A NEW APPROACH TO TAX WORK

Tax work is changing.
The value of expertise isn't.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax
More time to review what matters.
More capacity for what comes next.

As workloads grow and returns become more complex, review time gets squeezed—and planning conversations get pushed aside.

CCH Axcess automates routine preparation and brings supporting documents, diagnostics, and review insights together. Give your team more time to investigate what changed, resolve what matters, and turn tax insights into actionable guidance for clients. 

See Agentic Tax Capabilities in Action

THE CCH AXCESS FOUNDATION

Give your team more time
for the decisions that matter.

CCH Axcess combines connected tax data, built-in agents, and authoritative CCH intelligence to reduce manual preparation and support informed review.

Connected information and context

Bring together prior-year returns, source documents, client information, workflow activity, and return data throughout the process.

Professionals spend less time rebuilding context and more time evaluating what matters.

Agents that prepare work for review

Agentic capabilities organize source information, automate routine preparation, and surface diagnostics and exceptions. Your team spends less time assembling returns and more time evaluating what needs attention.

Intelligence grounded in tax expertise

Authoritative CCH content, workflow knowledge, diagnostics, and client context help professionals investigate issues and understand the evidence behind a decision.

Professional judgement throughout

Automation prepares information and highlights issues that need attention. Your professionals evaluate exceptions, determine the appropriate tax treatment, document their reasoning, and approve the results.
Cathy Rowe Headshot
The future of tax isn't deciding faster. It's having the right information in front of the right professional at the right time.
Cathy Rowe
Executive Vice President, Professional Market, Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting North America

See how work moves through the new tax workflow

Explore how CCH Axcess supports each phase, from planning and risk assessment through testing and completion.

  • Gather
  • Process
  • Prepare
  • Review
  • Deliver
  • Advise

01 | GATHER: AUTOMATE CLIENT INTAKE AND DOCUMENT COLLECTION

Get the information you need—with less back-and-forth.

Bring prior-year context, client responses, and source documents together so your team can identify gaps and resolve questions before they delay preparation.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your team evaluates changed circumstances, clarifies incomplete responses, and determines whether the information provided is sufficient for preparation.

Build requests from what you already know

Use prior-year returns to establish expected documents, then supplement requests for changes in the client’s circumstances. Spend less time rebuilding the collection list each year.

Capture information that documents don't tell you

Collect organizer responses alongside source documents, including details such as charitable contributions and estimated tax payments that clients may report without supporting tax forms. Give preparers a fuller picture of the information available.

See what's missing and focus the follow-up

Track questionnaire and document-request progress to identify outstanding items. Keep clarification in secure client messages and use reminders to reduce manual chasing.

Suggest engagement-specific risks

Agents propose documented risks using engagement information and a risk library tailored to the audit title, giving your team a starting point to evaluate and refine.

2 | PROCESS: CONVERT DOCUMENTS INTO ORGANIZED, USABLE TAX DATA

Less manual extraction. More usable tax data.

Turn source documents into structured tax data, with exceptions and supporting evidence available for verification. Reduce manual entry and give your team a clearer starting point for preparation.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your team verifies flagged values, corrects extraction errors, and evaluates document-analysis findings before relying on the information in preparation.

Extract data from complex source documents

Capture tax data from standard forms and complex K-1 packages, including supplemental statements, footnotes, and state information. Reduce the manual effort of assembling details across varied documents.

Focus verification on flagged values

Surface extraction issues and inspect flagged values alongside their source documents. Your team can confirm or correct the information without searching through separate files.

Investigate the information behind the numbers

Use AI-assisted document analysis to summarize complex content, ask questions, and identify relevant details or inconsistencies. Give your team more context for evaluating the source information.

Use validated data in return prepatation

Transfer structured, validated data into CCH Axcess Tax to reduce rekeying and connect document processing with return preparation.

03 | PREPARE: PREPARE AND CALCULATE RETURNS WITH LESS MANUAL EFFORT 

Get to a review-ready return with less manual preparation.

Agentic Return Preparation combines prior-year context, source documents, and organizer information to populate and calculate the return. AI-assisted diagnostic explanations and authoritative guidance help your team address preparation issues before review.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your team evaluates guidance, determines tax treatment, supplies missing facts, and decides when additional preparation is required. Professionals address issues and identify questions that need further review.

Build and calculate the return

Roll forward an existing return or extract starting information from a new client’s prior-year PDF. Combine that context with current-year documents and organizer information to populate and calculate the return through the CCH Axcess Tax engine.

