The Future in Tax Preparation is Here. #WithIntuitTax, Your Tax Practice is Ready!

In a world where you can start your car with your smartphone and your refrigerator can tell you that your milk has gone bad, it’s safe to say that the future is here. Tax preparers may wonder where their profession is headed in light of new advancements in technology, and more importantly, how they can best take advantage of these innovations to help their clients succeed.

That’s why Intuit^® ProConnect™ is partnering with third parties to accelerate the capabilities of Intuit ProConnect Tax Online, Lacerte^® and ProSeries^®. Through these partnerships, Intuit’s products will be able to deliver immediate benefits to professional tax preparers on top of the services the tax software already provide, including upgrades to security, overall performance, steps toward reaching 100 percent e-file coverage and continued strong support for tax reform.

We sat down with a few members of the Intuit ProConnect family to get their thoughts on what’s next for the profession, and their take on what these updates mean for tax preparers.

What do third-party connections mean for our ProConnect users?

“We’re thrilled to partner with others in order to expand the capabilities we can offer to our customers in order to solve their most important problems. Leaning into partnerships enables us to bring new capabilities to our customers faster than we could do it on our own, which is a win for Intuit, our partners and most importantly, our customers.” – Patti Newcomer, vice president, head of marketing, professional tax business at Intuit.

“At Intuit, our ultimate goal is to help solve the biggest problems our customers face. By leaning into third-party integrations, we are able to accelerate our delivery of tax and accounting solutions to the market, and further drive efficiency for our tax professionals’ clients.” – Jorge Olavarrieta, vice president of product management at Intuit.

Which new capabilities are you most excited about?

“I am most excited about us leaning into business insights, especially collaborating with a third party to help us get there faster. We know the profession is moving from compliance to more advisory services, and this will help make this transformation easier for our accountants.” – Barry Pennett, vice president of accountant sales at Intuit.

“I’m excited about helping to automate drudgery work for our accountants by applying artificial intelligence to solve some of our biggest customer problems, including saving time. I am also excited that we are building the advisory capability for accountants and helping to solve their workflow challenges through third-party integrations.” – Mamie Jones Sr., vice president, technology, at Intuit.

What should customers know about security measures taken with these capabilities?

“We put all new capabilities – whether we build them or use third parties – through the same rigorous security processes to ensure our customers can feel confident their information is secure.” – Barry Pennett.

“The personal, tax and financial data our customers entrust to us through the use of our applications is highly sensitive. As such, the security of our customers’ data, and their clients’ data, is a top priority for our business. As we engage partners to help us solve the biggest problems for our customers, a large part of our evaluation entails a rigorous and detailed security review.” – Jorge Olavarrieta.

What do you think a tax practice will look like in five years? 10 years?

“In the near term, a professional tax practice will look very different. Manual, data-entry and backward-facing work will be automated, and will be replaced with tax and accounting pros. These pros will focus on advising their clients regarding making financial decisions that will increase the likelihood their businesses will succeed beyond the five-year point, and that individuals will have better financial outcomes in line with their goals. We expect that tax and accounting pros will have insights at their fingertips that will enable them to provide real-time advice without having to worry about tracking down data.” – Patti Newcomer.

“As technology continues to rapidly evolve, and as taxpayer and small business financial data becomes readily available, we see a day when the compliance work within the tax and accounting office will be fully automated. This does not mean that the value of the professional decreases, but rather expect that as compliance work continues to be simplified, the added efficiency and real-time access to data will enable a shift toward delivering advisory services that further help their clients optimize their financial lives.” – Jorge Olavarrieta.

Now that you’re armed with the knowledge you need, we’re here with you to take the next step! Learn more about the latest integrations and updates from ProConnect Tax Online, Lacerte and ProSeries, and use #WithIntuitTax to join the conversation on social.