Tips and Tricks: Organize With ProSeries

During those late nights of transmitting, do you find yourself promising to get better organized next year? ProSeries® Professional provides features that will help you get through the busiest time of the year. Below are just some examples of ProSeries features that make tracking and organizing your clients a whole lot easier. So, if you are stressing and worried that one of your tax clients will fall through the cracks, don’t stress. Get organized!

Tax Analyzer in ProSeries

The built-in Tax Analyzer allows you to identify customers that meet a certain criteria, or have returns affected by tax law or ProSeries software changes. Queries can be performed on the organizer, 1040 Individuals and the selected individual state products. Simply change the HomeBase View to Client Analyzer Queries, Select Return Type, Select a Query and click on “Go.”

The Client Status Worksheet: Tracking Client Status

The Client Status Worksheet helps you keep track of the status of each of your clients. Based on the boxes you check, the program completes the client status and status date at the top of the form. Besides the normal client status, such as data input completed, extension filed or ready to efile, there are fields to track prior and current year billing amounts. The last box is for Other Status. If you check this box, enter the status in the text field, such as bank product, to the right of the box. The status you enter here will then appear in the status field at the top of the form.

You can then create a customized HomeBase view based on the Client Status. Go to the HomeBase menu and select Column Headings. From there, you can add, delete or move the columns in the current view. You can click and drag column headings in HomeBase to resize or rearrange columns. Lastly, you can sort a column in HomeBase by clicking on the column heading. To sort it in the opposite order, click the heading again.

Final Review: The Missing Client Information

While preparing to e-file a tax return from the e-file Center in ProSeries, you can use the Missing Client Information column feature to prevent from e-filing returns with missing information in your office. The exclamation point indicates that someone is missing from the return and should be cleared before e-filing. To use the missing client information feature, open a return that has missing information. Click on Tools at the top of the program. Click on Add/Edit Missing Client Info and enter a summary of the missing item in the Missing Information section. Lastly, click OK and save the return. You can also use the Missing Client Information feature to print lists of missing information and email lists of missing information to clients from the ProSeries program.

Please note that ProSeries Basic Edition does not support Client Analyzer Queries, Client Status, customizing HomeBase view and Missing Client Information.

Want more?

Whether you’re new to ProSeries or a seasoned user, check out our self-paced online Training Center for more resources.