Businesses dramatically accelerated the adoption of new technology, accord to Sage’s 2021 Return to Growth Outlook. The recently released survey of 1,000 SMB business leaders found that 52 percent accelerated their technology plans by three or more years.

 The most frequently cited areas for digitization were accounting and finance, mentioned by 45 percent of respondents; marketing, 31 percent; and customer relationship management, 26 percent.

Cloud accounting software was cited by 27 percent as the most important technology in dealing with the crisis.

The pandemic also shifted business practices with 32 percent saying they tried social media advertising for the first time while 23 percent hired employees completely digitally for the first time. Non-traditional HR policies, such as childcare stipends or flexible work arrangements, were implemented by 27 percent for the first time. Only 13 percent intend to reduce budgets for these areas in 2021.

A third of surveyed business leaders said government assistance was listed as a key reason for business survival in the last 12 months.

Fifty-two percent said increase increased government funding for COVID-19 testing and additional safety measures would have the most positive impact in the next year, followed by 47 percent who said more employee support in the form of stimulus or increased funding for items such as childcare would be the most helpful.

Botkeeper, which markets on-line bookkeeping systems, has introduced Botkeeper Basic Service and Botkeeper Advanced Service.  The company has cut its monthly fees, and implemented a sharp decrease in its platform fee.

The model includes a platform fee and a cost per entity. Basic startsat $55 per month. The prior rate was $79 monthly, scaled up based on monthly expenses. The starting fee for Advanced is $165 per month per entity billed annually.

The platform fee has been changed to $500 monthly billed annually, compared to a prior $3,500 per month flat fee.

Botkeeper Basic includes Categorizations and Classifications, Bank and Credit Card Reconciliations, Payroll Journal Entries, Standard Balance Sheet, P&L & Cash Flow Statement, Overall Book Review for any unusual balances or discrepancies, Dedicated Growth and Success Teams

Avantax, Blucora’s wealth-management business, has acquired GuideVine Technologies. GuideVine market lead-generation and marketing software using to convert prospects into clients.

GuideVine will be integrated Avantax’s existing software suite to support the marketing needs of its advisors.

Avantax said GuideVine’s technology “focuses on converting general consumer interest into motivated, qualified prospects.” It employs a variety of techniques to match prospects with advisors.

“Adding GuideVine’s technology will help Avantax streamline lead-generation and client conversion for our Financial Professionals so they can pursue organic growth while serving existing clients,” Todd Mackay, president of Avantax, said in a prepared statement.

The elimination of data entry was a major emphasis at the recent Forward Together Virtual conference held by Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting. The move toward automation include the upcoming CCH Axcess Engagement, bringing the K-1 engine into the cloud this year and a release of Client Collaboration in December.

 Overall, the company also emphasized improvements in performance based on changes made to products and services in the last year.

Jim McGinnis, the EVP who manages Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting US Mid/Large Firm Segment, noted during the conference the launch of the Open Compute Platform “which dramatically improved our performance.” That system, he said, reduced the time needed calculations for even the largest returns by 45 percent

He also reported a significant investment in support. “We have invested in support to reduce wait times by 40 percent,” he continued.

The most imminent of the products releases include Multi-user 2.0 this month which supports five users with concurrent print and calculation capability. Expected next summer is bringing the K-1 engine into the cloud. The system, which is in beta test now,  interprets unstructured data and transfers it to the tax software..

On the near horizon is the move of audit into the cloud with beta release CCH Axcess Engagement this fall. TeamMate Analytics, introduced in 2017, will also soon move onto the cloud,

“We will be inviting existing customers for Engagement to try it first for their preps, comps and reviews and then on audits,” said Cathy Rowe, director of product management for accounting and audit solutions. The company promises what Rowe called a “robust migration strategy” for on-premise users to move to the cloud.

New tools in this area include CCH Axcess Knowledge Coach and Knowledge Coach, introduced during the conference. Wolters Kluwer also introduced integration between TeamMate Analytics and Knowledge Coach. Rowe said Engagement Organizer, a cloud-based request list, is being made available to all Engagement users and will become part of Engagement.

Another cloud-based product, Axcess Financial Prep, a trial balance module, will be integrated with Axcess Engagement next year.  Automation in this area means, “We will feed trial balance data directly into the form,” Rowe said.

Everybody is talking about Client Advisory Services and a lot of people are doing something about them. That is because businesses have never needed advice more than they have during the COVID-19 pandemic..

Sponsor:

.They have been confronted with decision they have not had to make before—how to transition employees to remote work; how to do deal with rapidly changing government requirements; how to keep operating in difficult conditions.

So they turn to the people that are usual at the time of their contact list at times like this: their accountants. Accountants are being called on for advice in area they usually leave to others, such as human resource and other people issues. And accountants need to be able to advise clients on what to do, not just how to reads their financial reports.

