Financially FAT

What happens to your firm when AI can prepare a thousand tax returns before lunch?

Amanda Argue helped build Instead, one of the first companies in decades licensed by the IRS across every form and state. She and Ben get into what agentic AI really means for tax and accounting.

They cover the difference between a chat assistant and an AI agent, why eighty to ninety percent done is the new starting line, and how the accountant’s job shifts from doer to reviewer. Amanda also makes the case for ending hourly billing for good.

The firms that stay flexible, adaptable, and teachable will pull ahead. The ones that wait may fall behind. Listen now.

• [00:03:22] The three words every business owner needs to survive
• [00:03:41] Building a company like turning a wooden ship into a steel boat mid-ocean
• [00:07:07] The pivot from compliance grind to high-value advisory work
• [00:09:50] The moment AI agents turned 2018 sci-fi into 2026 reality
• [00:11:43] Why the desire to change is there, but tax season eats the time
• [00:13:16] How to actually take a lunch break in the middle of busy season
• [00:15:14] What your firm looks like when AI drafts 2,000 returns at once
• [00:16:05] The one thing AI will never do for your tax return
• [00:17:20] Why it is not AI that beats you, it is the people who use it
• [00:23:17] The Tesla Full Self-Driving analogy that finally explains AI agents
• [00:26:27] The IRS position on AI savings that could change how you bill
• [00:27:46] The controversial take on killing the hourly rate

• Corvee, Instead’s tax planning product launched in 2020
• AI assistants: ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini
• Legacy tax software: Lacerte, UltraTax
• Financial Times

Amanda Argue, CPA, is co-founder and chief of staff at Instead, a tax preparation platform built for tax and accounting professionals with AI agents inside the tax engine. Based in San Francisco, she specializes in taking new products from zero to one, building the first version and then handing it off to scale. Instead is one of the first companies in decades to earn IRS licensing across all forms and states.

🔗 LinkedIn | Website

• Connect with Ben: LinkedIn
• Connect with Golden Tax Relief: Website | LinkedIn
• Request a consultation: Schedule a FREE Tax Evaluation
• Check our socials: Instagram | Facebook | TikTok

The Financially FAT Podcast is an original production hosted by Ben Golden. Brought to you by Golden Tax Relief. Production and editing by Podcast Your Brand.

What would you do if the IRS gave you 24 hours to pay a $171,000 debt that was never yours?

In the first episode of The Financially FAT Podcast, Ben Golden opens with the night that shaped everything. A revenue officer read his personal net worth back to him and told him to pay a logger client’s payroll taxes by morning.

Ben walks through the arrangement that put him on that account, the IRS procedure the agent skipped, and the old manual he found at 3 in the morning that changed the outcome. He also unpacks what FAT really stands for, Flexible, Adaptable, Teachable, and where it came from.

This is the origin of the show, who it is for, and the one thing Ben wants every owner who feels alone to hear. Listen now.

[00:00:51] The 24-hour ultimatum, and the $171,000 that was never Ben's to pay

[00:02:10] The Scrivener contract: the hand that only held the pen

[00:03:02] "I don't owe this. This isn't mine." What the revenue officer said back

[00:03:45] Walking home to his kids while carrying a secret he would not share

[00:04:28] 3 a.m., an old master's program manual, and the form that mattered

[00:05:16] The IRS procedure they skipped on the way to Ben

[00:05:58] Why he went over two heads to the territory manager

[00:06:41] How it ended: a suspension, a payment plan, and no check

[00:07:24] Where FAT comes from, and why it is not a marketing term

[00:08:56] The chain of advisors, and the weak link you cannot see

[00:10:22] Who this show is for, and who it is honestly not for

[00:14:25] The real why behind the show, and it is not the money

• Connect with Ben: LinkedIn
• Connect with Golden Tax Relief: Website | LinkedIn
• Request a consultation: Schedule a FREE Tax Evaluation
• Check our socials: Instagram | Facebook | TikTok

The Financially FAT Podcast is an original production hosted by Ben Golden. Brought to you by Golden Tax Relief. Production and editing by Podcast Your Brand.