Did you know that over 40% of CPAs pointed out dealing with paperwork and documents as one of their top headaches? This is according to a survey by the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA). That little fact throws a spotlight on a ubiquitous stumbling block in the accounting world, especially when we talk about Prepared by Client (PBC) requests. PBC requests are obviously crucial in audit and accounting gigs. Yet they often turn into a real puzzle because of the lack of clarity and responsibility. This article aims to walk CPAs, CFOs, and accountants through the twisty paths of PBC request processes, shining a light on common bumps in the road and offering practical solutions to make workflow management smoother.
The Pains of Managing PBC Requests
Visibility Goes Poof!
One of the big pains in handling PBC requests is that seeing the full picture can be tough. When requests are all over the place—stuck in emails, spreadsheets, or on paper—you face a nightmare trying to keep track of everything. Getting a current status of all work is often a reconciliation project of its own involving tracing down documents and rolling up various email threads and ending with no real certainty of the accuracy. Sorting by status and priority is nearly impossible when Excel and email are the system of record. This mess can lead to delays, deadlines whooshing by, and a bigger chance of lower audit quality. How do you get the CFO an accurate representation of audit progress so she can stand in front of the board with confidence?
Who’s On First?
Another headache is making sure someone’s actually taking care of business. Without clear tasks and deadlines, it’s way too easy for things to slip through the cracks. This ends up in a wild rush and heaps of stress when crunch time hits. Not only is ownership of tasks unclear, it gets worse when requests require the involvement of several people. Ownership in a spreadsheet is not nuanced enough to paint a clear picture of who has the ball. For the same reasons, it is very challenging to retroactively review workloads and throughpout across the team.
How to Tame the PBC Request Beast
One Stop for All Requests
First step to smoothing out the PBC request process is to get all your ducks in a row with centralized request management. Audit teams must establish one place where all requests live, get tracked, and updated. It makes everything more visible and ensures everyone knows what’s happening in real time. Many smaller accounting firms and independent CPAs must develop their own governance model. Additionally they must create their own tooling to support it. These systems are only as good as the understanding and diligence of the contributors.
Talk the Talk
Good communication is essential to PBC request efficiency and outcomes. Having clear ways to talk things out makes sure requests get handled fast and right. Also, catching up regularly and having meetings can keep everyone in the loop and cut down on mix-ups.If you’re in person, wonderful, make sure to take notes and email action items and summaries. Keep in mind if you have a process management tool in place that allows for realtime communication and an audit trail for individual actions. Had your team mastered communication? Is this an area for improvement? This requires a plan.
Tech to the Rescue for PBC Lists
Tech plays a huge part in making PBC requests less of a headache. Using a PBC management tool can automate tons of the process, from making requests to keeping an eye on progress and nudging people with reminders. For example, Dash360, is a platform built just for handling PBC request and workflows. It offers features like automated request lists, real-time updates, and ways to work together better. It sits on top of existing tools and add visibility, traceability, and analytics.
Realistic Deadlines for PBC Responses
Being smart about deadlines is super important. One must think about how complex requests are, and break down work into smaller assignable tasks, for instance. How much bandwidth the team has before setting timelines? How do you go about understanding this limitation? This approach not only keeps everyone sane but also improves audit quality. Tracking actual time invested against estimates can be a useful learning exercise. This can also provide insights into individual performance against certain types of work.
Check Yourself
Regularly taking a step back to see how things are going and asking for feedback can spotlight areas for improvement. Keeping things fresh and responsive is the name of the game. Daily or weekly team stand-ups of 15 minutes to repot on status and blocks or impediments to doing work. Avoiding surprises can be a massive time savings and help to keep morale high. Transparency across the team can also foster a sense of teamwork and ensure healthy collaboration.
Accountability is Everything
Create a vibe where everyone knows what they’re supposed to do to streamline the process. Set clear expectations for team members. Better yet, document and discuss those expectations. Shared accountability among teammates can be an effective way to support productivity and teamwork while assuring a high quality outcome. As a result, you’ll drive towards an inherent equity among people. You can create an environment where the workload is fairly distributed. You gain buy-in by creating this equity.
Flexibility for the Win
Being able to adapt is crucial in managing PBC requests. Staying open to changing plans or deadlines as needed can help deal with the unexpected, making sure everything gets across the finish line smoothly. Having tools that encourage thoughtful consideration of existing workflows and opportunities to improve without being terribly restrictive or feeling foreign will help drive adoption. Document your processes and then rate their effectiveness. Then identify bottlenecks. Avoid tribal knowledge of process since it scales poorly. Because being intentional about workflows and processes is key, using lightweight overlays that help existing manual processes operate more efficiently is the goal. Some PBC and other workflow tools overlay on top of your existing set of tools without creating disruption and simplifying onboarding.
Wrapping it up, while the PBC request process can be a bit of a maze with its visibility and accountability challenges, there are solid strategies to conquer these issues. In order to get everything in one place, using tech like Dash360, setting smart deadlines. Likewise it can help with ensuring clear communication and accountability so that accounting pros can really level up their PBC workflow efficiency. As we get on board with these fixes, one has to wonder: What new improvements will we see in the PBC request game down the line?
