The 2024 Top New Products

ByChris Gaetano, Danielle Lee, Daniel Hood

February 6, 2024 11:00 AM

Artificial intelligence has been at the top of people's minds for all of the past year, and the accounting profession is no exception. This is reflected in our 2024 Top New Products list, where nearly every single submission we received had some sort of AI component, whether as a core part of its functionality or as support for other features.

AI is used in tax, in audit, in advisory; it's used to draft letters, to write reports, to analyze data; it automates processes, it provides advice, it helps manage clients. Based on the submissions we got this year, we can see that the AI future of accounting isn't coming, it is here. The profession is not just willing but eager to find new ways to apply this technology for, at the very least, productivity and efficiency gains, if not entirely new lines of business. (See "With AI, no more 'wait and see'.")

Yet AI is not the only story this year. On top of this recent innovation, we're also highlighting products that sport new integrations that enable new functionalities, that connect people with resources to meet the challenges of a changing profession, that support growing practice areas like ESG, and that assist accountants with new regulations.

But AI or not, what these top products all have in common is a laser focus not on the profession's past but on its future, driving accounting ever-forward in its digital transformation and providing support along the way.

Advisory Tools

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Checkpoint Edge Advisory Maps (Thomson Reuters)

It's undeniable that accountants are moving to more advisory roles, and the best technology solutions support this professionwide transition. But while some focus on automation and efficiencies to unshackle accountants from rote work so they can elevate to more value-added services, Checkpoint Edge Advisory Maps is specifically designed as an assistant in this more holistic level of service.

The solution was created to deliver advisory engagements more systematically: It contains 50 tax advisory maps and 25 financial management/accounting advisory maps, each of which identifies the required phases and the tasks within each phase, and then automates the step-by-step guidance by providing the implementation aid required to complete each phase and task. The solution keeps users updated on changes, while providing an opportunity to the more senior-level staff to start training the more junior-level employees, all while keeping clients informed.

Also boosting accountants to a higher level of service is our Honorable Mention in this category, ADP's Advisory Opportunities tool, available within its Accountant Connect platform. The tool, supported by ADP constantly monitoring continually shifting federal and state regulations, provides accountants with customized, data-driven recommendations based on each client's distinct business and employee activity. Recommendations cover everything from retirement and insurance compliance, to time tracking, tax credits and more, instantly alerting firms so they can quickly — and proactively — pass this information on to their clients.

AI Tools

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GenAI Toolkit (CPA.com)

So many people are talking about what generative AI can do in the future that it can sometimes be tough to get a handle on what it can do right now. Sifting through the hype to find genuine use cases that can actually drive revenue at your firm can be a challenge even for experienced professionals. Even then, figuring out how the technology can be applied to a practitioner's particular speciality, and how it can play into a wider firm strategy, can seem like an insurmountable task, especially for smaller firms without many resources.

This is why CPA.com released its Generative AI Toolkit, containing the resources an accountant needs to build their AI strategy — whatever that might be. This set of practical tools is meant to help practitioners build their knowledge of generative AI, as well as better understand both the risks and opportunities it presents. The downloadable toolkit includes practical use case video tutorials covering tax, audit, finance, advisory and other practice areas; a security checklist with risk considerations and recommendations for remediation; and a glossary of terms to help understand the finer points of this technology. While you might not be an instant AI master upon downloading the toolkit, the materials contained in it have all the necessary components to at least begin that journey.

Audit Tools

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FieldGuide AI (FieldGuide) and TeamMate Document Linker (Wolters Kluwer)

Automation has been a major focus of advisory and audit engagement platform Fieldguide since the beginning, and its newest offering — FieldGuide AI — kicks this up another notch. While many solutions tout the ability to automate this process or that task, Fieldguide AI emphasizes customization, as practitioners can use the AI to automate any type of manual task or activity, whether comparing risks and data across engagements, creating multiple client requests, or drafting recommendations for exceptions. The automations produced by the system, therefore, account for each firm's unique methodologies so that the software adjusts to the accountants, not the other way around. It also boasts the ability to read and analyze documents, as well as generating consistent test procedures consistent with the firm's own procedures. Understanding the security and confidentiality challenges that come with generative AI, the software does not train or improve its AI models with user-submitted data — it only learns within the context of the engagement, and the data does not leave its secure and private environment.

Automation and AI are also key to our second honoree among audit tools, Wolters Kluwer's TeamMate Document Linker. It's the kind of tool junior auditors have been dreaming of for years: It automates the tying of samples to supporting evidence, using AI-powered optical character recognition technology to extract text from scanned documents to match everything up in seconds, and then making it all available for review in Excel. It's a perfect example of how technology is boosting productivity across the audit — and a great help for firms that are finding it harder and harder to staff engagements.

