Discover What's New

It’s been a busy couple of months at FYI! We’ve been onboarding new practices every day, and our dev team continues to roll out new features and improvements to the platform at a cracking pace.

Read on to learn more about some of our latest time-saving features:

• Automatically record XPM time from the emails, documents and client interactions recorded in FYI
• Use the FYI Drawer from within Excel to cross link supporting source documents
• Powerful full text search on the contents of emails
• Move seamlessly between Groups, Clients and Jobs with the new Group workspace and navigation
• Build smart email signatures that can be leveraged across the practice
• Our exciting beta release, Custom Processes and an update on Tax Assessments!

We also have two live webinars this month – the first in a new masterclass series helping clients get the most from FYI, and a live webinar, co-hosted by Xero and FYI, for practices contemplating moving from a desktop practice suite to the cloud. There’s still time to register at the links above.

Record XPM time without leaving FYI

Our new timesheet feature allows you to automatically record XPM time from within FYI. Timesheets are pre-populated, making it quick and easy to complete all your daily tasks without leaving FYI.

We estimate that this exciting new feature will deliver a time saving of 15 minutes or more per user each day!

• Create timesheets from the FYI Drawer – Select any document in FYI to open the drawer and Create a Time Sheet record. Relevant information will be pre-populated to make the process quick and easy.
• View time from your FYI Dashboard – View a total of hours recorded on any individual day or access more detail as required.
• Take the pain out of time recording – View My Recent documents for a handy record of emails, client interactions and documents you’ve worked on in recent days. Select one and record your time. It’s that easy!

Improved Email Workflow and New Smart Signatures

• Email Workflow – We’ve fixed some issues regarding draft emails to allow teams to collaborate on emails prior to sending. Draft emails created from FYI will now be available for editing and sending from a new, auto-created Outlook folder “FYI – Drafts” for each user. This improvement makes it easy for teams to work together, ensuring only the best quality emails are sent to clients!
• Email Signatures – You can now create a single practice-wide email signature that, through the use of merge fields, can be applied to any users in your team! Learn more about setting up your email stationery in our upcoming Masterclass on Optimising Stationery and Templates.

New features making search and retrieval more powerful

• Full text search on emails – Search the body of emails from any FYI document list. Simply turn on Search Email Contents and now any text you type into the search field will search any word within the emails.
• New document views – To speed up your searching further we’ve released a number of best-practice default views which teams can leverage from anywhere in FYI. Simply click the view drop-down when searching for documents and pick your favourite view. You can, of course, still create your own custom views.
• Doclink from within Excel – Using the FYI drawer from within Excel, you can now utilise FYI’s powerful search and retrieval functionality to locate and link documents. This makes the process of attaching supporting workpapers to a spreadsheet quick and easy.
• New workspace and views for Client Groups – Traverse seamlessly from Group to Client to Job and back again, to assist with the constant switching in context required throughout your day. This ensures the info you need is always easily accessible and provides additional insights across the Client group.

Custom Processes now in beta & Tax Assessments coming soon…

Custom processes will allow you to develop bespoke automated workflows unique to your practice. Some examples, might include:

• Setting-up processes to automatically create emails, documents, or tasks (or a combination of all three) on certain dates or triggers.
• Automate recurring tasks
• Automate bulk email processes

These examples are really just the beginning of what is possible!

• Our friends at Xero Tax have been busy finalising their Tax Assessment service which is a precursor to FYI Tax Assessments.
• This has been released early to FYI clients to lay down the framework and as a bonus for being part of the FYI Community
• We expect to release a beta version of our Tax Assessment Automation within the next 3 weeks

New features and product enhancements have been coming thick and fast over the last couple of months, and we’re not slowing down in the slightest! Upcoming releases include integration with Adobe Sign, Custom Processes and the long-awaited Tax Assessments.

