with. I just gave up."

"AVOID AVOID AVOID!!! Not only will you get poor service, you will not get the maximum amount for your tax return. You must avoid Mammen Mammen. He is by far the worst tax accountant I have ever encountered and overcharged me. He is a extremely rude , not thorough, slow with his work and overcharged me. I am detailing my experience below in the hope that others avoid him which will hopefully save you money: - He charged me $623 for a tax return that should have only taken 1 hour but took 2 and half hours because he was slow. - He refused to answer my questions (and when he did, he directed me to either call the ATO or my superfund instead of actually answering my questions). I had asked for his help in calculating how much additional super I can voluntarily contribute to my superfund on top of my guaranteed 10% so that I don't breach the 15% concessional tax rate. He refused to do the calculation and directed me to my superfund. He is a tax ACCOUNTANT and should be doing this calculation, not my superfund. That's why we pay accountants. - He yelled at me and we almost got into an argument but I had to de-escalate things. - When I asked him questions, he interrupted and said "not yet" - He was not thorough with my tax return, not even looking at the supporting documents I provided him (including my ETF dividend statements that include foreign tax offsets). He also did not account for all of my deductions for my rental including the repairs and maintenance expenses. I have to say I am also disappointed with H&R block as a franchise. I contacted their head office and they were unsympathetic to my situation. I will NEVER be going back to H&R block Prahran (or any H&R block offices for that matter). Whilst my experience was only with Mammen Mammen (so I can't speak for the other accountants at H&R block Prahran), my experience was so bad, it has soured me from ever visiting the office. I am lucky that my friend recommended me her tax accountant and she only charged $170, plus increased my return by $3,000 more."