Bookkeeping workflow software
Recurring work, run on rails
Your ledger stays exactly where it is. FigsFlow runs the close around it — recurring jobs that create themselves, client requests that chase on their own, and fixed-fee margin you can read before the month ends.
What is bookkeeping workflow software?
Bookkeeping workflow software schedules and tracks recurring client work — monthly closes, reconciliations, document requests — so each job is created, assigned and dated without anyone starting it. It sits on top of your ledger rather than replacing it, and records the time each close actually takes against the fee.
See a month's close, end to end.
| Close step | Closes here |
|---|---|
| Bank rec | 4 |
| Credit cards | 7 |
| Payroll journal | 6 |
| Sales tax | 3 |
| A/R and A/P | 5 |
| Review | 12 |
| Sign-off | 1 |
Close board — August. Forty closes, seven steps, one screen. Illustrative, not customer data.
One month, start to close
What does a month-end close look like in FigsFlow?
No slides and no narrator telling you what you're about to see. One client, one month: the job appears on the 1st, the request goes out, the documents land in the folder they belong in, the reconciliation gets reviewed, the hours land against the fee, the close is signed off on the 10th. Watch the parts you don't believe.
Poster frame, 3:2, click to play. No autoplay, no auto-sound. Chapter markers so a reader can skip to the step they care about.
Two ways firms get here
What's the difference between bookkeeping software and bookkeeping practice management software?
Bookkeeping software records the transactions — QuickBooks Online, Xero, a ledger. Bookkeeping practice management software runs the firm doing the recording: which closes are due, who owns them, what the client still owes you, how long each one took and whether the fixed fee covered it.
What does client accounting services software need that bookkeeping software doesn't?
Client accounting services software has to hold a cadence, not a filing deadline. The same close, every month, for every client, with the fee fixed in advance. So it needs recurring jobs, request chasing and margin per close — none of which a ledger or a tax calendar provides.
It's the 12th. Where is everything?
Why does month-end close slip when nothing actually went wrong?
Nothing went wrong. Every client's close is somewhere. The problem is that “somewhere” is a tracker, and a tracker is a record of what somebody last typed — not of what is true right now.
So on the 12th you are reading last Thursday's answer to this morning's question. Twelve closes say In review, and the most recently updated of those twelve was touched four days ago. Two have no status at all, which means either nothing has started or nobody has updated them, and the only way to tell is to ask.
The cost isn't the closes that are late. It's the hour a day spent establishing where things are before any work happens, every day, all month, forever.
| Close step | Closes here | Oldest status | Newest status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bank rec | 4 | 6 days | 2 days |
| Credit cards | 7 | 5 days | 3 days |
| Payroll journal | 6 | 5 days | 4 days |
| Sales tax | 3 | 4 days | 4 days |
| A/R and A/P | 5 | 6 days | 3 days |
| Review | 12 | 5 days | 4 days |
| Sign-off | 1 | 1 day | 1 day |
| No status set | 2 | — | — |
Status age — 1–2 days · 3–4 days · 5+ days
Swipe the table to see every column.
Forty closes. The two right-hand columns are the whole fold — every number in them is older than the question being asked. Illustrative, not customer data.
A well-kept tracker. Last edited Aug 07, read on Aug 12.
How the schedule starts it instead →Nobody starts the close. The schedule does.
How do bookkeeping firms manage monthly close across multiple clients?
Each close is defined once as a recurring job — steps, owner, due date, the client requests it depends on. The schedule creates every month's instance in advance, assigns it by rule, and dates it from the client's own close deadline rather than from when someone remembered to start.
You build the close once. Monthly close — standard. Seven steps, each with an owner rule rather than a name, each with a due offset rather than a date. Then you attach it to a client and set the cadence: generates on the 1st, due on the 10th.
From that point the firm stops deciding. On the 1st of every month, forty instances exist. Each one is dated from its own client's deadline, assigned by the rule, and already holds the document requests it depends on — which have already gone out.
Forty closes, three definitions. Change a template and every future instance under it changes. Change one client's due date and only that client moves. Neither requires touching forty rows. Illustrative, not customer data.
Aug 01, 9:04am — nobody has opened FigsFlow yet
Recurring jobs and close steps →The five parts that do the work
Can practice management software for bookkeepers create recurring monthly jobs automatically?
Yes. Recurring jobs generate on a cadence you set, workflow templates decide the steps and owners, forms and requests chase the client without anyone sending an email, the portal is where documents land, and time and billing records what the close cost against the fee.
The close has states, not a status column
What happens to a monthly close between the 1st and sign-off?
