How FreeAgent is giving practices more control

We’re constantly seeking ways to enhance our Practice Partners’ experience in FreeAgent. How do we achieve this? By listening to feedback and requests from our Partners. Here, we take a closer look at some of our most recent updates designed to give practices more control over the way they work with clients and manage their accounts. 

Update clients' bank feeds in bulk

Currently, you can update your clients' bank feeds on their behalf (if they have a compatible bank feed) at just a click of a button in FreeAgent, saving you valuable time chasing clients on this essential part of your banking admin.   

We’re now taking this great feature a step further. In just a few weeks, you’ll also be able to perform this task in bulk. A new ‘Bank Connections’ page will allow you to view the bank feed status for all clients in one centralised location, making it easy to see the feeds that need to be updated. 

From here, you can also update the connections for all your clients in one go rather than navigating to each individual client’s account. This will not only save you valuable time but also align all bank feed expiry dates, so reconsent can be performed less frequently. 

Even if a client’s bank feed does expire, you can reconnect their bank feed, and FreeAgent will automatically import data from their last transaction date, so no data will be missing. 

Greater flexibility in the Tax Timeline

Our Tax Timeline feature has always provided Partners and their clients with a handy list of deadlines for tax returns and payments. It’s an invaluable tool, helping users schedule their payments and set aside cash for upcoming deadlines. 

Last year, we made significant updates to the Tax Timeline functionality. We added filtering options, the ability to file tax returns and mark liabilities as paid from the Timeline, and even established integrations with Mettle and NatWest.

Now we want to give Partners even more control and flexibility. We listened to your feedback and discovered that some of the information displayed wasn’t always relevant to every client. Now, you can set Tax Timeline preferences to hide items or liabilities that you’d prefer your clients not to see. For instance, if a client doesn’t need to file a Self Assessment return or file Corporation Tax through FreeAgent, or the amount that the client needs to pay doesn’t match the liability showing in FreeAgent, you can simply hide those items from their view.

This new level of customisation gives you full control over what your clients can and can’t see, ensuring that only the most relevant and useful information is displayed.

More control over who pays for add-ons

We’ve been working hard to enhance our add-on offering this year, introducing functionality that makes managing client data more efficient than ever. Recently, we rolled out Smart Capture Unlimited, which automatically extracts dates and amounts from receipts, and an Amazon integration, that allows clients with an Amazon UK Marketplace account to connect directly to FreeAgent. 

Practices now have full control over their clients’ access, billing, and usage of Smart Capture Unlimited, and when the free period ends in September 2024, the same flexibility will be available for Partners with clients who use the Amazon add-on. These updates ensure that you have the tools and control needed to optimise your practice and better serve your clients.

And finally…

It doesn’t stop there. We’ve been busy rolling out a number of control-boosting improvements, such as giving you more flexibility over your clients' accounting dates and extending our capital asset and depreciation functionality.

Don’t forget about our longstanding features that help you work effectively with your clients as well. Client access levels allow you to control the data and actions your clients can access, and alerts notify you of important events and client activities.  

To make the most of these features, get in touch with your Account Manager or for a full list of our most recent updates, you can visit our blog.