As the Senate takes up President Donald Trump’s wide-ranging tax legislation, the American Institute of CPAs is pushing for revision to several provisions that could significantly affect accounting firms and other service-based businesses, according to a report by Accounting Today. 

In a letter sent on Thursday, the AICPA urged lawmakers to rethink changes to the state and local tax (SALT) deduction for pass-through entities (PTEs) classified as “specified service trades or businesses” (SSTBs). That includes fields like accounting, law, consulting, and healthcare, industries that often don’t have the option of organizing as C corporations. 

Under the current law, many PTEs use state-level entity taxes (PTETs) to get around the federal SALT cap. But the House-passed bill would deny that workaround to SSTBs, creating what the AICPA calls a “parity gap” between service firms and other business types. 

The group is also asking Congress to strike a provision that would allow contingent fee arrangements for original tax return preparation. AICPA leaders argue that it invites fraud and mirror the conditions that led to abuse during the Employee Retention Credit program. 

Other requests include preserving the ability to carry forward excess business losses as net operating losses, rather than limiting them indefinitely to future business income. 

Despite its criticisms, the AICPA also expressed support for provisions like raising the 1099-K threshold, making the paid family leave credit permanent, and increasing flexibility in the use of 529 plans. 

The organization has encouraged CPAs to contact lawmakers ahead of the Senate’s expected debate on the bill.