Privacy Policy | TM Tax Advisors

T&M Business Advisors, LLC, trading as TM Tax Advisors ("we", "us", "our"), operates www.tmtaxadvisors.com. This policy explains what this website collects, what the firm does with information you give us, and the choices you have. Confidentiality is both a professional obligation and a legal one for a tax practice, and this policy is written to describe what actually happens here — not to describe a website we do not run.

Who we are

T&M Business Advisors, LLC, trading as TM Tax Advisors
1151 W 5th Street, Azusa, CA 91702
Telephone: (818) 806-8131
Email: info@tmtaxadvisors.com

What this website is

This is a static, informational website. There is no account to create and no login on the site itself. You cannot register, and nothing you read here is recorded against a profile. The firm's actual client work happens by telephone, by email, in the Azusa office and in our secure client portal — not on these pages.

Information we collect

Information you give us. When you complete the contact form, email us or call us, we collect what you choose to provide — typically your name, email address, telephone number, business type and a description of what you need help with. The form submission is sent to the firm so that we can answer you. The form deliberately asks you not to send Social Security numbers, financial account numbers or tax documents through it, because a web form is not a secure channel for those. If you tick the text-message box, we also record that consent.

Information collected automatically. The site is hosted by Vercel. Like any web server, the host records standard request logs — IP address, browser and device type, the page requested, the referring page, and the date and time. Those logs exist to keep the site available and secure and to diagnose faults. We do not use them to identify individual visitors, and we do not combine them with anything you send us.

Client information. Once you engage the firm, we collect the identifying and financial information necessary to do the work you have retained us for. That information is governed by your engagement letter and by the confidentiality rules that apply to tax professionals — not by this website policy alone.

Cookies and local storage

This site sets only strictly necessary cookies. In addition, it stores a single entry in your own browser — a cookie or a localStorage value — recording the choice you made in the cookie banner, and, if you switch languages, your language preference. That entry stays in your browser, is not sent to an advertising network, and identifies nothing about you beyond the preference itself.

You can clear or block cookies and site storage through your browser settings at any time. The site will continue to work; you will simply see the cookie banner again.

Analytics

Analytics are not running on this website at present. No Google Analytics tag and no Google Tag Manager container is loaded, and no analytics cookie is set.

If we switch analytics on in future, then: the cookie banner will ask you before any analytics cookie is set; this page will be updated to name the provider and the cookies involved; you will be able to decline non-essential cookies and keep using the whole site; and we would use the resulting data only in aggregate, to understand which pages are useful. We would not use it for advertising.

Third parties this site touches

Google Fonts. Our typefaces are loaded from fonts.googleapis.com and fonts.gstatic.com. That request goes from your browser directly to Google, which means Google receives your IP address and basic request information in order to serve the font files. We receive nothing from that request.
Google Maps. The contact page may embed a Google map of the office. Where it loads, Google receives your IP address and may set its own cookies under its own privacy policy. The full street address, a directions link and the telephone number appear in text next to the map, so no information is available only through the embed.
Vercel, our website host, which keeps the server logs described above.
TaxDome, our client portal, where client documents, signatures and invoices live. TaxDome handles that information on our instructions under its own security and confidentiality terms. This website never receives, stores or displays client tax documents.
Email, telephone and practice software providers used to run the firm day to day.

Each provider has access only to what it needs to perform its function, and each is bound by confidentiality obligations.

We do not sell your personal information. We do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising. We do not give it to data brokers, advertising networks or list vendors, and we do not use anything submitted through this website to build advertising profiles.

Why we use information

To answer your enquiry and arrange a consultation
To provide the tax, accounting and IRS-representation services you engage us for, and to bill for them
To send appointment reminders and service messages, where you have asked us to
To meet our legal, regulatory and professional obligations, including those of the IRS, the California Franchise Tax Board and other agencies
To keep this website and the firm's systems secure, and to investigate misuse
To keep the records a tax practice is required to keep

We do not use your information for any purpose materially different from these without telling you first.

Tax return information and IRC §7216

Federal law — Internal Revenue Code §7216 and the regulations under it — restricts how a tax return preparer may use or disclose tax return information. We do not disclose or use your tax return information for any purpose other than preparing, or assisting in preparing, your return, unless you give us specific written consent or the law requires the disclosure. That includes not using your return information to market unrelated products or services to you.

Where a disclosure would be useful to you — sending a return to a lender, for example — we will ask you to sign a consent that says exactly what is being disclosed, to whom, and for what purpose, before anything is sent.

How we protect information

We maintain a written information security programme, as tax professionals are required to under the FTC Safeguards Rule and as set out in IRS Publication 4557, and we are subject to the privacy obligations the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act places on tax return preparers. In practice that means:

Documents are exchanged through the encrypted TaxDome portal rather than by email
Access is limited to the team members working on your engagement
Multi-factor authentication is used on firm systems
Information is encrypted in transit, and this website is served over HTTPS
Controls are reviewed regularly and after any significant change to how we work

No system is perfectly secure. If a breach ever affected your personal information, we would notify you as California law requires.

Text messages

If you opt in to text messages, we will use your number only to send appointment reminders and service messages related to your engagement. Message and data rates may apply. Reply STOP to opt out at any time. We never sell or share mobile numbers, and mobile opt-in data is never shared with third parties for marketing.

How long we keep information

Client records are kept for as long as professional standards, your engagement letter and applicable law require — generally at least seven years for tax records, and longer where a matter remains open with a taxing authority.
Enquiries that do not become engagements are kept only as long as needed to answer them and for a short period afterwards, so we can recognise you if you come back.
Server logs are kept by our host for a short period, for security and diagnostics.
Consent records, including text-message consent, are kept for as long as the underlying relationship lasts and for the period our records rules require afterwards.

Your California privacy rights

If you are a California resident, the California Consumer Privacy Act as amended by the CPRA gives you the right to:

Know what personal information we have collected about you, where it came from, why we collected it and who we disclosed it to
Delete personal information we hold about you, subject to our legal and professional retention obligations
Correct personal information that is inaccurate
Opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information
Limit the use of sensitive personal information
Not be discriminated against — in price, service or anything else — for exercising any of these rights

We do not sell personal information and we do not share it for cross-context behavioural advertising, and we have not done so in the preceding twelve months. There is therefore no opt-out for you to exercise, but you are welcome to ask us to confirm that in writing and we will.

Please note that records relating to tax preparation and representation carry retention requirements that may prevent us from deleting some information on request. Where that is the case we will tell you what we are keeping and why.

How to exercise your rights

Email: info@tmtaxadvisors.com
Telephone: (818) 806-8131
Post: T&M Business Advisors, LLC, 1151 W 5th Street, Azusa, CA 91702

We will verify your identity before acting on a request — for existing clients that is usually done through the client portal — and we will respond within the timeframe the law requires, generally 45 days, extendable once where a request is complex. An authorised agent may make a request on your behalf with your written permission. Exercising any of these rights costs nothing.

Children's privacy

This website is not directed at children, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 16 through it. If we learn that we have, we will delete it. A child's information may of course appear in a tax return as a dependent; that information reaches us from the parent or guardian as part of an engagement, not from this website.

Changes to this policy

We will post any change on this page and update the date at the top. Changes that materially affect existing clients will be communicated directly rather than left here to be discovered.

Questions

Questions about this policy, or about how your information is handled, should go to info@tmtaxadvisors.com or (818) 806-8131. If you are not satisfied with our answer, you may contact the California Attorney General's office.

Language of this policy

This page is published in English and in Spanish. The two versions are meant to say the same thing. If they ever differ, the English version governs.