Done, waiting, still waiting
The accounts are finished and reviewed. They go to the director with a covering email asking them to check and sign. The director is busy, the attachment is a long PDF, and the email slips down the inbox. A week later someone chases. Two weeks later the manager calls. The filing deadline is getting closer, the job cannot be billed, and it is sitting on the work in progress report as done-but-not-done.
Across the practice, a surprising amount of finished work is in this state at any one time.
Approval asks too much of the client
The approval email usually contains the full accounts, the tax computation and sometimes a letter of representation, with a request to read, sign and return. For a busy owner, that is a job they will do later. Printing, signing and scanning makes it worse.
The practice also has little visibility. Approvals are chased by whoever did the work, from memory, and there is no list of all jobs waiting on clients. So the chasing is patchy, and some jobs wait much longer than others.
Clients sometimes have questions they do not want to put in an email, so they put the approval off until they have time to call. Without an easy way to ask, the question becomes a delay.
What slow approvals cost
| Issue | Effect |
|---|---|
| Finished work not filed | Deadlines approached with no margin |
| Work not billed | Cash tied up in completed jobs |
| Chasing by memory | Some clients chased often, others forgotten |
| Print, sign, scan | Clients put it off |
| No list of waiting jobs | Partners cannot see how much work is stuck |
There is a knock-on effect on the team as well. Managers carry a mental list of jobs waiting on clients, and that list competes for attention with the work they are actually doing.
The approval flow we build
- When a job reaches the approval stage in your practice management system, an approval pack is prepared: a one-page summary your practice designs, such as profit, tax payable and key changes from last year, plus the documents to approve.
- The client receives a link to view the summary and documents on their phone or computer and signs electronically, through a provider such as DocuSign or a similar service your practice already uses.
- Questions the client raises are sent to the manager, and the approval stays open until they are answered.
- Reminders follow your practice's schedule, and after a set point the manager gets a task to call.
- Signed documents are filed on the client record and the job moves to ready to file, with the date of approval recorded.
- A practice-wide list shows every job waiting on client approval, how long it has waited, and its filing date.
The summary content and wording are your practice's. The flow handles delivery, signing, chasing and recording.
Finished work that moves
Clients can approve from their phone without printing anything, which removes the usual reason for putting it off. Managers stop chasing by memory. The practice can see how much work is stuck with clients and act on it. Jobs get filed with more margin and billed sooner.
Clients also like the summary. A single page showing what matters, with the full documents behind it, is easier to understand than a long set of accounts, and questions tend to be better when the client has read something they can follow.
Is this where your work gets stuck?
- Finished accounts wait weeks for client signatures
- Clients are asked to print, sign and scan
- Chasing approvals is left to whoever did the job
- You cannot list every job waiting on a client
- Billing is delayed by missing approvals