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.

Chatbots emerged as important tools for state chief information officers in responding to the COVID-19 crisis. The 2020 State CIO Survey, sponsored by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers), Grant Thornton and CompTIA found Chatbots, used for online citizen service inquiries was by far the most common technology implemented this year.

The survey of 47 state and territory CIOs found 76 percent had implemented chatbots for the first time in response to COVID-19. The second most-frequently adopted technology was mobile apps for contact tracing/exposure notification (53 percent), followed by voicebots to support call center interactions (40 percent).

Not surprising, asked which business process, practices or investments will change as a result of the pandemic, the CIOs listed expanded options for working remotely as the No. 1 impact. No 2 was expanded use of collaboration platforms and remote meetings. Increased attention on digital government services/ citizen experience was No. 3; Investments in broadband expansion/adoption, No 4; and Increased priority and investment in legacy modernization, No. 5.

Zoho has introduced an office suite, Zoho Workplace, a cloud-based suite that encompasses nine integrated applications. The applications were built on a common model with common search and AI with a single dashboard.

The suite includes a business mail package, Zoho Mail, that enables users to make audio or video calls from within the application and edit document attachments in Zoho Writer. Users can meet online with contacts, and access all email accounts from within the application.

The platform also offers a control panel with eDiscovery, Backup and Recovery. Another application is Meeting, which  can be used to set up recurring or one-off meetings and is integrated with applications such as Zoho Projects, Bookings and CRM. 

Workplace also features the Cliq messaging application; and Connect, which integrates with HR systems such Zoho People. Additionally, there is Show, a presentation system, which integrates with ‌Atlassian, Unsplash, and Humaans; Sheet, a spreadsheet system; and Workdrive, a document management system; and ShowTime for online training. Workplace pricing starts at $3 per user per month for the Standard version and $6 per user per month for the Professional version.

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.

The number of returns received by the Internal Revenue Service for the 50 filing days ended April 2 reached 93,203,000, down 4.3 percent from the 97,366,000 received during the 60 days ended April 3, 2020. But instead of closing the gap on last year after pulling within .4 percent a week ago, the number of self-prepared returns fell back.

 There were 88,285,000 efiles received through April 2,   a decline of 3.5 percent from 91,448,000 in last year’s corresponding period.

The pace of efiling for self-preparer returns had continued to close on last year with each weekly report and those were only .4 percent behind 2020 for the season ended March 26.  However, for the April 2 report there were 43,293,000 files, 1.1 percent off the 43,776,000 received a year earlier.

Tax professionals efiled 44,992,000 returns for the year reported to date, off 5.6 percent from 47,672,000 from a year ago.

The pace of issuing refunds improved by 3.3  percentage points over the March 26 report. There were 74,055,000 refunds issued this year, off 15.9 percent from 62,305,000. The number as of March 21 was 19.2 percent off last year. 

SafeSend has received an investment of an undisclosed amount for developing its SafeSend suite. The funding came from Lead Edge Capital, a growth-stage investment firm.

SafeSend will also use the funds to develop sales and marketing. The suite incorporates several parts of the tax workflow process including engagement letters, organizers, return assembly/delivery, e-sign, and extensions

As a stand-alone component, SafeSend Returns features assembly, delivery, and e-signing of prepared returns SageSend Exchange offers  file sharing, client portal capabilities, and encrypted PDFs 

LEC general partner, Brian Neider, and LEC operating partner, Ron Gill, are joining SafeSend’s board of directors as a result of the investment.

A District Court in Massachusetts has authorized the Internal Revenue Service to use a John Doe Summons to find cryptocurrency investors. The action enables the IRS to use the summons for investors in Circle Internet Financial and its affiliates, including Poloniex.

The IRS is seeking information on taxpayers who conducted at least $20,000 in cryptocurrency transactions for the years 2016 to 2012.  The IRS wants records of those who conducted business with or through Circle, a Boston, Mass.-based digital currency exchanger. T

he IRS wants Circle to produce records identifying any such U.S. taxpayers and documents related to their transactions. U.S. Judge Richard G. Stearns found there is a reasonable basis for believing that cryptocurrency users may have failed to comply with federal tax laws. The petition by the IRS does not allege any wrongdoing on the part of Circle. Instead, the IRS says there is reason to believe there is “an ascertainable group or class of persons” who may have failed to comply with tax laws.

Self-prepared returns almost caught up with last year’s tax season as the rate of filing by professionals accelerated. The DIY efiles were down .4 percent for the 43 filing days ended March 26, from the 61 days ended March 27, 2020.

But professional efiles improved by 5.4 percentage points over the total reported for the season ended March 26. The pros submitted 39,926,000 efiles, off 10.3 percent from 44,501,000 in last year’s corresponding period. The category was off by 15.7 percent for the period reported through March 19.

There were 85,005,000 returns received by the Internal Revenue Service for the season to date, a decline of 6.2 percent from 90,617,000 for the longer corresponding period in the 2020 tax season.

Overall, there were 80,835,000 received, a decline of 5.5 percent from 85,559,000. DIYers had 40,909,000 efiles submitted, a drop from 41,058,000 a year ago.

The number of refunds remained down double digits with 56,494,000 issued for the tax season as reported, off 19.2 percent from 69,931,000 a year earlier.

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

CPA firm Rubino & Co . has promoted two of its directors to shareholder. These are Dawit Negari in the firm’s audit department, and Lisa Hahn in the tax department. 

Negari offers guidance on matters related to GAAPs, Uniform Guidance, employee benefit plan audits, and assists in overseeing the Firm’s audit quality and services. He joined the firm in 2007

Hahn, who started work with Rubino in 1999, specializes in individual and corporate tax planning and preparation for high net-worth individuals, pass-through entities, and corporations. She also assists in managing the tax department.