This special report looks at the evolving world of CAS, how practitioners are adapting to it and how their technology partners can help them deliver the needed services. 

The coronavirus has helped make the argument for the use of online payroll systems. With the cloud, you can still run payroll and issue checks, even if no one is in the office. But it has also put accountants on the hook for being able to answer an increasing number of client questions about human resources issues, including furloughing and recalling staff, especially with the Paycheck Protection Programs Loans, which are based on payroll.  At once, it has provided the tools for producing paychecks even when practitioners are out of the office and has also given them a new set of problems and new opportunities. In this special report, Payroll and Beyond, The Progressive Accountant looks at the impact of the response to COVID-19 on payroll and HR services.

 Where are we going in the mid-market? Or in general? The economy started out the year with record employment and has moved to record unemployment with the effects of shutdowns of the Covid-19 virus.  For resellers this year, how they are doing depends on where they are located and in what markets they are involved. Bob Scott’s Top 100 VARs for 2020 examines the issues in an era of extreme uncertainty and names 100 firms who are the big players in this market.

For resellers, the issue now is meeting user needs and making money, not worrying about whether software is in the cloud. Certainly, there are many thousands of on-premise mid-market accounting systems in use and a decent number are being sold. But the action is in the cloud and it is a matter of features, which is what users really care about. The issue is which product is better at handling nonprofits, which is good for businesses with inventory, which best suits professional services and which delve into highly specialized markets. In the fact, the thought did not even occur this year to count how many of the Top 100 2019 VARs carry cloud products. It was just assumed they all do. That is why this year’s theme is “The Cloud Rules”  If you are not in the cloud game, you are not really in the game.

Jeff Siegel is the owner of Siegel Solutions, an 11-person firm that provides outsourced bookkeeping solutions usingJeff Siegel is the owner of Siegel Solutions, an 11-person firm that provides outsourced bookkeeping solutions usingQuickBooks to over 300 clients. Jeff knows what it takes to grow a business: efficiency of scale, real-time insights thatbuild strong customer relationships, and a secure data environment. He gets all three from Right Networks.

In this ebook, we’ll examine:In this ebook, we’ll examine:

• Why DIY (Do-It-Yourself) accounting systems created forsmall businesses cause undue pain for both small businessowners and for accountants
• How the right cloud-based professional accounting systemcan not only eliminate that pain, but also open up newopportunities for accountants to better serve their clients

Steven Brewer, CPA is the President of Steven Brewer and Company, CPAs, located in Salem, IN. He talked to AccountantsWorld about how he’s grown his accounting practice without needing to increase his number of clients – and how those improvements have eased his tax season crunch.

BooXkeeping: How White Label Bookkeeping Services Provide Scalability to Your Firm When it comes to running a business the main thing that every business owner wants to do is sell their products or services, create brand awareness and generate profits that they can enjoy later in life. The last thing a business owner wants to do is to worry about bookkeeping, taxes, and the rest of time consuming accounting tasks needed to run a successful business, with limited resources and time, often the bookkeeping ends up being the last on the list of things that need to be completed.

Liberty Tax has reported a 64.9-percent on 14.6-percent drop in revenue for the first quarter ended March 31. The numbers were reported this week as discontinued operations by the parent the Franchise Group.

The Franchise group is selling Liberty to NextPoint Acquisition, which is also buying Loan Me and will combine the operations. Liberty's operating income rose to $42.1 million from $25.6 million while revenue rose to $76.5 million from $89.6 million. The company made no comments on the operations and no statistics about tax returns prepared were included..  However, the move of the tax deadline to May 15 from April 15 has shifted revenue for companies from one quarter to another.

Blucora cut the pricing for its federal tax products for tax season 2021, the company said this week. It noted the action as it reported a 6.4-percent increase for its consumer tax business, but an 8.1-percent decline in its professional tax software sales

 “We lowered federal pricing this year for the first time in at least five tax seasons,” CEO Christopher Walters noted during this week’s webcast for earnings for the first quarter ended March 31. “Depending upon the point in the season, we had a 20% to 50% discount relative to the market leader.”

However, the company said the launch of its Hybrid Assisted Offering led to an increase in the average retail price per unit for its TaxAct software line.

Revenue for professional tax software dropped to $13.3. million for the most recently ended quarter, down from $14.5 million a year earlier. Consumer tax revenue rose to $110.6 million, up from $103.8 million. Total tax revenue was $123.9 million, up 4.7 percent from $118.3 million in last year’s corresponding period.

The company recently soundly defeated an attempted by Ancora to elect four directors to its board. One point of contention was Ancora’s claim the TaxAct business has no relationship to the company’s Avantax wealth management operations and should be sold.

Avantax revenue rose 6.6 percent to $154.5 million from slightly less than $145 million.