Understand diagnostics and address the issues

Pair familiar Tax diagnostics with AI-assisted explanations of what needs attention and how to resolve it. Make supported corrections within the preparation experience, with your team evaluating issues that require a decision.

Bring authoritative guidance into preparation

Ask tax questions and investigate treatment using guidance grounded in authoritative CCH content, with citations to verify the sources. Support preparation decisions without separating research from the tax workflow.

Handle complexity in the underlying return

Open the return in CCH Axcess Tax when a situation requires additional preparation or adjustments. Keep access to the tax engine’s capabilities as your team works through complex details.

04 | REVIEW: SURFACE EXCEPTIONS AND FOCUS PROFESSIONAL JUDGEMENT

See what changed.
Understand what it means.

Automatically assembled workpapers, supporting calculations, and source tie-outs reduce the work of getting a return ready for review. Year-over-year insights and authoritative tax guidance help reviewers investigate issues and evaluate the return.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your reviewers determine whether explanations and tax treatments are appropriate and which unresolved issues require further work.

Highlight year-over-year changes

Surface differences between current- and prior-year returns alongside source documents and calculated amounts, helping reviewers identify changes that deserve investigation.

Automate supporting calculations and tie-outs

Generated workpapers aggregate amounts from multiple documents, show the calculations behind return totals, and highlight differences between source amounts and the calculated return.

Investigate issues with authoritative guidance

AI-assisted document analysis and tax guidance with citations help reviewers investigate inconsistencies and evaluate tax treatments without assembling the evidence and research from scratch.

Keep review explanations with the workpapers

Capture why an amount differs from its source or why a particular tax treatment was used, keeping those explanations with the supporting workpapers.

05 | DELIVER: FILE, DELIVER, AND DOCUMENT COMPLETED WORK 

Deliver more than a tax return.

Generate the final return, a complete workpaper package, and an executive summary that explains the client’s tax results. Connected delivery, electronic signatures, and filing tools reduce manual assembly and help your team complete the engagement.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your team approves the final documents and client summary and confirms the required authorizations before releasing the return for filing.

Generate the final return and workpaper package

Produce the accountant copy from the tax return and assemble a downloadable workpaper package with source documents, calculation tie-outs, review explanations, and the audit trail.

Explain the client's tax results

Generate an executive summary explaining taxes paid, taxes due, and year-over-year changes, grounded in authoritative tax content and ready for your team to review before sharing.

Connect return delivery and client signatures

Send the client return, filing instructions, and authorization forms through the integrated electronic signature process, with signed documents available in the client hub.

Export the approved return for e-filing

Export returns to the electronic filing system, hold them for release, and track filing status through the connected tax workflow.

06 | ADVISE: TURN CONNECTED TAX DATA INTO CLIENT OPPORTUNITIES

Turn tax returns into advisory growth.

Find advisory opportunities in the returns you already prepare, compare future tax outcomes, and build engagements around your clients’ needs. Guided workflows and practical learning help more of your team deliver advisory services throughout the year.

Agentic return preparation with CCH Axcess Tax

Where your team makes the decisions

Your team selects suitable strategies, validates planning assumptions, and tailors recommendations to each client’s goals and circumstances.

Find advisory opportunities in existing returns

Connected tax return data helps surface potential engagements and prioritize clients by estimated impact, without re-entering their information.

Compare the tax impact of different scenarios

Start projections from return data and model alternative scenarios, giving your team concrete tax comparisons to discuss with clients before they make decisions.

Guide the advisory engagement

Step-by-step workflows, templates, and authoritative research help your team develop recommendations and deliver the engagement with less work building the process from scratch.

Help more of your team delivery advisory services

Practical learning and embedded guidance help staff build advisory skills, while firm dashboards show opportunities and engagement progress so leaders can assign and manage the work.

AI that actually helps prepare returns? 

CCH Axcess Does That. 

Watch how CCH Axcess turns source documents into prepared returns, highlights issues for review, and brings supporting evidence into view so your team can investigate, resolve, and approve. 

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BETTER OUTCOMES FOR YOUR FIRM

Less manual preparation.
More informed decisions.

Spend less time assembling returns

Agentic Return Preparation extracts tax data, populates returns, and generates supporting workpapers—reducing the manual effort needed to get a return ready for review.

