"The key problems we are solving are the problems of data collecting and data," says Jorge Olavarrieta, director of product management at the software company. "Two thirds of the time involved in tax preparation is spent on those two jobs."

Olavarrieta declined to identify forms under consideration. But in May CeCe Morken, EVP of the company's professional tax business, listed W-2s as among forms to be supported. She also talked about importing the same forms into Intuit's Lacerte and ProSeries tax preparation packages.

Intuit says its uses intelligent mapping, optical character recognition technology, direct connections with financial institutions and payroll providers, and document uploads to provide the automatic import of supported forms.

The company's Link portal is utilized to aggregate and import forms. Once data has been imported and data extracted, the accountant is notified and has the ability to review extracted data and accept or edit it.

Intuit has also added a side-by-side view current and prior-year tax data and is using Link to automate the delivery of client data. Professionals can quickly create and send personalized digital checklists to clients based on prior-year tax returns. Clients can answer questions and upload documents from any device with Link.

Additionally, Intuit say the transfer of client data from QuickBooks Online Accountant Edition into ProConnect has been made easier though better integration. QBO users will be able to monitor return status from inside that application, says Olavarrieta.