Make self-assessment easy with software designed for accountants, by accountants
As self-assessment season arrives, we’re sparing a thought for our colleagues on the frontline in accountancy firms up and down the UK, who face a tough month.
We also can’t help but think about how AIRPA could make their lives easier.
With dozens of tax returns to process and clients to wrangle throughout January, many accountants are finding themselves stressed out and bogged down in work. But with the right software, automations and integrations, self-assessment could be a much smoother, and more profitable process.
In fact, that was the starting point for many of AIRPA’s integration and automation features – our own experience as accountants and the tools we wished we’d had.
Automate admin
Self-assessment is, in many ways, the ideal task to enhance with automation. The whole process is structured and repeatable and can be managed end-to-end using software.
From automatically emailing reminders to clients to tracking your team’s progress, a good practice management tool will help you to handle each return methodically.
Cloud accounting software, meanwhile, will allow you to record your clients’ data throughout the year and then pull it all into their tax return when the time comes.
You can also collect and store your clients’ files through a cloud platform, making it easy for them to share important information with you and easy for anyone in your firm to find it when they need it.
Shared information, fast communication
In our experience, even firms with functional technology can encounter communication and information sharing problems.
If software knowledge is siloed across different departments, or client communications are limited to one-to-one interaction over emails or phone calls, half the battle is often getting the right information from the right person.
We’ve built a number of features into AIRPA to eliminate this problem.
Firstly, our universal search function. Instead of searching for client data and files in various pieces of software, or contacting other team members for the information you need, universal search also allows you to find key information across all your platforms – including drives, emails, and content within a document.
AIRPA also includes a document directory, allowing you to organise and view documents across multiple drives in one place.
And our data syncing feature means you can search for inconsistencies across all your systems and automatically correct them – no more confusion over gathering the correct client details.
Make it profitable
With as much of the process automated as possible, and your data, teams and systems all connected, you should be all set for a streamlined self-assessment season.
But to really see the benefits, it’s important to track your team’s work and measure time and cost.
In AIRPA, you can view deadlines across your business throughout the year for different types of work. This is then broken down into expected effort and cost per job, allowing you to dig into the details and see which types of work are the most profitable to you.
When January is behind you, you’ll have a clear view of how this year’s self-assessment season went, how long your team spent on different tasks, and where improvements could be made. This could include changing your pricing, improving efficiency, or nudging your clients sooner to spread your workload out ahead of the deadline.
Whatever you decide to do, you’ll be ready for next year with a wealth of information and powerful accounting tools at your fingertips.
When you get a chance to breathe again, get in touch to learn more about AIRPA and its accountant-friendly features.