Opportunity
Sasserath & Co., a 25-person boutique CPA firm on Long Island, was facing the same challenge plaguing accounting firms nationwide. With complex client needs spanning closely-held businesses, international tax (20-25% of their work), and M&A of up to $2.4 billion in transaction value, the firm needed sophisticated research capabilities to carry out accurate, compliant work in a highly competitive landscape.
This barrier was particularly challenging for younger staff members who lacked the deep tax background to effectively navigate legacy research tools. The firm needed a solution that could democratize access to sophisticated tax research across their entire team.
“With legacy tax research software, you need an idea of the issues before you can even start researching—but getting to that point was the problem.”
Alan Sasserath, Managing Partner
Solution
In early 2024, Sasserath & Co. began to use Accordance. The decision proved transformative, fundamentally changing how the firm approaches tax research and client service.
Enhanced Research Quality & Scope
For a complex multi-state sales tax case, Accordance enabled Sasserath to:
Provide quantified exposure numbers for immediate client consultation
Analyze sales tax exposure across 5-10 states in just a few hours
Identify voluntary disclosure opportunities
Set realistic expectations for comprehensive compliance work
Simple research on consulting expenses was reduced from 1 hour to 10 minutes — an 80% time savings, while complex analysis on multistate sales tax exposure went from 1.5 days to 3 hours — 75% time savings.
Democratizing Expertise Across the Team
The AI-powered platform proved especially valuable for staff development:
Younger staff adaptation: ”Our younger staff didn't have to unlearn legacy methods, making it easier for them to engage with complex tax technical areas."
Language support: One of the firm's top Accordance users, whose first language isn't English, uses the platform to "put the technical tax talk into words and phrases that people can understand" for better client and internal communication.
Research confidence: "I have experienced people that just hated doing tax research now feel much more comfortable going in and doing it."
Moving to Value-Based Pricing
Perhaps the most significant impact has been enabling Sasserath & Co.'s transition from traditional hourly billing to value-based pricing models. The efficiency gains from Accordance have been instrumental in the firm's strategic shift:
New client onboarding: Now structured around fixed monthly fees where appropriate
Project-based pricing: The risk of accepting fixed fee engagements lessens with tools that help to manage unexpected complexity
Enhanced profitability: ”Now we can manage client engagements based on the value that we're ultimately bringing."
Impact
“Accordance has been a tremendous benefit. It simplifies our work and enhances collaboration, significantly improving how the firm operates.”
Sasserath & Co has realized up to an 80% reduction in research time on complex scenarios. |
Managed a successful transition to value-based billing models. |
While providing enhanced team capabilities across all experience levels. |
Their clients enjoy improved client service with faster, more confident responses, |
Resulting in competitive differentiation in sophisticated tax and M&A work. |
