Managing the hundreds or thousands of documents required to complete an audit, tax, or advisory engagement is time-consuming, stressful, and oftentimes inefficient. But choosing a request list management solution can be the magic element you didn’t know you needed. Instead of ‘just’ understanding you, though, the right software can make your process more streamlined, efficient, and much more productive. Here are five ways how:

1. It Helps You Get a Jumpstart on the Season

Annual engagements seem to sneak up on us every year. You and your clients can see them coming, but before you know it, they’re here, and your firm needs an expedient solution. Even though many engagements are 90% the same year-to-year, you might not have a great way to roll them over as consistently. 

A good request list solution allows you to create templates, copy engagements, or roll them over to prepare you for a new one before it even begins! Imagine the time you could save if, going into an engagement, and your client request lists were ready—not just getting started.

2. You Can Automate Tasks that are Otherwise Manual

Sending emails, managing and updating spreadsheets, creating reports, tracking engagements, and communicating with team members. These small-scale tasks only occupy a few minutes here and there—until all that time spent manually managing request lists adds up. 

Suddenly, you’ve lost a huge part of your week. Imagine getting those hours back by automating those busy work, busy season tasks. A good request list solution does just that.

3. Stop Worrying About Security

With everything that occurs during the busy season, keeping your clients’ sensitive information safe should be the last thing on your mind. Many firms still use spreadsheets and email to manage client request lists… but not only is email one of the least secure forms of communication, but it’s also virtually impossible to control. 

More specifically, documents that should be deleted are not. Or documents get lost. And it’s easy to avoid accountability because individual email accounts aren’t transparent to everyone involved in the process. The right request list management solution features built-in, highly advanced security measures to keep your client’s information safe (and to keep you from spending precious time worrying about it).

4. Get Real-time Updates

Reporting on your engagement can be time-consuming, especially during the busy season. Whether it’s a client, colleague, or supervisor who needs the information, gathering, analyzing, and presenting data about your engagement’s progress takes time you often don’t have. Additionally, by the time you’re done getting everything together, much of it is out-of-date, and you must begin again. 

What if you could quickly access real-time information about the status of your engagement and securely share it with the people who need it? An effective request list solution enables everyone involved in the engagement process to do exactly that. It empowers firms to bid farewell to piecemeal accountability solutions favoring a single, continuously updated platform.

5. Spend Less Time Managing and More Time Enhancing the Client Experience

At the end of the day, an effective engagement is all about spending less time fighting with ever-changing client request lists and focusing more on creating a meaningful, holistic experience for your client.

Suralink provides professional services firms with a secure platform to collaborate with clients, exchange documents at scale, and track engagements’ progress. With enterprise-grade security and an easy-to-use interface, Suralink’s award-winning client interaction portal is used by over 500,00 businesses worldwide to increase efficiency and offer a fundamentally improved client experience.

Interested in seeing how this platform can benefit your organization and client experience? Contact our sales team to learn more about what Suralink’s award-winning platform can do for you!