The company reported net income of $27.6 million, compared to a loss of $315.5 million. Last year’s loss reflected a $270.6 million goodwill  impairment charge, related to its purcchase of HK Financial Services.

Total revenue was $278.4 million, a 4.7-percent increase from $263.3 million. 

The company made more money, partly because it cut marketing expenses. Wolters noted Blucora has revamped almost its entire marketing organization.

A King of Prussia, Pa.-based tax preparer has been indicted on 29 counts of aiding and assisting in the preparation of false income tax returns. If convicted of all charges, Eric Amaefuna, 65, would face a maximum of 87 years in prison and a $7,250,000 fine.

 The indictment alleges that Amaefuna, owner of American Financial Stewardship, a tax preparation business in North East Philadelphia, prepared fraudulent 1040s returns for at least tax years 2014 through 2016. He also added false attachments to the 1040s.

The returns  claimed false or inflated employee business expenses, inflated state and local taxes, false or inflated miscellaneous deductions, and losses that were entirely fictitious or falsely inflated.

Efiles from paid preparers totaled 58,506,000 for the 64 days ended April 16, a 5.4-percent rise over the 82 days ended April 17, 2020. Meanwhile, DIY users who owe money may be waiting on deadline as self-prepared returns have fallen behind the 2020 compared season at an accelerating rate over the last two reporting periods.

There were 50,875,000 self-prepared efiles through April 16, a 6.8-percent drop from 54,561,000 a year ago. That left total efiles at 109,381,000, down .6 percent from 110,089,000 for the comparable period a year ago.

Total returns received by the Internal Revenue Serove remained 4.7 percent behind last year’s totals, falling to 116,139,000 from 121,892,000. There were 77,652,000 refunds reported by the IRS this year, a decline of 8.4 percent from 84,771,000.

Elmer J. Whiting Jr., the first Black partner of a Big Eight accounting firm, is the latest subject of a profile by the Black CPA Centennial. Whiting became a partner in the former Ernst & Ernst when it merged in his practice in 1971.

Whiting, whose accomplishment came 50 years after the first Black CPA was licensed, was the first Black CPA in Ohio and the Twenty-fifth Black CPA in the United States.

Graduating from Howard University in the 1940s, he received an MBA from Case Western University and a law degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. Like other black candidates, he found it extremely difficult to get work experience because white-owned firms believed their clients would not work with a black staff

He received his license in 1950 by successfully petitioning to have bookkeeping work counted as valid experience. After his Cleveland, Ohio, was running, he provided experience for the next five black CPAs in Ohio, including his brother.

Whiting, who died in 1985, also served on a city finance committee under Cleveland mayor Carl Stokes, the first black mayor of a major American city.

Whiting is also credit with help the black community become more acquainted with the accounting profession. Samuel Johnson, CPA, EY Americas vice chair–accounts, noted, “While those in underserved communities may have been familiar with doctors, lawyers, and teachers, they may not have known about the opportunities in the accounting profession if prominent leaders like Whiting had not made a name for themselves on a national stage”

The Black CPA Centennial is honoring Mary T. Washington Wylie, who became the first female Black CPA in 1943. The Centennial this year is a collaborative effort of the AICPA, Diverse Organization of Firms, Illinois CPA Society, National Association of Black Accountants, and National Society of Black CPAs.

 Washington Wiley (1906–2005) was born in Mississippi but was taken to live with her grandparents in Chicago, Ill., after her mother’s death. To escape an abusive grandmother, she was about to drop out of high school in her junior year, but was mentored by a caring teacher and stayed in school

After high school, Washington Wiley began working at the Black-owned Binga State Bank, whose VP, Arthur Wilson, became the second Black CPA in the United States in 1923.  He encouraged her to return to school and in 1941 she graduated from Northwestern’s College of Business in 1941, the only woman in her graduating class.

Although she received he license in 1943, Washington Wiley started a practice in her own basement because no other firm would hire her.

There were 14 Black CPAs in the United States at the end of World War II, half of them in Chicago with Black accountants serving other Black professionals as Southern Blacks moved to the area after the war. Washington Wylie dedicated herself to making her firm a gateway into the profession, hiring her first full-time employee, Hiram Pittman, after she read in a Black-owned newspaper that he had passed his CPA exam. Similarly, she hired Lester McKeever, who could not find work at any other CPA firms.

Most of the firm’ clients were small Black-owned businesses and not-for-profits, along with numerous large Black-owned companies, including the Fuller Products Company. Owner Samuel B. Fuller, offered Washington Wylie’s firm office space in his company’s building, subsidized half of Pittman’s pay for six months when he was hired, and kept the firm on retainer for 35 years.

Eventually, Pittman and McKeever became partners in the firm and McKeever became managing partner as well as chair of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and a member of the Finance Transition Committee under Chicago’s Mayors Washington and Daley.

Washington Wylie retired at the age of 75.