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.

Avalara has entered the business license market through the acquisition of Monsey, N.Y.-based Business Licenses. The sales and use tax vendor is paying $97 million in stock and cash.

 Business Licenses markets software and services for the research, acquisition and management of business licenses, acquisition and permits for organizations of all sizes.

CEO Scott McFarlane noted this month licenses cover a wide range of businesses.These  include basic business licenses, occupancy permits, permits for healthcare and childcare facilities, and a myriad of licenses and permits

”It’s a natural and complimentary step beyond tax,” McFarlane said during an Avalara earnings webcast. BL research, acquisition and management of business license, acquisition and permits for organizations of all sizes.

The past six months have delivered more challenges to clients than anyone could have anticipated. Business that were primarily brick-and-mortar at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic have rushed to establish an online selling presence in order to survive. 

In doing so, they were also hastily introduced to state-by-state economic nexus laws resulting from the 2018 S. Dakota v Wayfair Supreme Court decision, requiring sales tax registration in each jurisdiction, and the collection, reporting and remittance of sales tax once sales or dollar amount thresholds were reached. Hence, the former mom and pop store entered a new world of compliance complexity that existing ecommerce merchants have been wrangling with for several years.

Wayfair also ushered in a wave of advisory work for accounting professionals, who’ve helped clients, often small businesses, untangle compliance scenarios previously reserved for larger companies. Clients who previously did business in just a small handful of states now have nexus wherever new customers buy their products online, and they need step-by-step guidance to get a handle on their new obligations.

Global aspirations meet cross-border compliance complexity

And what about those ambitious clients who look at the entire globe as their total addressable market? While many of us are hearing about trends related to ecommerce sellers going international, in lock step with more consumers shopping online around the world, and more sellers wanting to take advantage of a total addressable market, the data is still surprising.   According to IDC, by 2022, cross-border ecommerce is expected to account for more than 15% of the world’s online retail market. eMarketer estimates that the global online retail market will grow to $5.7 trillion by 2022.

While demand for cross-border ecommerce has risen, so has the complexity surrounding country-level tax and customs regulations. For would-be international sellers, mastering cross-border compliance – the value-added tax (VAT), goods and services tax (GST), customs duties (also called tariffs), import fees, and the variations of each from country to country -- can mean the difference between success and failure, in addition to staying competitive, in the up-for-grabs ecommerce world market.  

In addition to different tax systems, your clients will need to accurately assign Harmonized System (HS) codes to all their goods. The first six digits of the code are standardized across all participating countries; however, each country appends its own set of digits to classify a product based on specific parameters and regulations. Every country sets its own laws governing what can be sold by whom. For example, tax rates applied to imports from Canada to Brazil may be applied differently than those same products when coming from the United States.

Shipping and pricing transparency are key success factors

Your clients’ ultimate success in global sales will hinge on their ability to provide a good (or great) customer experience, regardless of where the customer is located. And shipping is an essential factor in the equation, in terms of how long it takes to reach the customer and how much it costs. The bar has already been raised high for shipping time, with ecommerce sellers racing to compete with tech giants who have defined and set customer expectations for delivery service. For international transactions, setting up an efficient fulfillment system and clearly communicating shipping times is mission critical to starting the experience on the right foot.

More complicated is setting expectations for price. Between assigning the correct HS code and properly applying the correct taxes, tariffs, shipping and import fees, transparency at the point of sale can be difficult. The customer in Ireland who purchased a sweater from your online seller client in Brooklyn expects a seamless drop-off delivery at their location. Some businesses are tempted to omit these fees at checkout, but surprising customers with costly fees upon delivery is never a good experience. Abandoned online shopping carts are one thing, but a rejected shipment at the destination doorstep results in an unhappy customer, and potential brand reputation damage via social media and other complaints, not to mention placing the cost of return on your client, if they decide it’s worth undertaking those costs.

Automation tames cross-border complexity

Automation solutions are a key ingredient for businesses entering the global retail space. For many international sellers, the task of manually assigning tariff codes and calculating customs duties and taxes is resource intensive, costly, prone to human error, and ultimately not a path to ongoing compliance. It’s only through modern technology that your clients can ensure that customs duties and import taxes are accurately calculated at the time of checkout to mitigate compliance risks and avoid negative customer experiences with surprise costs at the time of delivery. 

Depending on the number of countries, breadth of products, and staff available to handle rates and regulations, an automated tax solution may be the most efficient, cost-effective way to manage tax compliance. Software programs such as Avalara Cross-Border are readily available for item classification, rate calculations, reporting, and returns filing. Make sure your client’s cross-border compliance system integrates with their other business applications, such as accounting/ERP, enterprise content management (ECM), and online retail platforms. Absent fully integrated technology solutions, 21^st Century commerce expectations won’t be realized, from multi-channel commerce to selling internationally.

Advising for your clients’ (and your firm’s) growth

Cross-border compliance falls squarely within the ongoing demand for enhanced business advisory services as we wend collectively through a global pandemic. And keep in mind that clients of all sizes, including emerging small businesses, will require technology automation and advisory in this area. Learn the basic terminology associated with cross-border selling and compliance in preparation for client conversations. Determine whether you want to develop expertise internally around this practice area, or partner with a firm that focuses on compliance international sellers. Then vet the available technology automation solutions that automate the most complex aspects of cross-border compliance at the moment of transaction. The numbers tell the story—this is an ideal opportunity to demonstrate added value for clients embarking on a new path to global growth.