Read on to learn more about:

• exciting new integrations with industry-leading apps, including BGL and NowInfinity
• new merge fields creating even more possibilities to create powerful templates
• new Knowledge cabinets
• new features making team collaboration even easier
• enhancements making task management more intuitive

New Integrations With BGL, NowInfinity And More

• FYI integrates with industry-leading apps across the practice ecosystem to enable an ever-expanding range of powerful process automations. Our new integrations with BGL and NowInfinity facilitate automatic daily import and filing of new documents within your client files in FYI.
• An Administrator can activate your connection to these apps and configure the settings for your practice via the Automation dashboard.
• The Client workspace now features a dedicated tab for Corporate Affairs. This provides a snapshot of the lodgement status of ASIC annual reviews, with single-click access to the specific document within BGL or NowInfinity.

New Merge Fields For Email And Word Templates

Process automation is only possible if the individual steps that make up the process can be completed automatically themselves. For this reason we have extended the range of merge fields that can be used to auto-create documents such as letters and emails. Examples include:

• Author Role – By assigning a role to each User (entered as free text) and adding the merge code “AuthorRole” to your templates, roles such as Director, Partner, Accountent etc can be added to sign-off emails and documents.
• Reference Number – Any inbound or outbound email is allocated a unique reference number for tracking purposes. If a client raises a query on any email, your team will be able to locate it and respond immediately.
• Custom Fields – If you have set up Custom Fields in Xero Practice Manager, these can also be used as Merge fields in your email and document templates in FYI.

New Knowledge Cabinets

Knowledge is an area dedicated to the storage of Practice Templates and non-client documents such as Policies and Procedures to boost productivity and client service.

• Search for Email and Word Templates that have been set up for your practice.
• Create additional Tabs to hold useful resources or reference documents for your team.
• Add and edit templates (this can only be done by an FYI administrator or by Users in a User Group that has been Administer Templates enabled).

Enhancements For Team Collaboration

New features designed to make team collaboration in a thriving accounting practice even easier:

• View Sent Documents – Use the new Sent filter to display the date and time documents were sent to or received from Clients. This acts as a mail register, also recording delivery method such as postal service, courier or email, and important details like reference ID.
• Share Your In Tray – Delegate un-filed documents in your In Tray to another user using the Share tab in My Settings. This may be useful, for example, if you wish to nominate someone else to check, file and/or delete documents in your In Tray on your behalf.
• View Documents as Read Only – Open one or more documents in FYI as read only without locking them from edit access by other users. Simply select a document and click the Read button in the tool bar, or use the Preview tab in the Drawer.
• Staple Documents – Staple documents together, for example, to create a record of them being sent together, or to collate a group of documents for internal review. The “Stapled” link in the FYI Drawer opens a dynamic filter of the documents that have been stapled together.

More Powerful Task Management

We’ve recently added some new enhancements making managing Tasks in FYI more intuitive

• Use Bulk Update to change the Due Date and/or Status of multiple tasks in a list
• For those practices wanting to be job-centric, tasks can now be categorised to the job they relate to.
• Customise your task lists by adding or removing columns to change which details display and saving as a Custom View.

We’re excited to be a key app partner at Xerocon in Brisbane next week. If you’re attending, come and say hi! You’ll find us at stand 48 right outside the Main Stage in Great Hall. We are running live demos of the FYI platform on the hour.

Some great new features this month including improvements that make finding information in FYI even easier, automatic user alerts within automations and two new integrations in beta – digital signatures using DocuSign and Zapier.

Enhanced Integration With XPM Jobs

Jobs displays a list of all jobs synched with Xero Practice Manager, allowing teams to track progress at a group, client and job level. View the state of a Job (as recorded in XPM), as well as estimated, actual and variance time allocations. You can even maintain the XPM job status from within FYI and add commentary as required.

Use Custom Views To Save Any Search Criteria

Views are used in FYI to manipulate lists of documents, tasks and jobs. Custom views allow administrators to save any preferred layout for a list and make it available for all users across the practice. This can be used to save any search criteria as well as column order and filters.