Editors' note: Some readers may wonder why the Dynamic Auditing Solution isn't included in this category. Developed by the AICPA, CPA.com, Caseware International and a consortium of large firms, it is an audit tool specifically designed to bring the latest technology to today's data-driven engagements. After much internal debate, ultimately we decided that while it is in limited release with several major firms, it has not yet been widely released, so we expect to consider it for inclusion once it is available to the broader profession.

BOI Reporting Tools

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FileForms (FileForms) and CCH Axcess Beneficial Ownership (Wolters Kluwer)

Anticipation of the start date of the beneficial ownership information reporting requirement ran like an undercurrent of dread throughout 2023, with accountants particularly worried that their small-business clients would expect their most trusted advisor to take care of it for them. Besides concerns about whether doing so would constitute the unauthorized practice of law — and create an obligation for firms to keep an eye out in perpetuity for any reportable changes on their clients' behalf — there were also serious problems around the mechanisms of reporting.

With that in mind, we're recognizing two tools that aim to help accountants help their clients with BOI reporting: First, FileForms offers a technology platform that wants to turn the FinCEN filing process into an "easy, TurboTax-like experience," with an emphasis on security and reassuring accountant users that they're not practicing law. It also gives them the option of using FileForms as a third-party referral partner, or as a workflow solution they can use to file for their clients.

Then there's Wolters Kluwer's CCH Axcess Beneficial Ownership, an online filing and information management solution that aims to significantly shorten the filing process. It has a special focus on firms that expect to file a high volume of reports on behalf of their clients, including a dashboard to help keep track of all BOI reports, form duplication to prepopulate forms, and report data storage so firms can reuse data for later filing amendments.

Data Analysis Tools

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Caseware Sherlock (Caseware)

Automation has been a huge part of accounting's digital transformation, as it allows accountants to shift from routine, mundane tasks to higher-level advisory functions that drive client engagement and revenue. Analysis has also played a significant part in a profession that is increasingly technologically driven, with firms using ever-more powerful tools to derive insights from vast pools of data so they can make better-informed decisions. It was only a matter of time before these two things were combined.

Caseware's Sherlock allows for the automated extraction, transformation and loading of firmwide engagement data into one central repository, which can then be analyzed and examined for actionable insights. These insights can be expressed via a number of pre-built data visualizations or through custom views based on a firm's specific needs. Through automating data mining and analysis, firms can get a practicewide view into engagement progress, identify key risks and controls, find areas for process improvement, and conduct benchmarking.

ESG Tools

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VL ESG Steward (Visual Lease)

As businesses continue to monitor the evolution of environmental, social and governance reporting standards — both their more active adoption abroad and their early stages in the U.S. — accountants have an immense opportunity to get ahead of all the new complexities required of compliance.

For many of the companies accountants advise, their real estate and equipment fit into these sustainability calculations, which provide their own set of complications. Visual Lease's VL ESG Steward was created to swoop in and make sense of just this, as the first carbon accounting and sustainability management solution for enterprise real estate and equipment portfolios. The solution provides accurate measurement and effective controls for reporting, along with visualization into the data needed to identify and achieve evolving sustainability goals.

Operating as a centralized system of record for all of this vital information, including contracts, workflows, financials and climate risk, VL ESG Steward facilitates sustainability calculations by giving users an operational, financial and environmental view of the portfolio and of real-time asset-level data.

The controls are configurable to remain up to date and compliant, and portfolio changes are automatically tracked, as are energy, water, waste and biodiversity impact in compliance with global regulations.

VL ESG Steward also integrates with other financial and sustainability reporting systems to share this data, for which complete documentation is also available, keeping businesses — and their advisors — proactive and alert on the burgeoning frontier of ESG reporting.

Practice Development Tools

"Transforming Your Business Model" Resources (AICPA)

Change has never been more rapid in the profession than it is now, and the American Institute of CPAs aims to help guide accountants with a multitude of tools. One of the most comprehensive of these is the "Transforming Your Business Model" resource, developed by the AICPA's Private Companies Practice Section to outline exactly how firms need to evolve to meet today's changing business landscape with a special focus on attracting, retaining and developing top talent.

All the integrated resources are culled from the expertise of leading consultants and the insights of peer firm leaders, and include topical toolkits, podcasts, articles, videos, charts, presentation materials and tips for planning sessions. The material is organized under five key areas: strategy, talent, technology, governance and service offerings. And it drills down into some of the most consequential issues for accounting firms, including strategy and vision, compensation, service areas and how to bill for them, remote work and work-life balance, among other topics.