It moves through named states rather than sitting in a cell someone edits. The date is agreed by two people, the client pause is a state of its own, review errors are classified and sent back, and the close cannot be signed off while any task under it is still open.
| # | State | What moves it |
|---|---|---|
| 01 | Created | Generated from the close definition on the 1st |
| 02 | Timeline agreed | Engagement manager proposes the date, the preparer agrees or asks to change it |
| 03 | In progress | Hours log against the close as it runs |
| 04 | Checklist complete | Preparer ticks, reviewer signs off — two people, not one |
| 05 | In review | Manager review. Errors are classified, not just corrected |
| 06 | Client approval | Draft goes to the portal for the client to approve |
| 07 | Signed off | Close closed. Hours roll into billing |
Swipe the table to see every column.
A close cannot reach signed off while any task or checklist item under it is open, and there is no override.
So what do you open on the 12th?
| Row | Value |
|---|---|
| Ranking | Overdue first, then due today, weighted by client |
| Scope | Yours only — managers also see the team |
| Snooze | Three times on one item and your manager is told |
| Dismiss | Needs a reason, and the reason is logged |
| Untouched two business days | Escalates without anyone reporting it |
The hour a day goes away here.
What the 12th looks like instead →Done is not the same as profitable
How do you track profitability on fixed-fee bookkeeping clients?
Every hour logged on a close lands against that client's fixed fee, so realization is a number you read per close rather than reconstruct at year end. Group the month's closes into bands and the ones where actual hours have outgrown the fee are visible in the month it happens, not after the renewal.
A task manager answers one question well: is it done? For recurring work at a fixed fee, that is the less useful half of the answer.
Forty closes finished on time is a good month or a bad month depending on something a task list cannot tell you. The close that took nine hours against a $450 fee finished on time. So did the one that took two. On a task board they are the same green tick.
The difference between a workflow tool and a practice management platform is not how many steps it tracks. It is whether the step knows what it cost.
Bar width is share of the forty closes.
Nine closes below 70%. Every one of them finished on schedule. The nine in the top band pay for the nine in the bottom. Illustrative figures, not customer data and not a benchmark.
Hours against the fixed fee →The first close, and the second one
What happens in the first month?
The first close is the one you do the old way and the new way at once, and we would rather say that than pretend otherwise.
Built once. Applied to eleven clients on the same close type.
One close, forty clients →The ledger stays. Everything around it moves.
Does it work with QuickBooks Online and Xero?
Yes. QuickBooks Online and Xero stay as your ledger and FigsFlow runs the work around them — the close job, the client requests, the documents, the time. Microsoft 365 carries sign-in, mail, calendar and document storage in your own tenant. Gmail is supported for mail only.
A CAS firm's stack is a ledger, a mail client, a place documents live and a way to get paid. All four exist today. Nothing on this list is on a roadmap.
There are no US tax software integrations. Not Drake, not Lacerte, not ProSeries, not CCH Axcess. If your close hands off to a return, that hand-off is a person today. For a firm whose work is the monthly close this is usually a footnote, and we would rather you read it here than find it in month two.
Watch it happen before you believe it
Who is already running this?
So the proof on offer here is the product, in this order.
FigsFlow has around 150 subscribers, and they are in the UK and Ireland. We are not going to put their logos on a US page and let you assume they are firms in Ohio.
FigsFlow is built inside two working firms, which is why the close board looks like a close board and not like a project management tool that has heard of accounting.
Per user, per month. In dollars.
What does it cost, and what's included?
Per user, per month, in USD, with everything on this page included at every tier. Seat count is the only variable. There is no implementation fee and no minimum term to quote here, and if that changes the pricing page changes with it.
Not in the US version yet — as at 08/18/2026. Dated because it will change.
- UK onlyAML and client due diligence — not planned for the US.
- None todayUS tax software integrations — Drake, Lacerte, ProSeries, CCH Axcess and others are not connected.
- Partly coveredE-signature for Forms 8879 and 8878 — not available. IRS Publication 1345 requires knowledge-based authentication we do not provide. E-signature covers engagement letters, proposals, consents and firm documents.
- Q4 2026Native invoicing — today, Xero or QuickBooks Online raises the invoice.
- Tracked onlySales tax — trackable as a close step and a deadline. No calculation, no nexus logic, no filing.
- Status openPre-built US workflow template set — confirm before launch.
Before you book anything
Where can I read more first?
Your next close is already on the calendar
Bring the client whose close always overruns. We'll build that close definition in the call, generate twelve months of it, and you can decide from a screen rather than from a brochure.
Thirty minutes, your worst client, one close definition.
Start Smarter. Grow Faster.
From proposals to pricing, streamline every step with automation designed particularly for accountants, bookkeepers and tax advisers.
