In this guide 6 sections
A shared tracker is enough while one partner reads it daily. Compare the two on three questions. What stage is each assignment at? Who is overloaded this week? Which finished work is still unbilled? Where a tracker cannot answer those, move to practice software.
Assignment status: one row or one record
A tracker row says a client’s return is pending. A practice record asks which return, for which assessment year, awaiting what. The gap shows once ten engagements run for a single client. Until then, nobody notices.
Statutory audit, return filing, a notice reply and a loan certificate each move through different stages, yet a single status column squeezes them into the same words. Partners stop trusting it.
Test your sheet with one question. Can an articled clerk who has never met the client say what is stuck, and why, within a minute? If not, the sheet is a memory aid for one partner, nothing more.
- Separate stages for each engagement type
- The reason for waiting, not just the word pending
- Document received dates against a checklist
- Partner review before filing
Team workload: who carries too much
Cell colours show who owns a row. They do not show that one article holds forty live items while another holds twelve, and counting by hand on a Friday evening wastes a partner’s time.
A practice system totals open assignments by person and by due date. Ask it about next Monday. A useful answer names the people, the clients and the filings that will collide.
Be fair to the sheet. A small team can filter the owner column and get the same answer in seconds. No software needed.
Fee billing: finished work with no invoice
Trackers leak here. The work completes, the status turns green, and nobody raises the bill until a partner stumbles on it weeks later while chasing something else entirely.
A practice system ties each assignment to a fee, an invoice and a receipt, so a closed job without an invoice shows as an exception. Hours or a fixed fee can sit against the job.
A sheet can hold a billed column. It only works if someone fills it every time.
- Closed assignments with no invoice
- Invoices raised but unpaid, aged by month
- Retainer clients billed each quarter
- Fee agreed against fee charged
Where the shared tracker breaks
Two people open the same file and one overwrites the other. A filter stays switched on, so a row seems to vanish. Someone sorts a single column without the rest, and every client’s due date scrambles.
Then there is visibility. A shared sheet shows every client’s fee to every user, whereas practice software can limit fee columns to partners and show a clerk only the assignments in hand.
For a firm of two, none of this matters. It bites once articles, a junior accountant and a visiting tax consultant all edit one file during the same filing week.
A fair way to decide
Run both through one filing season on a copy of your live clients. Keep the sheet as the master and enter the same assignments into the software in parallel.
At season end, count the surprises. Which tool caught a missing Form 26AS, an overloaded article or an unbilled engagement first? Let that count decide.
If the sheet wins, keep it and tidy the columns. If the software wins, move one closed year across and leave the open ones for the next cycle.
Tracker or software comparison sheet
A sheet of one page with three blocks for status, workload and billing. Each block lists two test questions. Beside them sit a column for the tracker’s answer, a column for the software’s answer, and a tick for whichever found the problem first.
Open a blank worksheet to printQuestions owners ask
Is a tracker acceptable for a two partner firm?
Yes, when one person owns the file and the client list is short. Review the choice when a third person starts editing.
Can practice software file returns for us?
No. It tracks jobs, documents and fees. Filing still happens on the government portals and in your tax tools.
What should we move across first?
Client master details and open assignments. Leave old closed years in the sheet until the new records feel dependable.
How do articled clerks fit in?
Give each a login that shows only their own assignments. Fee columns stay with the partners.