July 2013

Change vs. Old School is something the accounting profession has had to deal with in recent years too, and while that theme isn’t new to these pages, I’d like to give it a bit of a different twist.

Sales and use tax is one of the three primary areas which legislators use to fund state and local government (the other two major areas are income taxes and property taxes). The concept is relatively simple: if you buy something tangible, you pay a fixed percentage to the local government as a tax.

Document Storage Solutions are one of several types of applications which accounting professionals may use in a firm to store, organize, search, and retrieve their digital documents.

From the July 2013 issue. In its 2013 SMB Cloud Insights Market Outlook report, hosting services provider Parallels estimates the worldwide market for cloud services aimed at small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) has reached $45 billion – up 30 percent relative to the prior year. Parallels further projects the SMB cloud services market will hit […]

I recently sat down with friends Doug and Sherrill Sleeter, founders of The Sleeter Group. Doug and Sherrill have been married for 27 years and have worked together for nearly 20 of those years.

CCH, a Wolters Kluwer Business —Sales Tax SaaS866.513.2677www.cchgroup.com From the July 2013 Review of Sales and Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit: Businesses or firms that need a sales tax calculation solution integrated into their live systems and an automated returns preparation tool with the option to outsource their tax return compliance work to CCH. […]

Bloomberg BNA — BNA Sales & Use Tax Rates and Forms800-424-2938, option 3www.BNASoftware.com From the July 2013 Review of Sales and Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit: Firms who need a comprehensive source for nationwide sales tax rates and an exhaustive forms library. Strengths Rate tables include all US jurisdictions, and include functions to validate […]

Avalara — AvaTax877-780-4848www.avalara.com From the July 2013 Review of Sales and Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit: Businesses who must file sales tax, use tax, or VAT returns in multiple jurisdictions across the US, Canada, and over 70 other countries. Firms with clients who are subject to Streamline sales tax requirements (22 states) and want […]

TrustFile, an Avalara Company877-780-4848    www.avalara.com From the July 2013 Review of Sales and Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit:  Businesses who would like to prepare and electronically file sales and use taxes in any or all of the 12 supported states. Firms and businesses who need sales tax, use tax, and VAT (GST/HST) forms for […]

CFS Tax Software, Inc. — CA & NY Sales Tax Preparer800-343-1157www.taxtools.com From the July 2013 Review of Sales and Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit: Accounting professionals responsible for preparing sales tax returns for small and medium sized businesses with multiple locations in California or New York Strengths User interface is intuitive and easy to […]

Thomson Reuters ONESOURCE Indirect Tax Global Software Suite888.885.0206 x1 Visit the website From the 2013 Review of Sales & Use Tax systems. Best Firm Fit: In-house corporate tax departments or tax consulting firms who outsource tax compliance for organizations of all sizes who are faced with simple to complex indirect tax needs. Also suited for […]

AccountantsWorld CyberCabinet888.999.1366www.AccountantsWorld.com/CyberCabinet From the July 2013 Review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: CyberCabinet fits best for tax, accounting, bookkeeping, and payroll firms who use the other components of the AccountantsWorld PowerPractice System for client accounting, payroll, and practice management. As a cloud-based solution, the application also fits very well for “virtual” or multi-location […]

Office Tools Professional Practice Management 2013661-794-2220www.officetoolspro.com From the July 2013 Review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: Firms with 100 or fewer users who want to combine practice management, document management, workflow management, and CRM capabilities into a single, integrated application. This application is particularly useful for sharing client data within client service teams […]

Thomson Reuters – FileCabinet CS800.968.8900CS.ThomsonReuters.com From the Jully 2013 Review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit FileCabinet CS from Thomson Reuters fits best within tax, accounting, and bookkeeping firms who use other components of the Thomson Reuters CS Professional Suite. Strengths Tight integration with other components of the Thomson Reuters CS Professional Suite of […]

SmartVault866-674-6785www.SmartVault.com From the July 2013 Review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: Accounting professionals and their clients whose practices involve working with the desktop version of QuickBooks or QuickBooks Online, and would like to view images of documents linked to transactions. Strengths Secure and stable (99.9% uptime) document storage and file sharing which scales […]

Drake Document Manager800.890.9500www.DrakeSoftware.com From the July 2013 review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: Firms who use the Drake Enterprises suite of applications for professional tax, accounting, and bookkeeping firms. Strengths Simple to use and included with the budget-priced Drake suite. Good integration with Drake’s add-on services for customers, including GruntWorx tax document organization […]

Intuit Lacerte and ProSeries DMS800.765.7777 (Lacerte) – http://accountants.intuit.com/lacerte800.934.1040 (ProSeries) – http://accountants.intuit.com/proseries From the July 2013 review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: Small tax and accounting firms who use Intuit’s Lacerte or ProSeries tax software and need to store documents associated with tax engagements. Strengths Good direct integration with the Lacerte and ProSeries applications, […]

Personable Document Management Suite 2013800.688.4281www.personable.com From the July 2013 review of Document Storage systems. Best Firm Fit: Firms who work with the desktop version of QuickBooks, as well as those who would like to set up workflow processes within the firm as well as with clients. Strengths Offers integration with Outlook, Windows Explorer, and QuickBooks. […]

The key is finding new ways to work more productively, of course. To do that requires constant evaluation and oversight of firm workflow and finding the right tools and best practices that meet the needs of the firm and its clients.

Business owners don’t have a boss to give them feedback, so many use their annual Profit & Loss (P&L) statement as their performance evaluation.

Over my 20 year career, I’ve spent an eternity in queues for tech support from a variety of companies. As I write this, I’ve been on hold for 80 minutes during business hours on a weekday to speak to a human about an issue. Dealing with hardware and software support is a hidden cost of doing business in every organization.

From the July 2013 Issue. Document management seems to be a recurring theme for my practice this year. It may be because there are so many improvements in products. It could be that document management can be resource intensive to implement and that it raises so many procedural and cultural issues. It could be that […]

Do you feel the winds of change blowing? Do you feel the impact of the cloud on your life? If not yet, you soon will. When I founded my first company PayCycle, I thought the web was all about anytime, anywhere access.

We just completed the first Strategic Partner Retreat as I write this. This was the first in our series of three, and was hosted in balmy Tampa, Florida. I’m happy to report that we presented to a room full of firm partners and several of their trusted administrators—al eager to learn how to elevate their firms to Next Generation Accounting Firm status.

Oh the glory days of IT – the calculator, the brick mobile phone, the fax machine! Remember back when new technologies got their start in business markets?