This month, we’ve introduced a bunch of improvements to get you started and take action in preparation for tax season 2023. Here we go!
Two important features have been introduced to the document workflow. Your clients can now hand draw a signature when signing documents, a popular request. Additionally, organizers can be sealed automatically, saving over 10 minutes in admin work per client.
We’ve made the first step towards robust time & billing, and you can now link time entries to Jobs when tracking time and see work hours across projects.
On the firm side, we’ve added the ability to reassign invoices to other team members and request access to task or messages you don’t have access to with a click of a button. Your teammates will be able to grant you access once notified.
Sneak peek: We are working to add the ability to create invoices directly from time entries and recurring invoices are on their way, as well!
Let’s see in detail what we’ve been working on this month!
📚 Document Management
E-signatures: ability to draw signatures for clients
This feature has long been a trending topic on our Feature Request Board, and today we are really excited to deliver it to you. Clients can now choose to type or draw their signature and initials in.
Hand-drawn e-signatures elevate your client experience by offering clients the option to sign docs in ways they’d expect to sign using standalone e-signature tools with similar functionality (think DocuSign). The only difference being that this is not a standalone tool you have to pay for, but incorporated with your client portal.
E-signatures bring efficiency and reduced document turnaround time to your workflow. Hand-drawn signatures mimic real-world signature in remote format, adding personal touch, authenticity and increased security to the e-signing process. Signers can draw signature once and reuse it in the future, saving time and clicks.
As a reminder, unlimited legally binding e-signatures and KBA are included with every TaxDome license.
More about drawing e-signatures for clients>>
Automatically seal organizers after submission
Organizers are forms you can send to collect information from your clients. Previously, clients could update the organizer answers after submission and to prevent that, you had to manually seal the organizer. You can now do it automatically by turning on ‘Automatically seal after submission’ toggle, saving at least 10 minutes per client and foolproofing the process.
As a reminder, your team can always unsubmit organizer to return it to the client’s ‘to-do list’ and send an email notification to the client with the requested changes.
More about sealing organizers after submission>>
Shortcodes in organizer names
Shortcodes enable you to add unique client-oriented or date-specific information in organizer titles automatically, providing context for both you and client and saving you time and clicks.
Example: For bookkeeping clients, an organizer can have the name “Monthly statements: [Account name] [Last month] [Current year]”. Every month, the organizer name will be updated automatically when sent out to clients through automations.
💰 Billing & Invoicing
First step towards robust time & billing: link time entries to Jobs
Previously, linking Jobs to time entries (and elements like tasks, invoices, wiki pages, etc.) was available within the Pipelines interface only. With this update, you get the ability to link time entries to Jobs within the Time Entry list interface as well. You can link individual time entry and multiple time entries to Jobs in bulk.
You get 2-way visibility: within each time entry you can see which Job(s) it relates to, and within the Job you can see all tracked time related to it. Linking time entries to Jobs when tracking time gives you more clarity into work hours across projects.
More about linking time entries to Jobs>>
Sneak peek: Soon you will be able to add the time spent on a client or on not just Jobs, but also specific tasks by linking time entries to invoices and creating invoices from time entries.
🤓 Team management
If you are mentioned in a task or message that you do not have access to, you can now request access with the click of a button. If you’ve ever used Google docs, this functionality is very similar to when you are accessing a document that has not yet been shared with you.
When you request access, a notification will be sent to your teammates to grant access.
Previously, when a firm employee was assigned tasks but did not yet have account access, they received an error message and had to contact someone. This flow has been redesigned and streamlined, the notification to grant access will arrive via email and Inbox+, allowing you to grant access with one click.
More about requesting access>>
New permission: allow team members to reassign invoices
In larger firms, the billing process is often handled by dedicated staff (admins). We have added the ability to reassign the invoice to different team members, helping with accurate reporting.
More about employee access rights>>
As a reminder: you can learn everything about permissions, access rights, effective team communication and so much more in our self-paced ‘Effective Team Management and Collaboration in TaxDome’ Academy course. Train your staff x2 faster and easier and ultimately increase their productivity and quality output. Join the course!
🔥 Other
- In addition to the ability to print chat threads, you can now print emails to PDFs or local printers and save your communication history. More>>
- URL links sent via Secure Messages are clickable now and open the hyperlink in a new tab. More about Secure Messages>>
- Services: you can now copy commonly used services templates via the Copy from library button and modify them to your needs. How to copy services from library>>
- Stripe integration has been updated to support 3D Secure for card payments by your clients. More about card authentication and 3DS>>
- UX/UI improvements: the right sidebar menus within Invoices and Organizers have been reworked: instead of the single ‘Back’ button, you have ‘Save’ and ‘Cancel’ options for better navigation.
- TaxDome Academy: we’ve launched a brand new ‘TaxDome Quick Guide’ onboarding course with a cheat sheet to set up your TaxDome within 2 hours. Take the course!
All of the above—plus 56 more tweaks and fixes! Join our Facebook Community to ask any questions, request features or just chat with your peers.
In case you missed it, here’s a summary of the major features that we covered in our previous post.
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