See what needs attention—and why

Diagnostics, year-over-year comparisons, and source evidence help reviewers investigate changes, resolve discrepancies, and document their decisions.

Turn tax data into planning conversations

Use return information to project tax outcomes and compare scenarios. Help clients understand their options and make informed choices.

THE CONNECTED ADVANTAGE

The tax engine.
The evidence.
The expertise.
Working together.

CCH Axcess brings tax calculation, supporting evidence, and authoritative knowledge into a connected workflow—from preparing a return to evaluating a client’s planning options.

Tax calculation

Agentic return preparation uses the CCH Axcess Tax engine to calculate returns, giving professionals a familiar foundation for evaluating results and handling complex tax situations.

Evidence and documentation

Connect return information with source documents, diagnostics, review comments, and supporting workpapers. Reviewers can trace discrepancies to their source and document how they resolved them.

Authoritative knowledge

Bring trusted CCH research into the review process to investigate tax questions, evaluate treatment, and support professional conclusions.

Open connectivity

Connect additional tools through APIs and integrations, giving your firm flexibility to build on its CCH Axcess investment.

A COMPLETE TAX SUITE

The technology behind the workflow.

CCH Axcess connects the technology behind your tax workflow, bringing client information, document automation, tax preparation, planning, advisory and intelligence together so work can move forward without forcing your firm into a series of disconnected processes.

CCH Axcess™ Tax

Prepare and calculate returns, with Agentic Return Preparation supporting the work your team evaluates.
CCH Axcess Tax

CCH Axcess™ Scan

Classify source documents and extract tax data with less manual keying, including complex returns like K-1s. 

CCH Axcess Scan

CCH Axcess™ Client Collaboration

Gather client information and documents to support the work ahead.
CCH Axcess Client Collaboration

CCH Axcess™ Workflow

Manage capacity, assignments, workflow status, and deadlines across your tax practice.
CCH Axcess Workflow

CCH Axcess™ Practice

Connect time, billing, and firm management with your CCH Axcess workflow.
CCH Axcess Practice Management

CCH Axcess™ Tax Planner

Model scenarios and project tax outcomes to inform future decisions.
CCH Axcess Tax Planner

CCH Axcess™ Advisor

Identify opportunities and support the development and delivery of advisory engagements.
CCH Axcess Advisor

CCH Axcess™ Intelligence

Bring authoritative CCH content, contextual answers, and document analysis into your work.
CCH Axcess Intelligence

CCH Axcess™ APIs

Connect CCH Axcess with the additional tools and capabilities your firm uses.
Explore Compatible APIs

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Understand the new tax workflow experience.

  • What does agentic return preparation automate?
    Agentic return preparation uses prior-year information, client documents, and organizer responses to populate and calculate returns, surface diagnostics, and generate supporting workpapers. Your team reviews the results, resolves exceptions, and approves the completed work.
  • How does this work with CCH Axcess Tax?
    CCH Axcess Tax provides the calculation engine behind agentic return preparation. The workflow uses Tax’s diagnostics and calculated results, and professionals can open the underlying return in CCH Axcess Tax when a situation requires more detailed preparation.
  • Does the AI make tax decisions for me?
    No. Automation prepares information and highlights issues that need attention. Your professionals determine the appropriate tax treatment, evaluate unusual circumstances, document their reasoning, and authorize the return for filing.
  • How does CCH Axcess Intelligence support the workflow?
    CCH Axcess Intelligence helps professionals analyze documents, investigate inconsistencies, and research tax questions using authoritative CCH content. Citation-backed guidance supports preparation and review while professionals evaluate how it applies to the client’s circumstances.
  • Can prior-year returns and organizers be used?
    Yes. Existing clients’ prior-year returns can roll forward, and a prior-year return PDF can provide starting information for a new client. Organizer responses supply additional information that may not appear on tax forms, such as estimated payments or charitable contributions.
  • How does the workflow help grow my advisory business?
    Connected return data helps identify advisory opportunities and provides a starting point for tax projections and scenario comparisons. Guided advisory workflows, templates, and practical learning help more of your team develop recommendations and deliver engagements beyond annual preparation.

Put the new tax workflow to work for your firm.

Discover how CCH Axcess can reduce manual tax work and create more opportunity to advise.

Contact a Representative

Explore ways to streamline your firm’s tax workflow, expand your team’s capacity, and grow advisory services. Contact a representative through the form below.
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See the workflow in action

See how agentic automation can revolutionize your tax workflow with live or on-demand demos.
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