Enable Sticky Views To Find Information Even Faster

Activating Sticky Views in FYI will ensure that list views selected by users are applied by default across all lists for the remainder of the session. This makes accessing information even faster.

Automatic Notification Of FYI’s Process Automations

FYI Automations work silently in the background, saving you time on repetitive tasks every day by importing, filing and changing documents on your behalf. Get alerted when process automations have occurred by creating Comments that can be defined and triggered as part of the automated process.

DocuSign Integration – IN BETA

FYI’s direct integration with DocuSign allows you to send documents directly to your clients for electronic signature. Create signature requests for single or multiple documents. Requests are automatically addressed, and when signed, documents are automatically imported and the workflow status is updated.

Zapier Integration – IN BETA

Zapier moves information between the world’s leading web apps with automated workflows called Zaps, helping to build processes faster. FYI’s integration with Zapier enables an endless variety of automations, beginning with automatic importing and filing of documents from apps such as OneDrive, Dropbox and Practice Ignition into FYI.

Once an FYI Administrator has connected FYI to your Zapier account, you can set up Zaps for the apps you want to connect with FYI. Simply get your FYI access keys for Zapier, connect to Zapier using this beta link, login to your Zapier account to accept the invitation from FYI, and you will be able to start building your Zaps.

These last two features are still in beta. Please send a request to support@fyidocs.com if you would like to start using them.

What’s Next?

Looking forward, our development team is focused on the upcoming release of assessment automation in June and the launch of NowInfinity integration. Stay tuned……

We are delighted to announce another significant set of features have been added FYI over the last fortnight. Highlights include FYI’s version of a client portal (including e-signatures), XPM jobs embedded within FYI and the automatic filing of email attachments!

Introducing FYI’s New Job Workspace

We’ve made navigating FYI even more intuitive with the addition of a new dedicated workspace for Jobs. File your documents to an XPM job, making search and retrieval of relevant information even faster. Each job includes a summary of key data from XPM and a list of relevant documents and tasks. Read More…

A Powerful Way To Collaborate With Your Clients On Sensitive Documents

Rather than attaching sensitive documents to emails, you can now share information securely via OneDrive (which is available with every Office 365 subscription). Future development will deliver similar integration with other client friendly platforms such as DropBox. Read More…

Seamless Integration With DocuSign

FYI now integrates seamlessly with the market-leading app, DocuSign. Documents signed by clients are automatically imported into FYI, updating the original with the signed copy and updating the workflow status. Our degree of integration with DocuSign and other apps such as Adobe Sign will increase in the future.

Saving Office Documents Into FYI Is Now Even Easier

We’ve made it easy to file any document originally created in Word, Excel or Powerpoint into FYI. Read More…

Now FYI Can Auto-File Your Email Attachments Too!

Email attachments can now be automatically filed as separate documents within FYI based on the filing rules of the underlying email. This option can be enabled across your practice via the Email AutoFile process on FYI’s automation dashboard. Read More…

Join Our FYI Masterclass On Thursday, 18th April

Due to the significance of the features recently released, we are hosting an online webinar to help ensure all our users are getting the most out of FYI. This presentation will be done as a MasterClass introducing each new feature and demonstrating how to implement it effectively within your practice.

What’s Next?

Looking forward, our development team is focused on further integration with XPM jobs, integrating with industry leading app partners and, as always, increasing the number of automations available to our users. We’re particularly excited about the upcoming release of assessment automation in May. Stay tuned…….

What makes FYI truly unique is its ability to perform repetitive processes across your compliance jobs on your behalf through automation. Today we are pleased to release another significant set of new features that automate the gathering of data across the Xero suite, together with significant enhancements to improve team and client collaboration.

Automatic Import Of Tax Returns

The FYI document store has been designed to provide a ‘complete picture’ of a client in a single, searchable view. Via automation, FYI can automatically create and maintain weblinks in the document store to every client’s Xero Tax returns. This delivers time savings by giving direct access from the client’s file in FYI to their tax return and avoids team members having to manually open and locate returns within Xero Tax.

