COVID-19

SURVEY: You’re Probably Not Reading This on an iPad

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The only uptick appears at the end of the spectrum.

By the Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey

Portability has been popular in many ways, but somehow that isn’t extending to iPads and other tablets in the accounting profession.

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Percentage of staff using tablets or iPads for work. (AFOT)

MORE: Cloud Backup Declining | Only 19% of Firms Host Email | Pandemic Changed Work for 64% | Today’s Top 3 Tech Problems: Security, Client Onboarding and Workflow
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Among CPA Trendlines readers, there’s a 74% chance you’re reading this on a desktop computer and a 25% chance you’re on a mobile device (most likely an iPhone), with less than 1% probably using a tablet, based on our Google Analytics figures for the past 12 months.

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The bigger the firm, the more likely they’re using tablets or iPads.

The heaviest users of tablets and iPads are the largest firms.
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Firms Battle Disruptions in Communications and Workflows

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Next up? Scheduling and PAPER.

The Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey

COVID-19 and its variants forced a number of challenges upon the accounting profession. Accountants are telling us that tops on that list were communication and workflow, at 49.4 and 49.1 percent respectively. Even solos felt the burn, at 40.6%, so it wasn’t all internal communication to blame, although large firms of 51-100 felt it most sharply, at 60%.

Survey Results

Top Corona Problems: Communication, workflow, and digitizing paper top the list.

MORE: Pandemic Changed Work for 64% | Pandemic? What Pandemic? | M&A Looms Large for 30% of Firms | Today’s Top 3 Tech Problems: Security, Client Onboarding and Workflow | Today’s Top 3 Problems: Staffing, Workflow and Tech
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Some responses that didn’t hit the top six still were notable. Postal mail was called out by 21.9 percent, including 40 percent of solos and 33.3 percent of large firms. Solos also reported phone calls and lost income at 24.6 percent. Despite most groups saying lost income was a challenge, relatively few put that figure anywhere near the one for paying bills, except extra-large firms noting 11.8 percent difficulty with lost income and 5.9 percent with paying bills.

Details by Firm Size READ MORE →

Pandemic Changed Work for 64%

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Extra-large firms had the easiest going.

The Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey

COVID-19 threw some in accounting – 3 percent – into turmoil, while 61.4 percent reported that some change was in order.

 

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MORE: Pandemic? What Pandemic? | M&A Looms Large for 30% of Firms | Today’s Top 3 Tech Problems: Security, Client Onboarding and Workflow | Today’s Top 3 Problems: Staffing, Workflow and Tech
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Pandemic? What Pandemic?

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How some firms are flourishing in the new normal.

The Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey

One of the benefits of an annual report such as the Accounting Firm Operations and Technology Survey is the opportunity to see not only the current sentiments but those from years before. Sometimes, though, new issues arise and are momentous to warrant inclusion via a new question … as when COVID-19 crashed onto the scene.

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MORE: M&A Looms Large for 30% of Firms | Today’s Top 3 Tech Problems: Security, Client Onboarding and Workflow | Today’s Top 3 Management Problems: Staffing, Workflow and Tech
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Of those working at home for the first time, by far the largest group fell into large firms of 51 to 100 employees, where 93.3 percent were new to remote work. Medium and extra-large flanked them in those results, at 51.9 percent and 47.1 percent respectively. See table: READ MORE →

Is Remote the New Normal?

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Young woman eating an apple and working on a laptop at homeWhat clients want may differ from your employees’ wishes.

By CPA Trendlines Research

No doubt about it: the accounting business was quick to shift to remote work when COVID-19 hit.

Now the question is: will accounting offices remain remote and will more go remote?

MORE SURVEYS & RESEARCH: Accounting Pros Face Challenges in Turbulent Times  |  Accountants Find New Worlds of Opportunity |  Trend? Or Just Hype? Accountants Weigh In |  Six Quick Solutions for IRS Backlogs |  The Big Battles Ahead for Corporate Finance  |  What Gig Workers Want  |  Accountants Agree: The Top Five Ways to Fix the IRS  |  Survey: Big Worries for U.S. and Small Business  |  The Big Issues in Audit: Frustration, Inconsistency, and Technology

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According to the CPA Trendlines Business Barometer, accountants are getting used to working out of their spare bedrooms and living room nooks, and managers are getting used to managing from afar.
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IRS Tops List of Busy Season Problems

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Forget COVID. The underfunded, understaffed, underequipped, underappreciated, misunderstood IRS is the top problem.

