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How to extract data from clients

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26th Sep 2012
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In August, AccountingWEB member Peter Saxton touched a nerve when he complained, “Clients seem incapable of answering more than one email.”

He continued: “If I ask a client if the attached company information is correct AND ask them for the SIC code(s) in the same email I usually get an answer to one of the questions, but not both.”

With self assessment season looming on the horizon, Saxton asked for help from the AccountingWEB community to find new ways of extracting multiple answers from clients. Numerous useful suggestions were advanced to solve his specific problem; this article summarises this advice and widens the net to look at other techniques gaining ground within the profession.

The problem with email

Saxton wondered whether the inability to answer more than one question was a matter of clients’ intelligence, but fellow members suggested that it was more a question of the detrimental effect on their attention spans caused by email and mobile communications.

“A few years ago the recipient would have sat down and read a letter. We then moved on to emails and today people receive messages on mobile devices at any time whilst they are on the go (and possibly also concentrating on something else),” commented B Roberts.

While email improved efficiency by drastically reducing the number of letters sent within the profession, the benefits have been eroded by what Ken Howard called the iPhone curse, which has dumbed down communications.

“Most emails these days are one liners, many are barely coherent, and often the response to a fairly lengthy or technical email is ‘OK’,” said Howard. “The best we can do is be aware of it and change our way of working again.  I've certainly reverted back to sending technical correspondence by snail mail which I think now commands a greater importance value. I really foresee an end to using email for anything other than quick one-liners - a bit like texting which is really what it's coming down to sadly.”

Practical email tips

There was a wealth of advice from members who continue to use email, summarised in the box to the right.

Try these email tips

1. Send separate emails.

2. Compose very short paragraphs with very short sentences. 

3. Number each question so the clients know which points require an answer.

4. Keep emails to a minimum: no more than one a day if they are hard to deal with. 

5. Use bold type as well as numbering and increase the font size for important bits. Underlining and highlighting can also help and include specific instructions such as, “John - Please confirm that this is the case, or provide X, Y or Z.

6. Itemise attachments and actions in the email header, for example queries plus draft accounts should have the subject line: "Jo Bloggs draft accounts - PLUS queries to be answered".  Include the same text in the body of the email.

7. Set a deadline for responses.

With thanks to: Moonbeam, taxhound, Lancsboy2 & Andy Partridge

Ken Howard creates Q&A forms for clients that one of them refers to as “idiot sheets”. The accountant fills in the points for which he already has the information or where he just needs the client’s confirmation - for example the director’s salary. The form is designed to prompt the client to stop and think sufficiently to provide the correct answers and he asks for them to sign and return the Q&A to confirm the data is correct. Even if the information is wrong, at least they have signed something to show it as correct. If they send back incorrect information, Howard returns a new, shortened Q&A to complete. “This tends to work with even the most illiterate and incommunicative of clients,” he advised.

Use text!

While Ken Howard lamented the effects of texting, the advice from Australian accountancy firm Pooles was, if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. When we posted the original query on Twitter, @Pooles replied: “Text… We have been using it for a couple of years and it’s very effective.”

Peterborough-based Rawlinsons has taken this medium a step further with text-based notifications and Echosign e-signatures. Documents such as tax returns that require personal signatures are loaded up to Echosign’s servers and a notification sent to the client via text or email . The message includes an option to sign the document electronically, which the client can do by replying with a unique personal identification number.

This form of e-signatures is legally binding, and fully integrates into Rawlinsons’ work processes, said partner Ken Craig.

SMS text may work for Rawlinsons and Down Under, but the original poster Peter Saxton remained sceptical. “I only send an SMS to somebody who doesn’t have a computer and it’s an unsocial hour. I don’t see why it’s any different than email, though, except for the fact that people usually read them more regularly.”

Client portals and e-signatures

Increasingly, practice managers and technology experts would question why so many practitioners rely on email. Instead of sending draft documents and accounts to the client, they can be published to an online client portal for retrieval. The Data Protection Act requires a minimum level of care and attention when sending personal information by email.  If a draft tax return was accidentally emailed to the wrong person, for example, that would constitute a data protection breach , according to Charles Verrier, the leader of AccountingWEB’s paperless office discussion group.

Email attachments containing personal can be encrypted and password-protected to reduce this risk, A secure online portal similar to Echosign’s, but under the firm’s own management, removes the need for this extra security precaution. Instead of emailing draft documents to the client, they can be published to the client portal for retrieval. The client will have their own password allowing them to upload and download documents, and when a file is posted in their portal, they will receive an email with a link to the sensitive information. None of it has been allowed out of the firm’s secure environment.

In recent months, we have seen Dropbox becoming a very popular mechanism for exchanging data with clients, even though a number of security issues make it less than ideal for such sensitive information. IRIS played this card recently when it launched its free OpenSpace online storage facility and numerous other suppliers including Lindenhouse, PracticeWEB, DocuSoft, CCH and Thomson Reuters have been offering portal facilities to the accounting profession for years. Many of the shortlisted firms in AccountingWEB’s recent Practice Excellence Awards reported using portals in this way, indicating that clients may also find it preferable to email as a way to exchange information.

Milsted Langdon, winner of the large firm Practice Excellence Award, commented in its submission to the judging panel: “Making information available electronically has not only enabled us to engage with a new generation of clients and prospective clients for whom technology forms an integral part of their day-to-day business activities, it has also enabled us to work more efficiently, saving both time and money across the firm as a whole.”

The right tools for the job

Faced with all this useful advice, Peter Saxton commented that he was trying to formulate the best way to communicate with different clients, but recognised that some ideas will work with some clients and not with others. “Who’s to know which is which?” he lamented.

