Today's Technology for Tomorrow's Firm.
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Reviews For Your Firm TAX DOCUMENT AUTOMATION REVIEW SECTIONS CORE PRODUCT FUNCTIONS • Scan/Organize or Scan/Organize/Import • Forms supported/recognition routine • File formats supported/created • Ease of use • Direct import of data from financial institutions • Best input location • How are errors handled & data verified before import? • Scanning support for barcoding PAPERLESS WORKFLOW • Best practices for scanner setup • Clear & easy to understand roadmap • How do organizers fit into the process? • How are last minute documents processed/handled? • Output options • Can organization structure be reconfigured? • Used w/retail tax where return is prepared during review & delivered immediately after in-person interview? INTEGRATION • Is DMS integrated into process? What DMS are supported? • Integration w/portals • How does tool integrate w/tax application? • Locally installed or hosted? Max & min turnaround times during tax season? • Interface or service to facilitate outsourced data correction or outsourced preparation? HELP/SUPPORT/TRAINING • Online resource center • Tech assistance availability/diagnostics for improving output? • Consulting services available to optimize transition to new process? • Training to help firm mgmt. w/new model? Streamline Your 1040 Tax Prep with Automation F orget the recent new idiom that "less is more." More is more, and less is less. When it comes to revenue, we all want to be on the frst side of that phrase, even if we strive to have our workload be in the second half. Your firm can, however, do more with less, especially when it comes to 1040 tax compliance. For many professional accounting practices, tax services can account for 50 percent or more of annual revenues. While that includes compliance and planning for other entities that are slightly distributed throughout the year, it's mostly 1040 compliance that pays the bills and the retirement accounts. Tis is especially so for frms who focus almost entirely on tax preparation. Tat makes for a busy "busy season," which can feel like a mixed blessing in the fnal weeks before April 15. Let's face it, if you're a tax professional, you are one of a strange category of people that finds enjoyment in something that most Americans, by far, loathe the thought of. If you didn't fnd some gratifcation from the job, you wouldn't have stayed in the profession, or kept your sanity, for this long. But that doesn't mean that you enjoy the tedious, mind- less, administrative processes that are a necessary part of tax engagements. From compiling client source documents (and reminding clients that they still need to provide X, Y and Z), to data entry, to verifying data compared to source documents, these are steps that are neither enjoyable nor challenging, they simply must be done. And they must be done, regardless of how many staf your frm has, which ofen means that senior staff may end up doing these tedious, mindless, administrative processes instead of more profitable engagements, or simply more engagements. STAR RATING EXPLANATION Each technology reviewed by CPA Practice Advisor is rated on core areas and also by subcategories unique to that type of system. For the products reviewed here, those areas are listed on the left side of this page. In addition to the overall ratings on the following review pages, you can view the detailed scores that each product received by viewing the reviews online at www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10832718 . Tax document automation programs have surfaced over the past half decade as the means by which tax professionals are doing more, even with less. Whether a sole practitioner or an ofce of dozens, the time-saving and accuracy-enhancing tools found in these systems reduce much GruntWorx - Tax Document Automation 2012 OVERALL RATING 4.75 22 • Saves time by organizing source BEST FIT Tax professionals who want a user- documents into one pdf to prepare friendly way to quickly create organized from; or importing the tax information into the tax sofware, eliminating data and bookmarked PDF workpapers entry time. generated from source documents, and that can be used alongside any • Auto-populate feature works with professional tax system. Te optional Drake, GoSystem Tax RS, ProSystem fx Tax and UltraTax CS. auto-populate functions only work • Integration with Tic, Tie & Calculate with specifc systems, however. workpaper tool STRENGTHS • Completely web-based means nothing POTENTIAL LIMITATIONS to install and easy access from com- • Average turnaround time for a completed organized PDF created puter or mobile device with userfrom client source documents is two friendly interface • Expanded management features enable to four hours, but license allows for up to 24 hours. Terefore, it is not detailed security access controls January 2013 • www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com of the grunt work involved in tax prep, and make it possible for junior or paraprofessional staff to handle initial engagement tasks. For frms with large client bases who ofen have numerous tax documents, tax document automation can significantly reduce the amount of time it takes to perform the basic tasks of an engagement. Tis means that a frm can do the same amount of work with less manpower. Tat's a win, whether you use this saved time so that you can take on more clients, or so that you spend less time in the ofce during tax season. ● Read the full review and see expanded ratings for this product online at: www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10832729 suited to high volumes of simple source documents and entered into returns or retail kiosk type preparers. client returns for frms using Drake Tax, GoSystem Tax RS, ProSystem fx SUMMARY & PRICING Tax or UltraTax CS. GruntWorx Organize, Populate, and Pricing GruntWorx is on a per-use Trades are each designed to provide basis, allowing frms to easily test it or streamlined workfow for tax frms, use it on a limited, as-needed basis if allowing them to focus on more they only have a few clients with high proftable tax engagements and review complexity. Te Organize system costs processes, not on the ofen tedious $5 per use (regardless of the number paper-pushing functions of puting of source documents). Te Populate together client workpapers. The system costs $30 per use. A high web-based system provides bookvolume discount is available for frms marked digital workpaper PDFs that with a commitment of 100 or more can be edited and annotated, and with uses. the GruntWorx Populate system, data 800-291-2136 can automatically be extracted from www.gruntworx.com