What did I learn checking a number before a board call?

What was the question?

Simple, and urgent. The client needs the immediate expensing limit for qualifying equipment before a board call at two. The last Halden memo had a number in it. My job, as the associate on matter 2041, was to give the team a figure they could rely on and to show my working.

Why not use the number in the draft?

Because I have sat through the firm's lesson on this twice and it stuck: a confident old number is still an old number. The draft said 1,160,000. The draft was from the previous year. The first thing to check is the period, not the number.

So I opened the memo the draft cited. Tax Advisory Memo TA-25-02 opens with its own historical status. It says its figure belongs to prior guidance and must not be quoted for tax years beginning in 2026, and it points to its replacement.

What did the current memo say?

Tax Advisory Memo TA-26-04, issued in March 2026, section 2: for tax years beginning in 2026 the immediate expensing limit for qualifying equipment is 1,250,000. It names TA-25-02 as superseded for that period. It also says the limit applies only after qualification and period have been confirmed. That sentence is the one that kept me honest about what I had and had not done.

How did I find it so quickly?

I asked our workspace. The firm runs its knowledge on Vera by UnicornIQ, and when I asked which memo governs the equipment expensing limit for tax years beginning in 2026, the answer named TA-26-04, section 2, quoted the figure, and said in the same breath that TA-25-02 was superseded. It also showed me the sentence it was quoting, so I read the section in full before I wrote anything down. That is the point: it took me to the line, and the firm's rule is that I read the line.

What did I write down?

Three things, kept apart. The verified source: TA-26-04, section 2, the figure, the period, and the named superseded memo. My interpretation: the draft needs a replacement figure and a replacement citation, and the changed line should be identified rather than quietly overwritten. And the open items: Rohan still needs to confirm that the equipment qualifies and that the tax-year start date is what the draft assumes. Finding the right memo is not the same as the figure applying.

I saved that as a personal research note and shared it with the Halden matter team. It is readable in the Halden lane and nowhere else. It is not a methods note and it is not firm policy.

Where did the time go?

Against matter 2041, with a factual narrative: checked the period and replacement status of the cited memo, identified the current source and section, drafted the replacement citation for review. Our billing standards say a useful entry states the work performed. This was work the client needed, and the entry says what it was.

What is still open?

The qualification and period review. The source change is identified; the client memo does not leave the matter team until Rohan has reviewed the qualification analysis. I would rather tell the director "here is the current figure and here is who is confirming it applies to you" than give a confident number that nobody has checked against the schedule.

What would I tell the next associate?

• Check the period before the figure.
• Read the cited section yourself, even when something found it for you.
• Write the source and your interpretation in separate sentences.
• Name what is still unconfirmed and who owns it.
• Share the note with the matter team, not the firm.

What would I do differently?

Start earlier. The check itself took minutes once I knew where to look. What took time was the moment of deciding to look at all, because the draft was approved and the clock was running and it would have been easy to send the figure as it stood. Next time the check comes first, before the draft is even reread, because a figure in last year's memo is a question about this year until the source says otherwise.

I would also write the open items at the top of the note rather than the bottom. Rohan's review of qualification and the period is the thing that stands between the draft and the client, and it should be the first thing a reviewer sees, not the last. The source, the section, my interpretation and the open items, in that order. It is a small change in a note. It is the whole method in miniature.

Q&A

The questions other associates asked me about this piece of research are answered below.

Last updated 1 October 2026.