It was released in 2023 but is an ongoing initiative, so the AICPA will keep adding more resources into the portfolio in 2024 and beyond, keeping users ahead of the very latest developments.

The AICPA's technology arm, CPA.com, is just as timely in its educational offering, the CAS 2.0 Practice Development Coaching Program, which earns an Honorable Mention this year. It follows CPA.com's prior primers on client advisory services, but this iteration is all about acceleration.

Underpinned by CPA.com's CAS 2.0 methodology and framework, the program offers the expertise and resources to ramp up CAS practice transformation, with a focus on firm strategy and governance.

The program begins with a pre-coaching alignment, followed by participating firms joining a coaching cohort for an 18-month itinerary, and includes interactive group sessions, roundtable discussions and personalized one-on-one coaching, all with the goal of providing participants with actionable, accountable plans to bring back to their firms to kick their CAS offering up a notch.

Practice Management Tools

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Ignition (Ignition)

AI solutions that enhance client engagements and improve firm performance are all well and good, but at the end of the day people still need to get paid. This has long been the focus of professional services payment platform Ignition, and in 2023 it introduced a bevy of new features that further streamline the process amid a challenging macroeconomic environment.

The new Ignition platform allows for instant billing without the need for creating new proposals or client agreements — touted as a way to generate revenue from the perennial problem of scope creep. Along these same lines, the platform now also sports the ability to automatically apply percentage-based price increases when renewing annual client engagements, a process that typically takes an awkward conversation most accountants would prefer to avoid. Finally, users can renew existing client proposals either individually or in bulk, which is especially relevant for those who have hundreds or even thousands of recurring tax engagements. They can also add new services to upsell their clients, adjust scope of work, and transition clients with all their information into the system.

Tax and Accounting Tools

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QuickBooks Ledger (Intuit)

Time-saving automation is never more crucial than during tax season, which QuickBooks Ledger, designed with tax professionals in mind, recognizes and provides. Built into QuickBooks Online Accountant, QB Ledger is specifically geared toward the kind of basic, low-complexity accounting and tax-only needs that are ripe for optimization during the busiest time of year, which explains why so many firms have adopted it since its fall launch.

It has been a seamless integration for those firms, as users can maintain their usual QuickBooks workflow, now with added automation to bank feeds, bank reconciliation, financial statements and 1099 tracking, along with the ability to send data to their preferred tax preparation software. Users can also maintain communication with their clients through the product, using the same practice management tools already in place for all QuickBooks Online clients.

And while Ledger makes it easier to meet the pure tax needs of these clients, its position in the wider QuickBooks ecosystem makes it easy for tax preparers to identify and ramp up any clients worthy of the move to the more value-added services, which QB's broad range of products are primed (and easily integrated) to support.

Tax Tools

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Intuit ProConnect with IRS Transcript (Intuit) and IRS Integration (TaxDome)

The Internal Revenue Service is not famous for its technology or for its user-friendliness, but our two final honorees leverage the fact that the agency has created an online portal for accessing taxpayer information: Both Intuit ProConnect and TaxDome now integrate with the IRS systems to allow users to access client transcripts quickly and easily from within their respective applications. It may sound like a small thing, but when you think about the potential impact of easy access to years of client information — without having to leave the program you're in to log into a separate IRS portal — it becomes clear that the accumulation of innovations like these is crucial to satisfying growing client demand with a shrinking workforce.

Honorable Mentions

In addition to the products named above, there were a number of other tools and offerings that we wanted to bring to your attention as being worth honorable mention:

More and more accounting firms, particularly large ones, are getting involved in developing solutions, both for themselves and their clients. In this area, we're highlighting RSM US's FamilySight, a cloud-based tool that gives family offices a comprehensive view of critical data and analytics across their business and personal enterprise structures, and Ernst & Young's EY Intelligent Enterprise Gateway Platform, which helps companies break down the silos between their finance and tax functions by connecting people, processes and data through a shared ecosystem.

Someday, data will flow frictionlessly wherever it needs to go, but that day has not yet come, and until it does, tools like Gusto's Smart Import, which vastly improves the process of gathering and formatting payroll information, will continue to make accountants' everyday lives better.

More firms need to make sure that their onboarding and new engagement processes are uniform, standardized, formalized and otherwise geared to making sure the client gets the service they need while the firm stays profitable and protected. With that in mind, we're highlighting Canopy's Canopy Engagements & Proposals capabilities, and TaxDome's Engagement Letters & Proposals feature.

Last but not least among our Honorable Mentions is Mindbridge's Mindbridge AI Platform, for adding four new Mindbridge Transaction Risk Analytics products in 2023 for vendor invoice, payroll, revenue, and company card risk analytics.