Perhaps he also needs a CRM database to help track these preferences and dispatch information requests in the appropriate format. Yet even this approach might fail with the most evasive clients.

“Some just say they never received my emails but I'm doubtful,” he said.

“Another client responds to queries by saying she’s already sent the information. I ask her to forward the email, but she never does. She sends another email which leads me to believe that's her standard response. That’s like when I was in industry and when I chased people for authorised invoices they’d say that they'd already sent them back to me but I would find them still in their office. They had no shame.”

Replies (11)

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By EmbarcAccounts
26th Sep 2012 13:53

How to extract data from clients
I think it is very important to know our clients well and find out what works for them. They are busy running their business day to day and the paperwork can easily get forgotten. For one client a late afternoon phone call always works as he will then call me back while driving home. For another client, a friendly text reminder is the answer.

Marion Thomson
www.embarc-accounts.co.uk

Thanks (1)
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By hiu612
27th Sep 2012 11:36

Send an interim bill with the info request

There is nothing like a fee note to encourage clients to provide answers to questions, or at least to make them phone you up, giving you a chance to chase it.

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By Rosalinda Taylor
27th Sep 2012 12:36

How to extract data from clients

I don't understand why there is a problem.  I always do those items listed in this article. Dont get me wrong, my experience is the same as everyone. They dont read or try to understand emails. One of my client even sent me shortened words and phrases which I have to ask my son to translate.  I agree with UHY WKH Partnership. Client always response if you give them an interim invoice.

 

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By Trevor Scott
27th Sep 2012 13:37

....

Keep request simple.

Ensure that the client realises the importance of said info, also that they know it is in their financial interest to provide it promptly.

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Nigel Harris
By Nigel Harris
27th Sep 2012 14:17

It's good to talk!

I realise there are limits if you have a large number of clients, but if a client doesn't respond to the first written communication I always tell my team to phone them. Many clients simply don't look at their email on a regular basis, especially those who work away from an office base. In those cases, a quick call to their mobile usually gets the response we need. Plus clients like to have a chat, it makes it a more personal thing and it can often open up a conversation on something that will turn into an additional fee.

Nothing makes me more frustrated than the team member who, as a deadline approaches, says to me "but I emailed them weeks ago". Waste of time. Just phone them!

Thanks (2)
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By malcolm141
27th Sep 2012 15:35

Additional service

 

I'd suggest this is discussed as part of the package and positioned as a higher level service.

You can explain that some clients are very organised, others that need the odd reminder but some prefer higher levels of support because they hate paperwork and often don't open letters or respond to emails. 

You can go on and say that you don't like to charge extras so it's important that if additional support is required it is built into the fee.

If they don't play ball explain that fee will go up from next month to cover the extra support. If you do this it would be good to collect fees by direct debit. 

Malcolm

North London Accountants

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By P2
27th Sep 2012 16:01

Letter as pdf in Dropbox

I am a little concerned to hear that Dropbox may have security issues - see lead article above. Please can somebody let me know what these issues are.  If there are serious issues I may need to reconsider my preferred method of sharing sensitive information which is currently to write a standard letter on headed paper, following most of the best practice as laid out in the lead article.  I then print and save this letter with any accompanying sheet - matters arising/how resolved - etc. as a .pdf file and pop it into the public folder in Dropbox. 

I then e-mail the client the security code to access the document from the Dropbox, which of course they can do in their own time and at a time which best suits them.  To encourage a timely response, in the e-mail transmittal I say that "the papers will be available for download for seven days".  This allows me to clear the Dropbox on a regular basis and keep within the FREE allowance for this very useful service.  I hope this is useful commentary.  Please DO say if you think there are security issues.  Many thanks, P2.

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John Stokdyk, AccountingWEB head of insight
By John Stokdyk
28th Sep 2012 09:25

Sorry - the missing Dropbox link

My apologies P2, when drafting the article I meant to include a link to previous articles and Any Answers threads on Dropbox.

From what the majority of our members are saying, it is fast becoming a de facto method for document transmission but the non-technical gist of the objections is that it's "good for granny's snaps, but not confidential client information".

More recently, there was a security scare in August when a Dropbox employee's email was hacked, and this  led to their account on the site where a project document containing thousands of Dropbox users' email addresses was stored.

Since one of the Dropbox issues raised was the privacy of material stored on US servers (where it could theoretically be accessed by staff and US authorities), this was as bad as it can get. The incident confirmed that internal data protection wasn't of the highest standard, and the advisability of encrypting any confidential material you might store on the site.

With all of that on the table, it appears that many Aweb members are happy to continue using Dropbox because their clients are comfortable with it. So if it has worked for you so far with no problem, I would make a measured assessment of the risks and consider what would happen if someone did access your files.

Given the transient nature of the files you're exchanging, and that the individual letters may not list the records and details of your clients, you may not need to take the most alarmist stance. But for serious professional use with large numbers of clients, perhaps you should also investigate some of the professional solutions and alternatives suppliers and recommended by the participants in our Dropbox debate.

 

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By thacca
28th Sep 2012 18:53

Water Boarding?
...

Thanks (2)
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By Trevor F
29th Sep 2012 09:39

The old methods are the best.
A bright light and a rubber hose,Pliers applied to the finger nailsDelicate parts of the anatomy connected to the electricity mains.

 

Thanks (3)
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By justsotax
01st Oct 2012 11:46

I always find that when told of the

tax liability clients suddenly have the memory of the combined group of NASA scientists who put man on the moon when recalling expenses incurred/finding receipts/proof of purchase etc.

 

So perhaps as an alternative....perhaps simply send a letter to the client advising that in the absence of the business records, you have estimated the clients tax liability as being £1k,£10k etc (select according to client)...but this may reduce pending receipt of records....and then just wait for the barrage of calls....

Thanks (2)