2000 AAA CPA Firm Information Technology Survey
by Roman H. Kepczyk, CPA 

The Association for Accounting Administration in conjunction with InfoTech Partners North America sent out a fax survey to member firms after busy season (April 2000) to get a feel for the applications everyone is actually using right now.  Over 110 firms participated with the following representation:

• 21 firms less than 16 members (Small)
• 17 firms between 16 and 29 members (Medium)
• 33 firms between 30 and 49 members (Medium)
• 24 firms between 50 and 99 members (Large)
• 14 firms with 100 or more members (Large)

InfoTech Partners has summarized the general findings below along with our analysis and opinions, which do not reflect the views of the Association for Accounting Administration.  In some instances answers were left blank, which accounts for the statistics not adding up to the total numbers. The results of the survey are available to members of the AAA by emailing the national office at www.cpaadmin.org. 

Desktop Operating Systems: We feel standardization of your desktop operating system is very important in reducing the total cost of ownership within the CPA practice.  Firms that run too many different operating systems have to learn the “nuances” of each individual product, which can be expensive. Those running 2000 and NT, we thank you for taking the "bleeding edge" amongst CPA firms and clearing the path for the rest of us over the next few years.  Virtually every firm was running Windows 95 or Windows 98.  Overall:

• 19 firms were using Windows 98 exclusively
• Only 4 firms were using NT Workstation and 3 firms using Windows 2000 exclusively
• 35 firms were using a combination of Windows 95 and 98
• 24 firms had at least one copy of NT workstation running, while 12 were experimenting with 2000
• 27 firms (including 6 of those larger than 100 members) were still using Windows 95

Network Operating Systems:  We were surprised by the number of firms still running Novell exclusively for their network operating system.  As firms have expanded their networks to include remote access and database applications, most of this has been done on the NT platform, while still keeping their Novell for print and file services.  The survey found:

• 47 firms exclusively on Novell with more than half on version 4.x
• 39 firms exclusively on NT, the vast majority on version 4.0
• 23 firms ran both with the majority on NT 4.x and Novell 4.x

For Network support, 35 firms totally outsourced their network administration (29 in the small to medium category).  We expect to see a trend towards more network administration being outsourced as the cost increases and it becomes more difficult to keep people in the CPA firm environment. On a positive note 95 of the firms reported making daily full-system backups which were kept offsite-the remaining 19 firms should update their procedures immediately!

Practice Management: Well we have good news; over 97 of the firms surveyed were doing daily timesheet entry with over 30 doing daily billing. The rest of you firms need to get with it!  The survey also found that more than ½ of CCH-CLR/CSI users would recommend their product, while more than ¾ of CPA Software users would recommend their product.  Overall:

• 44 firms on CPA Software Visual Practice Management (including more than half the firms in the 30-99 member firm size)
• 20 firms utilized CCH Practice (formerly PACS)
• 20 firms used CLR/CSI-Creative Solutions Inc
• 7 firms utilized UniLink
• 5 firms used CLI-Commercial Logic

Marketing: Over 50 firms stated they maintained a web site, 25 of which used Microsoft FrontPage.  Additionally, 41 firms stated they had their own intranet. Of the 70 firms that responded to using a marketing database:

• 14 firms used Microsoft Access database
• 14 firms utilized Microsoft Outlook
• 13 firms used ACT!
• 13 firms used Goldmine
• 10 used CPA Software Visual Practice Management

Internal Accounting:  As expected, firms were using all kinds of products for their internal accounting.  Amongst the leaders were:

• 21 firms utilized MAS90
• 19 firms utilized QuickBooks
• 16 firms utilized Creative Solutions
• 13 firms utilized Peachtree
• 6 firms utilized ACCPAC
• 5 firms utilized CPASoftware
• 5 firms utilized Great Plains

For payroll, half the firms surveyed outsourced their payroll to companies (majority of which was ADP/Paychex).  For those doing internal payroll, 11 used MAS90 and 9 used Creative Solutions.

Tax Products: Of the firms that responded to Tax Products, the majority was clearly with CCH ProSystem Fx.  In addition to the form 5500 respondents, 8 firms used HyperPrep and 5 used Datair. An interesting finding was that the firms were split with roughly half printing all thee tax return copies (taxpayer, IRS and preparer), while the other half copyed the IRS and taxpayer submissions.  Below are the general findings. Please note, that 114 firms participated in the survey but not all of them responded to all questions.

In addition, for due date monitoring, firms were using a variety of products.  In general:

• 19 firms utilized PPC Trakker
• 18 firms utilized CPA Software Visual Practice Management
• 9 firms utilized CCH Prosystem
• 9 firms utilized Spreadsheets (Excel or Word)
• 8 firms utilized Custom Database
• 6 firms utilized PACS

Accounting Products: Within all of the accounting products, there was a lot of variety but in general, Creative Solutions was the dominant name amongst respondents:

Write-Products: There were many products represented but the majority were with:

• 34-Creative Solutions
• 15-GoSystem/ACE
• 9-QuickBooks
• 7-MAS90

Depreciation:

• 39-Creative Solutions
• 15-FAS/FAS Encore
• 14-BNA
• 9-Asset Keeper

Payroll:

• 24-Creative Solutions
• 10-Peachtree
• 6-MAS90
• 6-QuickBooks

Outside Accounting Products Supported:

• 52-QuickBooks
• 21-Peachtree
• 15-MAS90
• 7-Creative Solutions Checkbook Solution

Audit Applications: The big three products were used by the majority of firms, with only a small percentage printing financial statements directly from the workpaper program which dramatically increases efficiency.  Many firms (52) still used a word processing program to prepare financials and footnotes and or a spreadsheet (28) to prepare the financial statements.  In 52 of the firms surveyed, the auditors were also responsible from the first draft of the tax return. In addition, 18 firms had been through the AuditWatch efficiency training program.

• 41-CLR (of which 11 print financial statements direct)
• 26-CCH Audit/AuditVision (of which 13 print financial statements direct)
• 20-ATB (of which 5 print financial statements direct)
• 5-Caseware (of which 2 print financial statements direct)

   ©2000 InfoTech Partners North America, Inc.
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