The Accounting, bookkeeping & CPA firms
Busy season is mostlychasing and keying.
Accounting firms spend more hours getting the inputs than doing the accounting: requesting documents, chasing them, opening them, keying them, categorizing the same vendors every month. We embed an engineer in your firm, watch where the hours go, and automate what repeats, until at least 20 hours a month are back.
The systems your team already uses, wired through Passel automations. Your people review exceptions instead of retyping.
issue for CPA firms: finding and keeping staff
AICPA PCPS Top Issues survey
typical month-end close; the best firms do it in one to three
Mid-market close benchmarks
of staff time on manual data entry and chasing documents
Practitioner surveys · typical range
a month back, per team, or we keep working
Our written commitment
Bookkeeping practices, outsourced accounting firms, and CPA firms with 3 to 100 staff, whether you're on QuickBooks Online, Xero, or a tax suite like Lacerte, Drake, or CCH. Especially if you can't hire fast enough for busy season.
Figures are typical ranges from published industry surveys and our own audits. Your Gap Report replaces them with your numbers.
Why the hours go missing
You can't hire your way out of it. You can automate the part nobody wanted to hire for.
Every firm we talk to has the same problem in the same order: not enough staff, too much of the staff's time spent on work that isn't accounting. Requesting documents. Reminding clients. Opening the upload, working out what it is, keying it in. Categorizing the coffee shop for the fortieth month in a row.
The software promised to fix it. QuickBooks has bank feeds, Karbon has request lists, the tax suite has import tools. But each one stops at its own edge, and a staff member carries the client between them.
We build across the edges. Requests chase themselves. Documents classify and extract on arrival. Categorization learns from your history and only asks about the new. The close runs as a workflow with a status board instead of a Monday meeting. Your accountants review, advise, and sign, which is the job they trained for.
The workflow map
13 things your team does by hand that it shouldn't have to.
Grouped by where they sit in your operation. Each card shows what happens today, what we build, and the time it typically gives back per person.
Getting the inputs
Client documents
Document collection & chasing
3–6 h/wkTodayRequest lists emailed, reminders sent by hand, uploads sorted into folders one at a time.
What we buildRequest lists that track themselves, automatic reminders, and uploads filed to the right client folder and checklist item.
Classification & data extraction
2–5 h/wkTodayW-2s, 1099s, statements, and receipts opened and keyed by hand.
What we buildDocuments classified on arrival. Key fields extracted and validated against last year before anyone opens them.
Questionnaires & organizers
1–3 h/wkTodayOrganizers sent, returned half-complete, followed up individually.
What we buildPre-filled organizers with automated follow-up on exactly the answers that are missing.
Bookkeeping & close
The work
Bank feed categorization
2–5 h/wkTodayTransactions categorized one by one in QuickBooks or Xero. The same vendors every month.
What we buildRules learned from your own history. Only new or ambiguous transactions reach a person.
Reconciliations
2–4 h/wkTodayBank, credit card, and loan accounts reconciled manually, every client, every month.
What we buildAutomated matching with the exceptions listed for review.
Month-end close checklist
2–4 h/wkTodayClose steps tracked in a spreadsheet. Status asked for in meetings.
What we buildThe close runs as a workflow with owners, due dates, and a live status board.
Sales tax & payroll filings
1–3 h/wkTodayFigures pulled, forms filled, filing dates calendared by hand.
What we buildFigures compiled automatically with the filing calendar and reminders built in.
Season & beyond
Tax & advisory
Tax return preparation support
3–8 h/wk in seasonTodayData entered from documents into the tax software. Prior-year comparisons done by eye.
What we buildExtracted data flowed into the return. Variances against prior year flagged for the reviewer.
Review notes & e-file tracking
1–3 h/wkTodayReview points passed around by email. E-file statuses checked by hand.
What we buildReview notes tracked to resolution. E-file acceptance monitored, with rejections routed to the preparer.
Client reporting & dashboards
1–3 h/wkTodayMonthly packages assembled from exports and pasted into a template.
What we buildReports generated in your template on schedule, with commentary drafted for the reviewer.
Running the firm
Practice
Engagement letters & onboarding
1–2 h/wkTodayLetters edited from last year's. Onboarding steps done from memory.
What we buildLetters generated and e-signed. Onboarding creates the folders, checklists, and portal access automatically.
Billing & WIP
1–3 h/wkTodayWIP reviewed by hand. Invoices go out late because nobody had time to prepare them.
What we buildFixed-fee schedules run automatically. Time-based invoices drafted from WIP for a partner to approve.
Email & client requests
2–4 h/wkTodayThe same questions answered one at a time from the inbox.
What we buildRequests routed and drafted from the client file, with a person approving before anything is sent.
Hours are per person, per week, typical range. Most operations run several of these at once, which is how an audit finds 20 hours a month across a team without anyone working differently.
Inside your stack
Built into the tools you already pay for.
Your ledger, practice management, and tax software stay where they are. We connect them, teach the categorization your history, and put AI behind the steps where a first pass saves an hour, all inside the tools your staff already open.
No new software to learn
Automations live inside the systems your team already opens every morning. If someone has to open a new app to feel the difference, we built it wrong.
Client financial data, handled like health data
We treat tax and financial records with the same discipline as PHI: minimum-necessary access, encryption in transit and at rest, nothing used to train anyone's models. Our controls map to the safeguards firms need for their written information security plans.
A person stays in the loop where it matters
Anything that touches money, a patient, or a client gets a human checkpoint by design. Automation does the retyping. Your people do the judgement.
Common questions
What firms ask us first.
Can this handle busy season volume? +
That's when it matters most. Document chasing, classification, and extraction are exactly the workflows that scale badly with people and well with automation. Firms typically start with those in the off-season so the system is trained on real documents before February.
Does it work with our tax software? +
Most tax suites (Lacerte, Drake, UltraTax, CCH Axcess, ProSeries) have limited or no APIs, so we work through their import formats and, where needed, careful desktop automation. The Observer phase confirms your exact process, because no two firms prepare a return the same way.
How do you keep client data safe? +
Access is limited to what the automation needs, everything is encrypted, and nothing is sent to a model that retains or trains on it. We document exactly where data flows before anything is switched on, which many firms attach to their written information security plan. Our HIPAA program, which holds us to a higher standard than most of our clients require, is independently verified through Live Compliance.
What does 20 hours a month mean for a small firm? +
Twenty hours of staff time per month, measured against what the Observer found, that your team no longer spends on the automated work. For a ten-person firm that's usually one or two workflows from the map above. Most firms have far more available; twenty is the floor we commit to in writing.
Next step
Find out what your staff could stop keying by hand.
One call, then two weeks with the Observer on every desk. We don't stop until at least 20 hours a month are back.
info@thepasselgroup.com