AI for your industry
AI for accountants: get the chasing off your team's desk
AI for accountants is less about robots doing the books and more about the admin around them. Most of the hours lost in a practice are not technical work. They are chasing clients for documents, chasing them for fees, and rebuilding the same reports every Monday. Those are the jobs AI does well, on top of the systems you already use.
Part of AI for your industry.
What can AI do for accountants?
AI can collect client documents, chase fees, draft routine replies, prepare first-pass bookkeeping queries and assemble weekly reports, leaving the accountant to review and advise.
The useful split is between work that needs a qualified judgement and work that only needs doing. Reviewing a set of accounts, advising on a tax position and signing off a return stay with the accountant. Sending the fourth reminder for a bank statement, writing the same deadline email to forty clients and rebuilding the Monday work-in-progress report do not need a qualification, and those are the jobs AI handles well.
This page is written for accountants and accounting firms of roughly 5 to 50 staff, in Ireland, the UK, Australia and elsewhere. The workflows are the same whether the practice calls itself a firm of accountants, a bookkeeping practice or a tax adviser, because the admin is the same.
Which AI workflows save accountants the most time?
Client document collection, fee chasing, onboarding, the bookkeeping review queue and work-in-progress reporting save the most, because each runs weekly and needs little judgement.
The test we apply is whether a task happens often, follows a recognisable pattern, and currently waits for a person to remember it. Document collection passes on all three: the request is the same, the reminders are the same, and the delay is nearly always on the client side. An automated collector sends the request, tracks what has come in, reminds politely, and tells the accountant only when the pack is complete.
The table shows the workflows we look at first and the tools each one usually connects to. Every one sits on top of the firm's existing stack; none of them asks you to leave Xero, QuickBooks or Sage.
| Workflow | Hours it targets | Tools it connects to |
|---|---|---|
| Client document collection | Chasing bank statements, receipts and year-end packs by email and phone | Email, client portal, Dext, Hubdoc, practice management (Karbon, Pixie, Senta) |
| Fee and invoice chasing | Debtor follow-up written and sent by hand each week | Xero, QuickBooks, Sage, GoCardless, email |
| New client onboarding | Engagement letters, AML checks, system access and welcome packs assembled one at a time | Practice management, e-signature, AML provider, email |
| Bookkeeping review queue | First-pass categorisation and query lists before a bookkeeper reviews | Xero, QuickBooks, Sage bank feeds |
| Work-in-progress and deadline reporting | Monday morning report rebuilt from spreadsheets and email | Practice management, Xero or QuickBooks, Google Sheets or Excel |
| Client query drafting | Routine replies about deadlines, payments and missing items | Email, practice management, a private knowledge base of your own guidance |
Tool names are examples of systems these workflows commonly connect to, not endorsements. We work with whatever the firm already runs.
Is client data safe if we use AI?
It depends on the tool tier and data handling. Business tiers with no training on your data and clear retention terms are our minimum.
The honest answer is that a free consumer chatbot and a business-tier AI account are different products with different terms. On the consumer tiers, your inputs may be used to improve the model. On the business tiers we configure, the provider commits contractually not to train on your data, and you control retention. That distinction matters more for an accounting firm than for almost any other business we work with.
Beyond the tier, the design of the workflow decides how much client data the AI sees at all. A document collector needs to know that a bank statement arrived, not what is in it. A fee chaser needs the invoice number and amount, not the ledger. We keep the scope of each workflow as narrow as the job allows.
We are not lawyers and this is not legal advice on your professional obligations. Where your professional body or your engagement terms set requirements for client data, we build to those requirements and document what each workflow can and cannot see.
How do we start without disrupting busy season?
Start with one workflow running beside the current process, prove it on a subset of clients, then switch over between filing peaks, not during one.
The mistake is to change how the whole practice works in the same month the deadlines land. The safer route is to pick the workflow with the clearest hours behind it, run it for a small group of clients while the old process carries on for everyone else, and compare. If it works, widen it. If it needs adjusting, nobody's filing was at risk.
Document collection is often the right first choice precisely because busy season is when the chasing peaks. Set it up in a quiet month and it is working for you when the year-end packs are due.
The free AI Readiness Review is the quickest way to pick that first workflow; the AI consulting for small business page explains how the engagement runs after that.
What does it cost?
A workflow build starts from €3,500, and the price follows the number of workflows and systems involved. The review that comes first is free.
Why the price varies. A fee chaser connected to Xero for one office is a different job from document collection, onboarding and reporting across a practice management system with three partners. We then quote each engagement on what it connects and what it has to do, and we put the estimated hours saved beside the price so you can judge it.
What you get free first. The AI Readiness Review report names the two or three highest-impact workflows for your firm and the estimated hours per week behind them. Ger then talks it through with you personally. There is no card and no obligation, and if the numbers do not justify the work we say so.
Who it is for. Practices with roughly 5 to 50 staff and enough clients that the chasing is measurable in hours, not minutes. Sole practitioners are usually better served by the review report alone. See how pricing works for the full picture across the review, implementation and GEO.
From the business I run
I do not run an accounting firm. I run Shamrock Electrical, an electrical wholesaler in Dublin, for its owner, and the two jobs at the top of every accountant's list are ones a wholesaler has too: invoice chasing and the weekly management report. Both are examples of what can be automated: chasing that depends on someone remembering can become reminders that go out on schedule, with what is outstanding visible without asking.
The mechanics transfer directly. A practice chases documents and fees the way a wholesaler chases invoices: the same message, to many people, on a schedule, with a person stepping in only when it stalls.
Common questions
What is the best AI for accountants?
There is no single best tool. For most practices it is a business-tier AI assistant plus a few workflows built on the ledger and practice management software the firm already runs, each chosen for one job.
Which AI tools do accounting firms actually use?
Most firms already have the core tools: Xero, QuickBooks or Sage, a practice management system and email. We add AI workflows on top of those rather than replacing them, so staff keep working where they work today.
Will AI make mistakes with client accounts?
AI drafts, sorts and chases; a person still reviews and approves anything that touches a client file or a filing. We set the review step deliberately so the firm gains the time without giving up control.
Do we need a technical person on staff?
No. We build and maintain the workflows and train the team on the parts they touch. The person who runs the workflow day to day is usually the practice manager or a senior bookkeeper.
How long does it take to get the first workflow live?
A single workflow such as document collection or fee chasing is typically live within a few weeks of the review call, depending on how many systems it connects. We start with one and expand once it is proven.
Is the AI Readiness Review free for accounting firms?
Yes. It is six questions, takes about three minutes, and returns an instant report naming the two or three highest-impact workflows for a professional services firm, followed by a personal call from Ger the same working day.
See which workflow your firm should start with
Six questions, about three minutes, and an instant report for professional services firms. Free, no card, no obligation, and a personal follow-up from Ger the same working day.
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