TaxCalc Blog

This is the story of just some of the practical gains enjoyed by one ficticious practice owner by adopting TaxCalc Document Manager.

The practice owner

Meet Yasmin. Yasmin manages her own firm, with ten longstanding members of staff. She‘s known for some time that she has needed to improve the way in which important documents are exchanged with her clients. Some of Yasmin’s staff still send tax returns to their clients in the post, which she knows is inefficient and costly; others by email, which she knows is not secure enough. When she needs to find a set of accounts or a tax return, there are several possible places to look, and sometimes she doesn’t succeed.
Yasmin decided to evolve her practice by integrating secure document management and storage into her existing suite of TaxCalc practice products. Choosing TaxCalc Document Manager powered by SmartVault, part of TaxCalc’s new practice management toolkit, made absolute sense. Virtually overnight TaxCalc Document Manager transformed her document exchange processes into a super-speedy, secure and highly effective operation.

The tech-shy guy

Nigel’s been preparing tax returns for thirty years. He‘s outstanding at his job, and a great asset to Yasmin’s firm. But every time he prepares a tax return, he prints it out and posts it to the client for approval. He’s been reluctant to embrace new technology and change his way of working. Yet, after seeing how easy it is to send a tax return to a client via TaxCalc Document Manager, he‘s immediately converted. Nigel still hits Control-P as he always did, but instead of selecting the printer in his office, he selects SmartVault PDF Printer. The connected desktop automatically places the tax return in the correct client folder for the correct period. The client is then automatically notified by email that the tax return is ready for review. Nigel is now able to progress jobs to completion far more smoothly and quickly, alongside saving a large sum of money on printing and posting.

The compliance expert

Aisha is Yasmin’s go-to for all matters relating to compliance. Although Aisha is extremely confident in, and proud of the firm’s compliance in nearly all areas of the business, she’s been looking out for a way of modernising the way in which key documentation is sent to and received from clients, especially in the light of GDPR. Aisha reads through SmartVault’s Supplemental Terms for Data Processing, incorporated in the Terms of Service, and is confident that the firm can obtain the required level of contractual protection for its use of the service under GDPR. As well as resting easy in the knowledge that TaxCalc Document Managerwill help the firm’s GDPR compliance, Aisha is delighted that all documents will be protected by bank-level security, which means the firm has dramatically reduced the risk of a sensitive document falling into the wrong hands.

The international businessperson

Nathan has been a client of Yasmin’s firm for five years, during which time his business has grown exponentially. He has been very happy with the service he has received, but has recently become frustrated with the sign-off process and has considered moving elsewhere. He regularly travels abroad, and found that communication with his accountant was becoming increasingly outdated. However, Nathan is overjoyed to learn that the firm has switched to TaxCalc Document Manager, which makes his life so much easier. He’s pleasantly surprised when Nigel, his point of contact at the firm, communicates via a branded portal. Nathan reviews his tax return on his mobile from New York. He can easily look back at historic accounts and tax returns, and can gain easy access to the firm’s newsletter and updated privacy policy, in the public area. It’s the missing link for Nathan, who, instead of leaving the firm, recommends its service to several peers. His loyalty is cemented and a valuable client is retained.