Email: The word itself sounds innocent, doesn’t it? Kind of like “snail mail,” but faster, sleeker, and without the slimy trail. But don’t be fooled—email is secretly a sinister beast, hiding in the shadows as it plots to destroy businesses—including your accounting firm.
If your accounting firm still relies heavily on email for client communication and document management, you’re not in the fast lane—you’re on the road to ruin. Let’s expose email for the silent assassin it is by running down the six ways email is secretly destroying your accounting firm.
1. Email threads tie your accounting firm in knots
Check your inbox. How many email threads do you have that resemble an entire season of a soap opera? If you’re like most people, you’ve got multiple sub-threads, people added in midway, and enough “Re: Re: Re: Re:” to populate the Psycho shower scene soundtrack ten times over.
Navigating those threads for one crucial piece of information is about as fun as untangling Christmas lights. Except it’s not Christmas. It’s April 15th, and your client is waiting.
2. File management is a fiasco
Sure, digging through hundreds of emails to find that one PDF your client sent you three months ago sounds exhilarating. It’s like a treasure hunt, except the treasure is a file named “Final_version_7.pdf,” and it’s buried under heaps of spam and calendar invites.
3. Email traps you in the ninth circle of versioning hell
Received an updated file via email while working on the original? Great! Now you’ve got two versions and zero clue which changes were made when. Your spreadsheet now has more conflicting versions than the tales of high school football glory your Cousin Earl tells every Thanksgiving.
4. Accountability is a circus
Tiffany changed the deadline to next Thursday but forgot to copy Rob, who was supposed to send the files to Joan but sent them to Lisa, who is out on vacation for the next two weeks but forgot to set her OOO auto-responder. So Tiffany doesn’t know that Rob sent the files, who doesn’t know when they’re due, and everything sucks.
Sound familiar? Email makes it hard to keep track of who sent what when—and virtually impossible to determine accountability when things go wrong. It’s a total circus, but swap the trapeze artists and clowns for miscommunication and time delays.
5. Security shmashmurity
If you’re sending sensitive documents through email, you’re doing it wrong. It’s actually hard to imagine a less secure way to communicate with your teammates and clients. Even using carrier pigeons would be safer, as birds have yet to master identity fraud.
6. Zero compatibility with modern workflows
Clay Lehman, Head of Product at Firm360, puts it succinctly: “When accounting firms rely on email to communicate with clients and manage documents, it’s like using a walkie-talkie in the era of smartphones. Sure, it technically works, but you’re not playing the same game as everyone else.”
Bring your accounting firm into the modern era
If you’re still using email as your primary tool for client communication and document management, it’s time for an intervention.
Solutions like Firm360 offer a powerful alternative to email—centralizing your communication, document management, and project management into an all-in-one platform that delivers advanced security email can only dream of.
Step into the 21st century with a comprehensive solution that can keep up with the dynamic needs of modern accounting. Get started with Firm360 today.
About Firm360
Feeling the pinch from email inefficiencies? Get with the times and upgrade to Firm360. Developed by accountants who’ve walked miles in your shoes, our platform provides project management, document management, time and billing capabilities, and even a portal for client communications. With Firm360, you can ditch email debacles and leap into the future of accounting. Are you in?
