Choosing pre-accounting software: a checklist for firms

Where do you start when choosing pre-accounting software?

You start with an inventory of your own firm: which accounting packages your clients use, how many administrations and users you have and how many documents are processed each month. Without those figures you cannot compare features and prices fairly. Also note where most time goes now: data entry, bank matching, chasing clients or the close.

Then decide what the software needs to solve. A firm with many small clients and loose receipts has different needs from a firm with larger clients who want approval steps and cost centres. Distinguish between requirements that are decisive, such as support for your main package, and wishes that are nice to have. That prevents a long feature list from driving the decision instead of your actual bottlenecks.

• Which accounting packages do your clients use, and how many administrations per package?
• How many purchase invoices, sales invoices and receipts do you process per month?
• How many employees work on processing, and how many clients deliver documents themselves?
• Which step takes the most time or causes the most errors today?

Which features should pre-accounting software have?

Pre-accounting software should at least collect, recognise, code and book documents to your accounting package, with checks and a clear overview of what is outstanding. Look at what works per package: not every feature is available with every integration, especially bank matching and VAT reporting. Ask for an overview per feature and per package, and check it for the packages where most of your administrations run.

For processing, look at how the software arrives at a proposal. Recognition without templates needs less maintenance than a system in which you keep settings per supplier. A confidence score with an explanation per booking shows why a proposal was made, and lets you use a threshold to decide what may be automated. Also assess how the software works with clients and the team. A checklist:

• Support for your accounting packages, with the features available per package.
• Recognition of invoices and receipts without templates, including lines, VAT and cost centres.
• Confidence score and explanation per booking, with an adjustable threshold for automatic booking.
• Bank matching and reconciliation, with flagging of deviating and unmatched transactions.
• Client portal and app for delivering documents and answering questions.
• Client questions linked to the document or transaction, with automatic follow-up.
• Approval steps before or after booking.
• Managing many administrations: roles, permissions, firm-wide rules and team overviews.

How do you assess security, privacy and hosting?

You assess security and privacy on the basis of concrete measures and documents, not general promises. Ask about encryption in transit and at rest, role-based access per administration, audit logs, backups, incident procedures and the list of subprocessors. Also ask which certifications the vendor actually holds and where you can view the documentation, because following principles is not the same as being certified.

Because the vendor processes your clients' personal data, a data processing agreement is mandatory under the GDPR (Article 28); the Dutch Data Protection Authority stresses that both parties are liable if it is missing. Also ask where the data and any AI processing are hosted, whether that happens within the EU and which subprocessors are outside the EU. Finally, ask whether client data is used to train AI models, and what happens to the data when you end the contract. Questions to ask:

• What encryption is used in transit and at rest?
• Can access be set per user and per administration, and is activity logged?
• Is there a data processing agreement and an up-to-date list of subprocessors?
• Where are data and AI processing hosted, and is that within the EU?
• Is client data used to train AI models?
• What happens to the data on termination?

Which pricing models exist and how do costs scale?

Common pricing models charge per administration, per document or booking, per user, or a fixed fee with a bundle, and often a combination of these. Each model scales differently: with a price per administration, firms with many small clients pay relatively a lot; with a price per user, firms with large teams pay more; and with a price per document, costs grow with volume. Also watch for extra costs, such as integration surcharges, a separate client portal or minimum commitments.

A worked example with fictitious rates makes the difference visible. Take a firm with 60 administrations, 8 users and 1,500 documents per month. At €3 per administration that costs €180, at €0.25 per document €375, at €35 per user €280, and with a fixed fee of €300 including 1,000 documents plus €0.20 per extra document €400. If volume doubles to 3,000 documents, the per-document model rises to €750 and the bundle model to €700, while the per-administration and per-user models stay the same. In practice vendors combine these elements, so always work out your own situation.

What should you look for in onboarding and contract terms?

For onboarding and the contract, look mainly at how quickly you can test with real administrations and how locked in you are if it disappoints. An integration that works in minutes and a trial with your own data say more than a demo with sample invoices. Ask whether onboarding and guidance are included, whether training costs extra, and how support can be reached.

In the contract, look at the term, the notice period, price changes and what happens to your data on termination. An annual contract can be fine, but then you want to be sure beforehand that the software works in your practice. Also agree how rules and settings are migrated, so work you built up in a previous system is not lost. A practical approach to the selection:

1. 1Make a shortlist based on package support and your decisive requirements.
2. 2Ask for a demo on your own situation and ask about features per package.
3. 3Test with two or three real administrations, ideally with different packages and client types.
4. 4Assess the proposals, the explanation per booking and the time your team spends on review.
5. 5Check the data processing agreement, subprocessors and security documentation.
6. 6Work out the price at your current volume and with growth, and read the cancellation terms.

How does Autoboeker fit this checklist?

Autoboeker works on top of Exact Online, Twinfield, SnelStart and e-Boekhouden and recognises invoices and receipts without templates, with a confidence score and explanation per booking and a threshold per firm or administration. AI bank matching with automatic reconciliation is available for Exact Online, Twinfield and SnelStart, not for e-Boekhouden; VAT analysis is available for Exact Online. There is also a client portal and app, client questions, approval before or after booking, administration rules and global rules, audit logs and team statistics. Data is encrypted with TLS and AES-256, is not used to train public AI models, and a DPA agreement is available; policies and subprocessors are in the Trust Center.

The pricing model is a fixed fee per firm: €50 per month including 200 bookings, with unlimited administrations, users and client portal with app, and €0.20 per extra booking (excl. VAT). A booking is one processed invoice or receipt posted definitively to the accounting software. At 1,500 bookings per month that is €310, at 3,000 bookings €610. Autoboeker can be cancelled monthly, with free onboarding and check-ins and a 30-day money-back guarantee. For firms with 25+ FTE there is a custom plan including Atlas, an SLA and a dedicated point of contact.