SmartVault works with thousands of accounting firm customers, who service tens of thousands of clients every year via SmartVault’s secure client portal. Over the years of working with accountants, we’ve taken what we’ve learned from our accounting professional friends, and put together some easy-to-use folder templates that you can use to easily build out your […]
Resource Category: Blogs & Articles
Client Portals: A Safe Bet for Secure Communication
From the August 2011 issue of Accounting Today AUGUST 30, 2011 BY KIM HOGAN AND MARK PRICCO In the wake of the scandal involving alleged phone and email hacking by News Corporation, many tax and accounting professionals are invariably questioning the security of their own client communications. Communicating with clients often involves conveying sensitive financial […]
Common Pitfalls to Business Security and How to Address Them
Simple things such as a lack of employee training can cause harm to your business without anyone expecting it. Educating yourself on common pitfalls to business security can help prevent this from happening. The Unknown Areas of Your Security Landscape: Common Pitfalls to Business Security and How to Address Them discusses issues such as: A […]
Digital File Sharing Is The Secret Sauce to Keeping Your Clients Happy
Digital file sharing helps ease the pain and is the “secret sauce” to keeping your clients happy. With digital file sharing, clients can easily keep track of their files and save time which will overall increase client satisfaction and keep them coming back to your practice. Why Digital File Sharing is the Secret Sauce to […]
Flexibility in Business Operations
Efficiency. Organization. Productivity. These things lead to a successful business; however, many people don’t realize that there’s more to this formula than these three concepts. Many small business owners are missing one of the most important concepts – Flexibility. People often dismiss the idea of flexibility because they assume it leads to chaos and disorganization. […]
How SmartVault Improved Efficiency for Powerful Accounting
How SmartVault Improved Efficiency for Powerful Accounting discusses: SmartVault’s cloud-based functionality and compliant security features How SmartVault’s tax and practice management integrations increase profitability How SmartVault can be a fundamental aspect of your tech stack
Javascript Namespace Collisions (and How to Avoid Them)
Writing Javascript to run within web browsers can be a lot of fun! It can also be mind-bendingly painful. I will mention two techniques that can save a lot of heartache when working within a Javascript environment where lots of code is playing (whether that be your own code or code you have pulled in […]
Measuring the Success of Client Portals
You’re Only as Good as Your Implementation… (as featured on AccountingToday.com) These days you’re not likely to pick up an accounting publication or surf the blogosphere without coming across an article on portals, or more specifically, client portals for secure file sharing. Client portals are a mainstay in the accounting profession and their value cannot […]
Open Banking, AI and the Future of Accounting
It’s 525 years since a monk called Luca Pacioli created the first written record of the double-entry bookkeeping process. Bookkeepers and accountants have been applying their numbers brain and their people skills to the problem of running businesses ever since, but it wasn’t until 1998 that the accounting industry would be changed forever by the emergence […]
Results Software Teams Up with SmartVault
Delivers the First CRM to Share Documents with QuickBooks via SmartVault Integration HERNDON, VA, May 12, 2011 – Results Software has announced the integration of SmartVault’s cloud-based document storage and file sharing service with its award-winning Results CRM solution. This integration leverages Results’ and SmartVault’s renowned bi-directional integration with QuickBooks to deliver the ultimate 3-way […]
Scan and upload with your iPhone – very sleek!
Found a new app that lets me scan anything directly from my iPhone which then converts it to a PDF that I can upload to my SmartVault account. It’s awesome! The app is called Scanner Pro by Readdle. It’s easy to configure, just follow these instructions. Once you’ve downloaded the app from the App Store, Tap Settings. […]
The Danger of Sharing Login Credentials
SmartVault is built on the idea that every employee user will have his or her own license – so like most software applications, it’s a violation of our terms of service to share login credentials. But more importantly, when you use someone else’s login credentials, you are creating a false audit trail and eliminating any […]
The Emerging Roles of the New Accountant: Why Transactional Accounting is No Longer Enough
Soley providing tax support is no longer enough, and clients expect their accountant to play a more advisory role. The Emerging Roles of the New Accountant: Why Transactional Accounting is No Longer Enough discusses: The contribution of technology How to manage this new role Don’t know where to begin?
The Freelance Bookkeeper: Why SmartVault is the Tool of Choice for Virtual Bookkeeping
The following is a guest post from Professional Bookkeeper and Advanced Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor Gabrielle Fontaine. For more of Gabrielle’s awesome advice on virtual bookkeeping, visit https://thefreelancebookkeeper.com. With cloud technology in the accounting world growing by leaps and bounds, the way freelance bookkeepers work with their clients is changing dramatically. The most exciting change by […]
The Impact of Internet Access (or the lack thereof) On Your Business
Lessons Learned from Last Week’s GoDaddy Outage Last Monday, our DNS provider, GoDaddy, experienced a widespread service disruption. This service disruption lasted approximately 4 hours and prevented over 50 million web sites, including SmartVault, from being accessible via name lookup. Although, at no time were SmartVault servers unavailable, most of our customers could not access […]
The Paperless Office – Information anytime, anywhere – no printing required.
Operating a “paperless office” seems to be the goal of many businesses today, but dealing with the realities of paper documents – bank statements, bills, invoices, receipts, and more – can be quite a challenge if the right tools aren’t available. The paperless office is the moniker applied to businesses electing to either eliminate or greatly reduce […]
The Unbreakable Chain – Accounting Source Files and QuickBooks Document Management
Accounting is a system comprised of inputs, processes, and outputs – much like a manufacturing process. In this case, the output is the financial statement and other financial records and reports. The inputs are the source documents which provide the details for financial transactions in the accounting system, and the process is balanced double-entry bookkeeping. […]
To Host or Not to Host? 4 Reasons to Consider QuickBooks Hosting for You or Your Clients
As a “Customer Care Hero” at SmartVault, I work with dozens of CPAs and accounting firms every week, all with unique methods and tools for working with their QuickBooks clients. Some use SmartVault’s QuickBooks backup feature to share their QuickBooks file, a few are still driving to their clients’ offices, some are using remote access […]
Why eSignatures are a Must-Have in 2023
How long do you wait for a document to return once you’ve sent it to a client for signature? Hours? Days? Maybe even weeks? Many people see massive disruptions to their workflow and business practices when clients become difficult to reach, slow to act, or make a mistake when signing documents. Electronic signature technology mitigates […]
Why I’m Calling for Better Privacy Laws for Email and Online Document Storage
What You Need to Know about ECPA Privacy laws in the United States regarding emails and online document storage are very archaic. Currently, the Electronics Communication Privacy Act (ECPA) designates that email stored for longer than 180 days is not protected communication. Therefore, access to archived email requires only a subpoena rather than a warrant. […]