Borland Benefield achieves highly efficient workflows and digital productivity

For nearly 100 years, accounting firm Borland Benefield, PC (“Borland Benefield") has been providing excellence to clients in Alabama and the Southeast. The firm offers high-quality services including audit and assurance, business advisory, and tax to a variety of industries. One of the things that has contributed to the firm’s success is their commitment to being dependable, personable, and advanced. To Borland Benefield, it’s about making real connections with their clients.

Though Borland Benefield was first established in 1922, the firm prides itself on using leading-edge technology to improve tax and audit practices, embolden collaboration, and drive added efficiency in tax and audit workflows. For more than 10 years, Borland Benefield leveraged many Wolters Kluwer software solutions to develop an efficient, paperless office with integrated, automated audit workflows. Today, the firm uses the CCH Axcess® Portal and the CCH® ProSystem fx® Suite including CCH® ProSystem fx® Engagement, CCH® ProSystem fx® Knowledge Coach, CCH® ProSystem fx® Tax, CCH® ProSystem fx® Scan, and CCH® ProSystem fx® Practice Management.

Borland Benefield's technology investments were aimed at achieving three objectives:

1. Getting rid of all the paper involved in the firm's operations
2. Increasing efficiency of its staff with automated workflows
3. Improving firm management to measure goals

Here's how the Wolters Kluwer CCH ProSystem fx Suite helped them succeed.

Change 1: Embracing digital transformation with an integrated, end-to-end solution

Borland Benefield first began using CCH ProSystem fx Tax to achieve better quality control, automatic calculations, and paperless 1040 preparation. When choosing a solution to serve as the central hub for all firm engagements, CCH ProSystem fx Engagement quickly became the top choice. Integrating Engagement with other CCH solutions enables the professionals at Borland Benefield to synchronize work from any location and easily pass tax or audit work to other reviewers in the firm using one central location. When it’s time to send work to clients, Engagement publishes digital documents to CCH Axcess Portal, where clients can securely get them.

Change 2: Increase volume by 65-75% without increasing staff size

One of the main foci for Borland Benefield was to increase efficiency with digital productivity. Having paperless processes across the firm enables Borland Benefield to make more efficient use of its tax professionals and auditors. Engagement enables the firm to put more responsibility on their clients to provide initial audit information through the firm’s secure Portal. And administrative audit staff can set up new accounts, balance the balance sheets, and check financials to free up time for the firm’s auditors to focus on analyzing risk. Along with Engagement, the firm uses CCH ProSystem fx Knowledge Coach to drive higher-quality audits. The firm’s ability to better leverage staff means audits have become more profitable. According to president and managing director, Jeff Chandler:

“We’re bringing in nearly twice as much revenue with roughly the same amount of people. That’s a win-win for everyone; the firm is more profitable…We can offer higher salaries because automation makes our firm so much more efficient.”

Change 3: Measuring performance to drive continuous improvement

Borland Benefield uses Wolters Kluwer’s CCH ProSystem fx Suite and Integrated Audit Approach to better manage and control the progress of audit and tax engagements from start to finish as well as free up time to make real connections with their clients. To help the firm track progress, Chandler and the executive team manage day-to-day operations with CCH ProSystem fx Practice Management. When it’s time for planning, they have all the information needed to measure performance against past objectives and set goals for the future.

The CCH ProSystem fx Suite has enabled Borland Benefield to better manage the firm towards its strategic goals for client and revenue management. Chandler explains the benefits this integrated, end-to-end solution delivered to the firm:

“Using the audit technology, the tax technology, and the time and billing technology has made my firm incrementally stronger. It’s made us more efficient, and I believe we are leveraging our staff better than most firms through the use of technology.”

Download the case study to read all of Borland Benefield's results, including how they use a winning combination of technology and firm culture to recruit talented professionals. 

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