Connect with us

Accounting

Tax Pros should use AI to simplify and elevate their work

Published

on

Working in tax requires nuance. Week in and week out, professionals are asked to deliver reliable and timely interpretations of laws, regulations, and guidance. And, of course, details and accuracy are paramount. 

So, I think it’s fair for tax pros to wonder: Can I trust AI to support my work? 

We recently streamed a Bloomberg Tax panel discussion that focuses on this question. To address it, I sat down with Sharad Jha, managing director at Deloitte with more than 20 years of experience advising tax departments on technology and process transformation, and Chris Little, a lead product manager at Bloomberg Tax. 

It makes sense that some tax professionals have concerns about the risks of hallucinations and inaccuracies associated with this rapidly growing technology, while others worry they’ll be viewed as expendable if AI becomes widely adopted in the workplace. 

On the flipside, I’m hearing many more people engage in conversations about how they can use AI practically at work – and not in a passing sense. During our panel conversion, I shared that some of our clients are beginning to dip their toes in, while others are going as far as developing their own in-house AI solutions. 

A global trend toward AI use

As Sharad told us, large companies are “definitely” doing experimentation – and the industry at large is “being more deliberate” in figuring out how they can best leverage this groundbreaking technology.

If you’re still skeptical about AI, I’ve also got to tell you this: It isn’t a job killer in the sense that the technology will replace all human insights and expertise. But soon professionals will need to leverage AI in their day-to-day work to stay ahead of, or at least on par with, their peers. To this point, according to a report from the International Monetary Fund, nearly 40% of global teams are already exposed to AI, a number that jumps to about 60% in advanced economies.

The IRS and other tax authorities also are increasingly using artificial intelligence to capture tax revenue. Plus – and this is the kicker for tax professionals – nearly one-third (29%) of tax functions already are deploying generative AI, with another 26% of tax functions currently exploring its uses, according to the 2024 KPMG Chief Tax Officer outlook survey.

Tax professionals are harnessing AI in the workplace to simplify daily tasks, avoid manual errors, skip those long-standing but tedious Excel sheets, and get lightning-fast answers to industry questions instead of poring through volumes of text. So, while concerns are fair, I do think it’s also important to grasp the incredible benefits of AI, and to understand that you can use a vetted AI program to help you simplify and elevate your work as a tax professional – as long as the right processes and guardrails are in place. 

Using this technology safely and responsibly starts with choosing the right tool and learning how to use it. My advice is to select a trustworthy and quality product that’s grounded in your professional domain and supported by expert human oversight as well as the appropriate industry guardrails. 

My team has been developing AI-powered tools for over a decade, and we know that the “who” behind the tech really matters. Our engineers and data scientists work closely with subject matter experts to allow them to develop deep domain expertise. We also continually seek feedback from users through our Innovation Studio and other avenues. This ensures we build solutions that actually solve the challenges of tax professionals and easily integrate into their workflows. 

The writing is on the wall, and the potential benefits of AI are astounding. So, it’s important for tax professionals to talk about generative AI – and to use it at work. 

AI for tax department growth

There are 340,000 fewer certified public accountants working today versus five years ago, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. So, many tax professionals are facing staffing shortages while managing mounting workloads in an already challenging industry. For today and tomorrow, AI can be a difference maker – a win-win for individuals and a stressed industry. 

Businesses that adopt trustworthy AI can lift the burden on overworked teams, providing efficiency-boosting support while potentially freeing up more time for strategic, high-value or growth-focused activities. And as new generations enter the workplace, a business’s embrace of new technology could help attract talent to fill vacancies. 

I encourage tax professionals to be open to learning about how trusted and quality AI products can save time, save money, and give you a competitive advantage.

Continue Reading

Accounting

IAASB tweaks standards on working with outside experts

Published

on

The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board is proposing to tailor some of its standards to align with recent additions to the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants’ International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants when it comes to using the work of an external expert.

The proposed narrow-scope amendments involve minor changes to several IAASB standards:

  • ISA 620, Using the Work of an Auditor’s Expert;
  • ISRE 2400 (Revised), Engagements to Review Historical Financial Statements;
  • ISAE 3000 (Revised), Assurance Engagements Other than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information;
  • ISRS 4400 (Revised), Agreed-upon Procedures Engagements.

The IAASB is asking for comments via a digital response template that can be found on the IAASB website by July 24, 2025.

In December 2023, the IESBA approved an exposure draft for proposed revisions to the IESBA’s Code of Ethics related to using the work of an external expert. The proposals included three new sections to the Code of Ethics, including provisions for professional accountants in public practice; professional accountants in business and sustainability assurance practitioners. The IESBA approved the provisions on using the work of an external expert at its December 2024 meeting, establishing an ethical framework to guide accountants and sustainability assurance practitioners in evaluating whether an external expert has the necessary competence, capabilities and objectivity to use their work, as well as provisions on applying the Ethics Code’s conceptual framework when using the work of an outside expert.  

