CPA Trendlines

Going paperless: “Best decision I ever made.”

by Mark Pricco
Mark Pricco, CPA, is the owner of X-Tax, a Lansing, MI, tax preparation businesses, and the founder and president of ATOM Software, a tax office management system.

For many CPAs converting to paperless is an exercise in procrastination: “someday.” Well, the growing trend to conversion has made many, including myself, face that “someday.” As a matter of fact, the CPA Tech Savvy Survey of 2010 just cited paperless as the leading technology issues CPAs are most interested in!

After two years of running three offices through a single paperless management software, I am here to say that the process is less painful than anticipated, and has reaped many rewards: more time to be a CPA and less time acting as an office manager, as well as terrific cost and time saving benefits.

The bottom line, paperless is all about storing and categorizing documents (financial, client notes, time sheets and otherwise) in something easier to use than overstuffed manila files and cabinets. When converting, the first rule is to make sure you choose a web-based storage facility, so that you, your employees and clients can easily and safely access the “filed” information from anywhere, anytime. Beyond that, what follows are five issues to consider when going paperless:

1.       Client Access – You want your clients to have access to their financial information, and you want them to be able to upload their documents (W-2s, 1099s, etc.) via a secure client portal anytime anywhere. Email and fax are no longer needed.

2.       Employee Access – You want your employees to have quick and easy access to their client files and their appointments from home, or outside their base office.

3.       Workflow Technology – You want to be able to organize and track financial documents, tax return workflow for example, from the time the client drops off their tax information to return completion. Further, you want their scanned documents and pertinent notes to move automatically with the client’s on-line file, thus eliminating the roving file folder.

4.        On-line Scheduler – You want to be able to match task complexity with worker competency (i.e. a lengthy tax return should be completed by an experience professional). And be able to precisely schedule a returning client based on the previous visit’s preparation time, rather than just arbitrarily scheduling all clients for a 1-hour appointment.

5.       All-in-one Paperless Tool – Choose an all in one paperless management tool (in this case software) that is designed specifically for an accounting office. Simplify by learning and paying for just one software package that places all of your office(s) information in one, easily retrievable place.

Finally, choose the right scanner. Choose a scanner for an accounting office based on the following criteria: compact size, easy of use, intelligent scanning features and fast speeds.

Going paperless has been the best decision I’ve ever made as a CPA. As a bottom line guy, the bottom line on paperless is that it pays off!

Posted July 22, 2010
Related Topics: IT, paperless, tech