Practical Insights (and Use Cases) on Emerging Tax Technologies

Emerging technology is reshaping how tax departments handle compliance. But with so many new tools competing for attention, knowing where to invest (and where to hold back) is just as important as adopting the technology itself.

Automation is no longer optional

Process automation has become a baseline expectation for competitive tax departments. APIs now connect tax engines with finance and accounting systems, making sales and use tax compliance faster and more accurate. Optical character recognition (OCR), robotic process automation (RPA), and machine learning are reducing manual work. Tasks like invoice review for refund studies once took hours. As CPA.com's Jeremiah LaRue puts it, automation now qualifies as table stakes.

What's driving adoption

Four pressures are pushing firms and tax departments toward new technology. A declining pipeline of accounting graduates is making talent harder to find and keep. Indirect tax complexity keeps rising: the U.S. sees more than 300 combined state and local tax rate and rule changes annually, and district-level changes nearly doubled in early 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. E-invoicing requirements are expanding globally and may reach the U.S. within the next decade. And cost-reduction mandates are forcing organizations to do more with the teams they already have.

Real results from a real use case

When Moss Adams evaluated its on-premise sales and use tax compliance solution, the firm asked a direct question: could it scale from 5,000 returns per year to 20,000 or 40,000 without hiring 30 more people? The answer led them to Vertex. By partnering with Vertex, Moss Adams built a scalable, cloud-based compliance operation with the security certifications and dashboard visibility their team needed to manage growing client workloads.

Business intelligence builds a smarter foundation

Many organizations start with spreadsheets (pivot tables, variance charts, purchase analysis). But as transaction volumes grow, spreadsheet-based approaches hit their limits. Moving to a dedicated business intelligence platform enables real-time economic nexus monitoring, customized reporting, refund review studies, and omni-channel general ledger reconciliations. A cloud-based data intelligence tool can help tax teams save time while improving audit performance and reducing compliance risk.

How to invest wisely

Shiny new tools will keep coming. The firms that benefit most are those with a disciplined, repeatable process for evaluating technology, one that starts with understanding current needs rather than chasing the latest solution. Partnering with trusted vendors, including CPA firms experienced in tax technology, helps you cut through the hype and find the right fit for your organization.