Continue Reading

Accounting

Tariffs will hit low-income Americans harder than richest, report says

Published

on

President Donald Trump’s tariffs would effectively cause a tax increase for low-income families that is more than three times higher than what wealthier Americans would pay, according to an analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

The report from the progressive think tank outlined the outcomes for Americans of all backgrounds if the tariffs currently in effect remain in place next year. Those making $28,600 or less would have to spend 6.2% more of their income due to higher prices, while the richest Americans with income of at least $914,900 are expected to spend 1.7% more. Middle-income families making between $55,100 and $94,100 would pay 5% more of their earnings. 

Trump has imposed the steepest U.S. duties in more than a century, including a 145% tariff on many products from China, a 25% rate on most imports from Canada and Mexico, duties on some sectors such as steel and aluminum and a baseline 10% tariff on the rest of the country’s trading partners. He suspended higher, customized tariffs on most countries for 90 days.

Economists have warned that costs from tariff increases would ultimately be passed on to U.S. consumers. And while prices will rise for everyone, lower-income families are expected to lose a larger portion of their budgets because they tend to spend more of their earnings on goods, including food and other necessities, compared to wealthier individuals.

Food prices could rise by 2.6% in the short run due to tariffs, according to an estimate from the Yale Budget Lab. Among all goods impacted, consumers are expected to face the steepest price hikes for clothing at 64%, the report showed. 

The Yale Budget Lab projected that the tariffs would result in a loss of $4,700 a year on average for American households.

Continue Reading

Accounting

At Schellman, AI reshapes a firm’s staffing needs

Published

on

Artificial intelligence is just getting started in the accounting world, but it is already helping firms like technology specialist Schellman do more things with fewer people, allowing the firm to scale back hiring and reduce headcount in certain areas through natural attrition. 

Schellman CEO Avani Desai said there have definitely been some shifts in headcount at the Top 100 Firm, though she stressed it was nothing dramatic, as it mostly reflects natural attrition combined with being more selective with hiring. She said the firm has already made an internal decision to not reduce headcount in force, as that just indicates they didn’t hire properly the first time. 

“It hasn’t been about reducing roles but evolving how we do work, so there wasn’t one specific date where we ‘started’ the reduction. It’s been more case by case. We’ve held back on refilling certain roles when we saw opportunities to streamline, especially with the use of new technologies like AI,” she said. 

One area where the firm has found such opportunities has been in the testing of certain cybersecurity controls, particularly within the SOC framework. The firm examined all the controls it tests on the service side and asked which ones require human judgment or deep expertise. The answer was a lot of them. But for the ones that don’t, AI algorithms have been able to significantly lighten the load. 

“[If] we don’t refill a role, it’s because the need actually has changed, or the process has improved so significantly [that] the workload is lighter or shared across the smarter system. So that’s what’s happening,” said Desai. 

Outside of client services like SOC control testing and reporting, the firm has found efficiencies in administrative functions as well as certain internal operational processes. On the latter point, Desai noted that Schellman’s engineers, including the chief information officer, have been using AI to help develop code, which means they’re not relying as much on outside expertise on the internal service delivery side of things. There are still people in the development process, but their roles are changing: They’re writing less code, and doing more reviewing of code before it gets pushed into production, saving time and creating efficiencies. 

“The best way for me to say this is, to us, this has been intentional. We paused hiring in a few areas where we saw overlaps, where technology was really working,” said Desai.

However, even in an age awash with AI, Schellman acknowledges there are certain jobs that need a human, at least for now. For example, the firm does assessments for the FedRAMP program, which is needed for cloud service providers to contract with certain government agencies. These assessments, even in the most stable of times, can be long and complex engagements, to say nothing of the less predictable nature of the current government. As such, it does not make as much sense to reduce human staff in this area. 

“The way it is right now for us to do FedRAMP engagements, it’s a very manual process. There’s a lot of back and forth between us and a third party, the government, and we don’t see a lot of overall application or technology help… We’re in the federal space and you can imagine, [with] what’s going on right now, there’s a big changing market condition for clients and their pricing pressure,” said Desai. 

As Schellman reduces staff levels in some places, it is increasing them in others. Desai said the firm is actively hiring in certain areas. In particular, it’s adding staff in technical cybersecurity (e.g., penetration testers), the aforementioned FedRAMP engagements, AI assessment (in line with recently becoming an ISO 42001 certification body) and in some client-facing roles like marketing and sales. 

“So, to me, this isn’t about doing more with less … It’s about doing more of the right things with the right people,” said Desai. 

While these moves have resulted in savings, she said that was never really the point, so whatever the firm has saved from staffing efficiencies it has reinvested in its tech stack to build its service line further. When asked for an example, she said the firm would like to focus more on penetration testing by building a SaaS tool for it. While Schellman has a proof of concept developed, she noted it would take a lot of money and time to deploy a full solution — both of which the firm now has more of because of its efficiency moves. 

“What is the ‘why’ behind these decisions? The ‘why’ for us isn’t what I think you traditionally see, which is ‘We need to get profitability high. We need to have less people do more things.’ That’s not what it is like,” said Desai. “I want to be able to focus on quality. And the only way I think I can focus on quality is if my people are not focusing on things that don’t matter … I feel like I’m in a much better place because the smart people that I’ve hired are working on the riskiest and most complicated things.”

Continue Reading

Trending