Pandemic financial relief firm seizes opportunity, seeks to hire 100 employees

A lesser-known pandemic relief program has attracted a flurry of scammers. But a Tampa company is determined to do right by its clients — and hopefully keep them around as it evolves.

By Brian Hartz
| 5:00 a.m. July 5, 2023
| 0 Free Articles Remaining!

Brian Anderson and John Souza co-founded ERTC Express and plan to develop into a comprehensive platform for helping entrepreneurs.

Tampa Bay-Lakeland

The federal Employee Retention Tax Credit program is more complicated than — and not nearly as well known — the Paycheck Protection Program. Yet the program, known as ERTC, can be a tremendous resource for businesses and nonprofits that didn’t lay off workers during the pandemic.

But just like with many other government programs, there's a ‘yeah but.’ Part of the $2.2 billion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, the ERTC program, like PPP, has attracted its fair share of fraud — so much so that the IRS has issued multiple warnings about third-party bad actors and their “too good to be true” promises of financial windfalls, which are really deceptive pledges that can lead to audits, fines and other penalties.