Automatic Import Of Client Ledger Reports

While the cloud can mean instant access to a client’s ledger, many practices still prefer to retain a set of substantiating reports when completing client accounts. To sat, filed and named correctly, you can now link each client in FYI to their Xero Ledger. Via process automation, you can run a batch of reports with a single click (e.g. Trial Balance, Profit & Loss, Bank Summary, Balance Sheet), with all the reports instantly named and filed, without ever having to leave FYI.

Jobs And Tax Tabs For Every Client

FYI is fast becoming a lens used to view the entire client. This latest update delivers two new tabs for each client:

• The Jobs Tab lists each of the jobs created in Xero Practice Manager for the client, including information such job status and current WIP balance.
• The Tax Tab lists each of the tax returns created for the client in Xero Tax. Like the Jobs Tab, the Tax Tab is dynamically populated, avoiding the need to open multiple systems to understand the current client position.

Document And Task Comments

When working on a complicated document or challenging task, there are times that team members within your practice need to collaborate – asking each other questions or giving updates to the team on individual progress. With the latest FYI update, each user can add comments on the back of any document or task, tracking the conversation and automatically recording it on the client file. To view comments in FYI, simply highlight the document or task and click ‘Comments’ on the side of the FYI Drawer.

OneDrive Watch Folders

Via our integration with Office 365, FYI has created watch folders for every user. Simply drag and drop documents into the folder and have them appear directly in your FYI In tray, ready for filing. The OneDrive watch folders can also be used when printing to PDF from any application or in conjunction with your network scanner, seamlessly adding batches of documents straight into FYI.

Primary Client

A common insight from our clients is that there are often times where a single email address is used across multiple clients in Xero Practice Manager. To ensure that the FYI email-filing always saves email to the appropriate contact, you can now denote a ‘Primary Contact’ in FYI.

Notifications On Completed Task

To ensure you are always in the loop, FYI now sends the delegator of a task an email notification as soon as an assignee completes a task. This instant notification will improve communication and reduce follow up in your firm.

The latest release of FYI delivers a series of powerful processes to increase automation across your practice. We’ve also included new features that provide instant time-saving benefits for first-time users, so you will see improvements in productivity as soon as you start using FYI.

Introducing FYI’s New Automation Dashboard

This universal dashboard provides administrators with one central location for the automations that will transform your practice. This is where you can configure and activate your automated processes in FYI and monitor activity logs for issues.

File Documents By Xero Practice Manager Job Name

Documents can now be filed using their Xero Practice Manager (XPM) job name (typically replacing Year). By deepening our existing XPM integration, you are no longer restricted to a static list of years for compliance jobs. Your files can now be filed dynamically depending on the sophistication of your client and range of jobs.

New ‘Filed In FYI’ Label For Your Inbox

At a glance, you can now see exactly what filing work FYI is doing on your behalf. Every email that FYI automatically files within Outlook will now include the label ‘Filed in FYI’.

Negative Email Alert

FYI can now scan all inbound client emails for negative sentiment and automatically alert the relevant partner or manager. This means senior members of your team can step in at critical points in a client relationship when a positive experience could be the difference between keeping a client or losing one.

AutoFile Outlook Calendar Entries

Along with email, all client related Outlook calendar entries can now be automatically imported and filed in FYI. This ensures that the client file includes all critical meetings and keeps the whole team aware without any manual effort.

Bulk Export Of The FYI Document Store

Just because you have moved systems to the cloud, it doesn’t mean you’re your data should be held hostage. FYI Administrators now have the ability to bulk export the entire FYI document store including key meta-data to a designated OneDrive directory.

You also can expect another significant set of product improvements over the next few weeks including:

• Improved integration with DocuSign
• Automatic import of tax returns from Xero Tax
• OneDrive watch folder for each user to batch import documents
• Auto filing attachments from emails