BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Alvin Katz knows what to expect during tax season. It’s his 47th as a professional, so the long hours and six-day work weeks are nothing new.

“This is what comes with the job,” said Katz, president and chief executive officer of KAWG&F, an accounting and consulting firm with about 115 employees and offices in Annapolis, Bel Air, Columbia, Easton and Timonium.

About 70 percent of electronic individual income tax returns received through March 21 have been prepared by tax professionals, according to the IRS. That’s a lot of work for accounting firms such as KAWG&F until and usually past April 15, the deadline to file individual tax returns without an extension.

“Many people don’t like to go on extensions, so we have a concentrated amount of time to get tax returns done,” Katz said. “That’s why you see so many accounting firms burning the midnight oil.”

Katz, who co-founded KAWG&F in 1969, said employees at accounting firms used to work even more hours than they do today, recalling tax seasons when workers were expected to work 6 1/2 days and four nights a week during tax season. Office hours have decreased somewhat, Katz said, for “generational reasons,” but it’s still very hectic time.

“As far as I’m concerned, you get used to it,” Katz said. “You try and make some fun out of it.”

KAWG&F has held several group events to give employees some time away from tax laws and number crunching. Employees have gone bowling, snow tubing and done the Polar Bear Plunge together.

“We close down around 4 p.m. or 5 p.m. on April 15, and we’ll go out and celebrate with a happy hour,” Katz said.

Before she can join her co-workers at that celebratory happy hour, Jane Brewer, co-chair of KAWG&F’s tax department, knows there’s still plenty of work ahead.

“It’s at the point where there’s so much yet to be done,” Brewer said. “After work, all you want to do is go home and rest so you’re ready to come back and do it again.”

acannarsa@baltimoreexaminer.com