Like many accountants, it’s likely you’ve at least tried or regularly use artificial intelligence (AI) apps like ChatGPT. Whether it’s to quickly draft an email or summarise a report, these tools offer a huge time saving – particularly during the mad rush that is end of financial year (EOFY).
However, free AI apps aren’t designed specifically for accountants and therefore come with several drawbacks. Not only is there the risk of sharing confidential information, but because these apps aren’t integrated with your internal systems, they often can’t help you with more complex, accounting-specific tasks – particularly those that require your client and tax data.
So, what if you used AI that’s specifically built for accountants and fully integrated into your accounting software? And how could a solution like this simplify your EOFY?
1. Create a simplified process for answering client questions
A common EOFY challenge for many firms is answering the same tax-related questions from multiple clients. This is where an AI solution built for accountants like Access Evo can help.
Because Access Evo has access to all your internal system data – including your clients’ financials, tax records and payroll data – as well as external data like that from the ATO and Fair Work Commission, it can quickly answer even the most complex tax-related questions.
How this works in practice
For example, let’s say a client calls in late June worried that they haven’t finalised their trust distribution. They ask, “Do I really need to have a resolution in place by 30 June? And how do I know how much to allocate to each beneficiary?
Rather than searching through the client’s financials, ATO rules and the trust deed, you could simply ask Access Evo, “Does [client name] need to prepare a trust distribution resolution for FY25, and what’s their current net income?”
Access Evo instantly checks the trust’s financial data and the resolution deadline, letting you know if any action is required. You can then follow up with, “Based on prior distributions and this year’s income, how should the trust allocate income to each beneficiary?” Access Evo analyses the trust’s historical allocations, applies the relevant rules and provides a suggested breakdown in seconds. You can also ask Access Evo to draft an email that explains this answer to the client and next steps in an easy-to-understand, client-friendly way.
2. Ensure client data is clean and consistent
If the client data you need to finalise their tax is stored in multiple systems – be it various accounting platforms, your CRM or spreadsheets – it’s likely you spend considerable time reconciling and manually importing it.
AI solutions built for accountants can eliminate this burden for you. This is because they’re designed to automatically clean, standardise and access all your client data, no matter where it’s located in your systems.
How this works in Access Evo
Say you need to perform tax planning for a client whose data is stored within Xero, Access Handisoft, spreadsheets and your CRM platform. Access Evo’s AI capabilities allow it to pull data from all these sources and automatically reconcile any discrepancies across the data.
This means you and your team can access clean and structured financial records for this client – or any client, for that matter – helping make their tax preparation far more efficient.
3. Streamline sourcing of client documents
Like many accounting firms, it’s likely EOFY sees you spend a lot of time searching through files, software platforms and emails for client documents. You may also find the search functionality in your accounting software doesn’t always surface what you’re looking for.
Finding documents is far quicker and effective when using accounting software with in-built AI capabilities. This is because solutions like Access Evo automatically convert PDFs and static files into structured, AI-ready data and categorise them with AI-driven metadata tagging.
What does this mean exactly?
Essentially, Access Evo searches for documents not only based on their title, but also all the information within documents. This makes your searches far more effective at surfacing the most relevant documents.
What’s more, you can search for documents by posing a question like you would to a human assistant. For example, let’s say you need to find a client’s profit and loss statement to prepare their EOFY tax. With Access Evo, you can quickly retrieve it by asking, “Find [client name]’s profit and loss statement for FY25.”
4. Get up to speed on client activity
One of the biggest EOFY pain points is finding out which clients are overdue, who’s missing info and which tasks are still open.
Let’s imagine you need to find out which clients haven’t lodged their Fringe Benefits Tax (FBT) declaration for FY25. This typically requires the onerous manual process of logging into the ATO’s Online Services for Agents portal, navigating through menus and checking their lodgment history.
With an AI solution built for accountants, you can get the answer you need in seconds by simply asking “Which clients haven’t completed FBT declarations for FY25?” There’s no more clicking through menus, opening multiple tabs and cross-referencing documents.
5. Stay on top of tax and regulatory changes
A critical part of EOFY is ensuring you’re across the latest ATO rulings, tax changes and Fair Work Commission updates. Typically, this could require spending hours researching online and wading through jargon-heavy documents.
AI built for accountants helps you keep up to date with the latest changes in a fraction of the time. For example, let’s say you want to find out if a client qualifies for the small business CGT concession.
Instead of labouring through the countless pages of a tax ruling, you can simply ask Access Evo, “Is [client name] eligible for the small business CGT concession?” You’ll then get a definitive answer on the spot.
In addition to getting answers like this from Access Evo, the solution also monitors tax law and regulatory changes in real-time, notifying you instantly with contextual explanations
6. Spot business advisory opportunities
Finalising your client’s tax at EOFY can also be a good opportunity to offer higher-value advice for their business – a process made far simpler and effective with the right AI.
Because traditional analytics tools or apps like ChatGPT can’t access all your client data, they only provide limited insights into their tax and business performance. Access Evo, on the other hand, can access your firm-wide client data. This means it can provide proactive insights about your clients’ financial trends, compliance risks and more.
How you can spot advisory opportunities with AI
For instance, you could ask Access Evo, “What trends are emerging in my clients’ cash flow over the past six months?” Because the solution has access to all your client data – whether it’s in multiple platforms or spreadsheets – you can get an instant and informed answer.
Another way Access Evo can help you is by creating a real-time tax compliance dashboard that shows which clients are at risk for an ATO audit, need tax planning advice or are behind compliance deadlines.
Want to know more about Access Evo?
Powered by Microsoft Open AI, Access Evo is the safe and secure AI assistant built for accountants that makes your day-to-day far simpler. Want to know about your client’s tax history or changes to ATO rules? Simply ask Access Evo and get the answer in seconds.
This AI co-pilot is privately hosted by Access and fully integrated into Access Accountants Evo and Access Handisoft Evo, giving you a far more powerful version of your software. It eliminates manual work and makes it simple to surface insights about your clients by simply asking questions.
Access Evo also allows you to build custom analytics dashboards, offers training courses and streamlines customer management with an intuitive portal.
Learn more about Access Evo and join over 160,000 of our customers already getting more done with this powerful AI assistant.