Washington, Pittman & McKeever became one of the nation’s largest Black-owned firms. The U.S.' largest minority-controlled accounting firm, New York-based Mitchell Titus, acquired most of her firm in 2018 and a division of Washington, Pittman & McKeever continues to operate.

Xero has hired two leaders of its partner program for the United States. Those are Latisha Carter as its new head of partner services and Will Moselle as its new head of partner growth. 

 Carter is overseeing a team focused on regional and enterprise partner consulting, practice tools and implementation. Moselle’s group supports accounting and bookkeeping partners, with a focus on expanding those relationships.

Carter worked at Sage for 19 years three months, starting in August 2000, and working in partner programs during much of that time.  From July 2017 through October 2019, she was director, diversified portfolio, for strategic solutions.

Based in Atlanta, she reports to U.S. country manager Ben Richmond.

Moselle spent 14 years eight months at Intuit. He was U.S. sales and account management leader, for the accountant channel from  June 2016 through May 2018. From May 2018 through August 2020 he served as head of outsourced U.S. small business SAAS sales, retention, saves and reactivations.

Corpay is creating an channel of accounting and bookkeeping firms to provide outsourced bill payment and other accounting services. The company, which markets Corpay One, this month has hired industry veteran Robert Lewis as SVP of accountant channel development.

Besides enlisting a variety of firms, the other major thrust is to develop and manage partnerships with accounting and financial software firms, according to Lewis.

So far the latter include Intuit, Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct and Xero.  Lewis notes the product’s core is AP, including Invoice capture, approval workflow and payments. Corpay also has expense reporting and a workflow engine that some firms are using for bookkeeping. Advisors can utilize a dashboard for managing their clients’ needs. The system has settings that enable managers to determine which staff members can access the records of which client.

 Firms can upload clients and their data to Corpay One without the need to onboard clients individually. Clients can send receipts, bills and expenses to a unique Corpay address. Firms can also utilize a global workflow library to automatically apply accounting rules to your clients.

There are three pricing levels for Corpay One. The Plus level is priced at $49 per month and enables 39 documents to be processed monthly. Customers receive unlimited seats. Accounts payable, reimbursements, accounting automation and unlimited workflows, along with the ability to synch with ERP software, are all available at this price. For $99 monthly, the Pro edition provides the same features, but increases the number of documents that can be processed to 99. At the Premium level, the price rises to $119 per month with purchasers receiving one-on-one onboarding and the ability to handle 169 documents per month

Avalara has purchased the operational assets from Davo Technologies. which provides sales tax software to small businesses. Terms were not disclosed.

Now shown on the purchaser’s website as Davo by Avalara, Davod  connects to POS systems to handle the collection, processing and reporting of sales tax information. It is also reported to have more than 4,000 small business customers in the United States in a wide variety of business segments.

It integrates with POS systems such as Clover and Square. Avalara will offer Davo customers its products in areas such aslicensing and registration, exemption certificates and custom data sets.

Stripe has agreed to buy TaxJar, which makes online sales tax software. Terms were not disclosed.

Stripe will integrate TaxJar into its applications and  create a suite of tax tools that platforms can offer to customers. The 200 employees of TaxJar, which was founded in 2013, are joining Stripe.

“With TaxJar, we will help millions of internet businesses running on Stripe with their sales tax and make it easier for them to sell internationally,” Stripe’s CFO Dhivya Suryadevara said in a prepared statement.

TaxJar customers can continue utilizing its services separately

Avalara has introduced an application that helps businesses create, send and track sales tax exemption documents at the time of purchase. Avalara Vendor Exemption Management, can manage sales and use tax compliance on purchases. 

The application automates the process of finding, verifying, storing, tracking and understanding the requirements for exemption certificates on tax-exempt purchases and can provide exemption certificates before or at the time of purchase.

The system also offers centralized storage of certificate and works with Avalara CertCapture to manage incoming and outgoing tax exemption documents.

 Firms are being offered the opportunity to outsource sales tax prepared through Avalara Managed Returns for Accountants. Accountants can provide a complete array of sales tax return preparation and filing through Avalara.

 Accounting firms are increasingly being asked for advice on indirect taxes, according to Sona Akmakjian,  global head of strategic accounting partnerships.  

“Market dynamics are dictating this for us. We are in the COVID world we are in the post-Wayfair world,” she says. Wayfair refers to the cases in which the Supreme Court made it possible for states to impose taxes on sellers outside of their boundaries.

In the past, firms that assisted clients were placed in a position that most accountants do not like. “It’s been a low-margin, high-risk service,” Akmakjian said. 

Avalara sees outsourced sales tax preparation taking a familiar form with firms. “I think sales tax compliance is going to be no different than payroll,” Akmakjian said. 

Firms will be able to make money on the services, with volume discounts available via a tiered system.