CASE STUDY
Illinois CPA Enhances Client
Experience and Increases Efficiency
with Mango Practice Management
Mission: Leverage technology to increase operational efficiency and improve the client experience
Challenge: Tech-savvy accounting firm needed a solution to take them from Excel sheets to the cloud.
Roadblocks: Tedious manual processes of managing an accounting practice, difficulty managing deadlines and client deliverables, and slower-than-desirable payment processes.
“When you start out as a two-person firm, you just do what you do, but then all of a sudden, there’s eight of us. We need procedures, we need onboarding, we need a process.”
—Scott Frick, CPA
The Challenge
Increasing efficiency and enhancing client relationships by moving from cumbersome Excel spreadsheets to a cloud-based software
Based in Kendallville, Indiana, Scott Frick, CPA, has been in practice since 1993. His accounting firm offers a range of services, with an emphasis on the local business community and high-income, high-net-worth individuals.
Scott’s team, which includes several accountants and administrative staff, offers holistic services that include tax preparation, accounting, payroll, and consulting. They like to enable the success of their clients, saying: “We do what we do so you can do what you do.”
Running an accounting firm was initially harder than he expected; “What was I thinking?” he joked. “You learn by fire.”
One of the many challenges of running a firm is managing the necessary technology, he said: “I like tech, not afraid of it, but I have other focuses. But as you grow, you have to adapt,” Scott explained. He soon realized that, “To become more efficient, technology’s going to have to be part of that process.”
Since he started out, Scott used traditional solutions like Excel spreadsheets to keep track of client data and deadlines while processing the firm’s time and billing through QuickBooks. These practices seemed to consistently come up short, especially as the company grew from two team members to eight, leaving Scott looking for solutions that could keep his team organized and improve his client relationships and time and billing processes.
The Solution
Time and billing software from Mango Practice Management
Being a tech-savvy firm, Scott’s team began looking for new technologies to make things easier for his practice. After looking into a few options that either didn’t meet their needs or were prohibitively expensive, they discovered Mango Practice Management (formerly ImagineTime).
In Mango, the firm found a solution that worked for their firm and provided valuable tools to improve their internal processes.
“The project management [feature] is one of my favorite things,” Scott said. “And the portal is wonderful. I’ve had outside users say it’s one of the best and friendliest that they’ve used.”
The Mango tools that Scott says benefit his firm the most are:
- The secure client portal for client communication
- Time-tracking tools that keep his team on task and keep hours logged correctly
- Management reports that keep him in the know
- Electronic payment processing that gets him paid faster and makes the payment process easier for clients
- Project management to keep office workflows running smoothly
- Document management that makes sharing files and obtaining signatures easier
Mango has allowed the firm to stay ahead of the curve, Scott said: “We do a lot of things with tech that maybe other firms our size don’t do, [or other] competitors locally.”
The Results
Scott implemented Mango Practice Management at his firm on June 1st, 2021, and says that he’s experienced tremendous improvements in everything from time and billing to accounts receivable and project management.
Mango’s robust accounting tools provided Scott Frick with the ability to stop relying on limited Excel spreadsheets for organization and freed his firm from the cumbersome software tools they used to rely on to process client billing and payments.
Smoother project management
Mango’s project management features is one of the features that Scott has found to offer the most value for his firm. “We would always miss extensions, forget somebody, that was the hole that we just couldn’t plug. QuickBooks doesn’t do it, and I’m not disciplined to keep an Excel worksheet updated.”
With Mango’s project management solution, Scott’s team no longer needs to worry about missing tax filing extensions or letting anything fall through the cracks when managing projects and workflows. Plus, “the whole team can see the status of a file.”
Easy time tracking and reports
Time tracking is among the best parts of Mango software, Scott said. And the time records translate directly into data that he can use to be more efficient and profitable.
“There are a lot of management reports I use for staff review, realization rates… things I have to study to find out what they mean,” Scott said. “I get some interesting numbers. There are a lot more management reports than there used to be.”
Faster billing and payments
Because Scott had quite a few clients that were still paying by check, he was a little apprehensive about switching to an online payment solution through Mango, but he found that most of his clients were not only agreeable to paying online but were excited about it. “Being from a small community, I thought, how are my clients going to respond to this? And I heard, “Well, it’s about time! Where have you been?”
When asked if there was any change in his firm’s accounts receivable, Scott replied, “I can bill, and in an hour, I get payments. It’s amazing.” He explained that he generally allows 14 days for payments, but now most payments come within hours or a day; “the receivable time has really shortened up.”
Security expertise
Scott also highlighted the advantages of benefitting from Mango’s security expertise when it comes to protecting his clients’ personal data and sensitive information. “When you use cloud-based software, you’re leveraging the skills of people who have way more skills than you do in the area of safety and security. It’s available for us regardless of what happens.”
Customer support that’s always available
When asked about the quality of client support he received during his transition to Mango Practice Management, he said, “They did a great job of converting our WIP and our Accounts Receivable from the old system to the new, that came out without a hitch.”
Scott named several Mango customer service representatives by name, noting how helpful they had been. Of one particular agent, he said, “even if it’s not his department, he’ll rattle someone's cage” to make sure you get an answer. When asked about his advice for people considering switching to Mango, Scott responded, “Don’t be afraid to ask questions.”
Integrations and constant updates
Mango software continues to grow and change in response to the demands of the industry, Scott said: “It truly has improved just over the last six months. They’re still doing add-ons behind the scenes, and it’s like, wow, where’d that come from?”
He was also surprised to see how many integrations Mango offers now: “It just grew, the list is bigger, I just know there’s more choices.”
Skyrocket your firm’s productivity and take back control.
About Mango Practice Management
The company known as ImagineTime was founded in 1999 by CPA Fred Lindsley, who needed a software solution to give him better visibility of information and a platform that would allow him to make data-driven decisions.
After developing a solution that gained steam with his employees and partners, he took ImagineTime to market and focused solely on providing accountants with the tools they needed.
In 2018, Carl Coe acquired the company and moved to modernize the platform to allow the platform to provide its services to a more extensive base of accounting professionals, and acquired Mango, which became the flagship product for the company.
Mango Practice Management provides a wealth of robust tools for accounting professionals like:
- File sharing and eSignature
- Time and billing software
- Project management software
- Document management
- Reporting and analytics
- Integrations with tools that accountants use regularly
- Mango websites
Mango strives to provide accounting professionals with the best tools to grow and scale their businesses. Our software is designed by accountants for accountants, so you can rest easy knowing that when you make the switch to Mango, you’ll be getting tools that are created with
your profession in mind.
About Scott Frick, CPA
An accounting practice owner since 1996, Scott Frick, CPA, works out of Kendallville, Indiana, with six staff members and serves businesses and individuals from Noble County to Boyne County, Michigan, and Lincoln, Alabama.
With a wide range of professional experience, Scott Frick and his team are well-equipped to handle the needs of many kinds of businesses, including retail, construction, professional services, manufacturing, distribution, farming, and more.
Scott’s practice provides holistic accounting services that include compilations, reviews, financial statements, tax planning, and connecting bankers with investment advisors. “When our clients succeed, we love that,” Scott says.