By CPA Trendlines

It probably won’t surprise you that the CPA Trendlines Busy Season Barometer identifies IRS operations as the biggest problem tax practitioners face today. In fact, we’ve never seen such widespread agreement among respondents—an astonishing 80 percent of them.

MORE in TAX: Shut Down the Tax Charlatans | Tax Pros Preparing 46 Percent of E-filings | Eight Quick, Easy Ways to Fix IRS Filing | For a Few: Why Busy Season 2022 Beats 2021 | A Tax Season Worse than 2021? | 16 Traits of the Best Tax Clients | Six Fixable Problems at the IRS | IRS under COVID: Heroes or Goats? | IRS Launches 2022 Season with “Strong Start” | Two Big (and Obvious) Ways IRS Could Work with Practitioners | Imagine a Fully Online IRS | The Real Cost of Interstate Sales Tax | IRS At Death’s Door? | Beyond Tax Prep: The Big Cha-Ching! | Crisis at the IRS | The IRS’s 10 Biggest Problems | Fear and Loathing for Tax Season ’22

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That consensus indicates that there really is a problem at the IRS. It’s underfunded, understaffed, underequipped, and, at this point, underappreciated and misunderstood.

The real problem is that the problem is creating problems. IRS staff can’t keep up with correspondence, yet the computers, even though working off an operating system that dates back to the Kennedy administration, keep churning out moot notices and undeserved penalties.

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Six Fixable Problems at the IRS

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And the IRS already knows what they are.

By CPA Trendlines

Tax practitioners beware: the IRS has become a mess of misinformation and missing information.

MORE TAX: Two Big (and Obvious) Ways IRS Could Work with Practitioners  | Imagine a Fully Online IRS | The Real Cost of Interstate Sales Tax | IRS At Death’s Door? | Beyond Tax Prep: The Big Cha-Ching! | Crisis at the IRS | The IRS’s 10 Biggest Problems | Fear and Loathing for Tax Season ’22 |  Padar Joins VC-Backed Tax Fintech for Banks |  COVID Chokes an Already Crippled IRS | Tax Regs for the Metaverse | 10 Steps to a Superior Tax Department | Accountants Critical of Competitor Price-Cutting |  Automate Busy Season with Apps You Already Use | Sales & Use Tax Costs Are Higher than Anyone Thought | Survey: Nobody Loves the Wayfair Decision | Busy Season Forecast: More Chaos  | A Woman Named Wanda Leaves an IRA Nightmare  | Are You Under-Pricing Your Client Accounting Services?  | Your Best Advice: Get Smart, Get Tech, Get Moving | Worries for Small Business Clients |

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It’s isn’t a complete mess, but there are problems… and solutions. We can think of six no-brainer easy fixes. READ MORE →

IRS under COVID: Heroes or Goats?

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Agents resort to filing by forklift.

By CPA Trendlines

Let us pause for a moment of kudos.

Last year, the IRS accepted a mission impossible. It wasn’t just underfunded, understaffed, and underequipped but overloaded, overworked, and overdue.

MORE TAX: Two Big (and Obvious) Ways IRS Could Work with Practitioners  | Imagine a Fully Online IRS | The Real Cost of Interstate Sales Tax | IRS At Death’s Door? | Beyond Tax Prep: The Big Cha-Ching! | Crisis at the IRS | The IRS’s 10 Biggest Problems | Fear and Loathing for Tax Season ’22 |  Padar Joins VC-Backed Tax Fintech for Banks |  COVID Chokes an Already Crippled IRS | Tax Regs for the Metaverse | 10 Steps to a Superior Tax Department | Accountants Critical of Competitor Price-Cutting |  Automate Busy Season with Apps You Already Use | Sales & Use Tax Costs Are Higher than Anyone Thought | Survey: Nobody Loves the Wayfair Decision | Busy Season Forecast: More Chaos  | A Woman Named Wanda Leaves an IRA Nightmare  | Are You Under-Pricing Your Client Accounting Services?  | Your Best Advice: Get Smart, Get Tech, Get Moving | Worries for Small Business Clients |

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And then Covid came back with a vengeance. READ MORE →