Every practice has them. The client who emails their records on January 30th, every single year, no matter how many reminders you send. The one who drops off a carrier bag of receipts and a USB stick with "everything on it" (it's never everything). The one who replies to your carefully structured document request with a blurry photo of a bank statement taken at arm's length.
We build practice management software. And we're here to tell you: no amount of software will fix these people.
"They provide it when they provide it"
There's a line from an AccountingWEB discussion that's stuck with me. Someone — in a thread about client portals and automated reminders — cut through the noise with five words: "They provide it when they provide it."
That's it. That's the whole problem with the bottom 20% of your client list. You can send automated reminders. You can set up a portal with a big green "Upload" button. You can build a workflow with escalating chasers at 7 days, 14 days, 21 days. You can send a text, an email, and a letter. Mrs. Henderson will still bring her records in on January 30th because that's when Mrs. Henderson brings her records in. She's been doing it since 2014. She'll be doing it in 2034.
This isn't a technology problem. It's a human one. And pretending otherwise — pretending that the right software or the right automation sequence will change deeply ingrained client behaviour — is dishonest. We'd rather be straight about it.
Where technology actually helps
Here's the thing, though. Mrs. Henderson isn't most of your clients. She's the one you remember because she causes you stress. But the other 80% of your client base? They're not difficult. They're just busy.
They don't send documents late because they're disorganised. They send them late because you asked via email, and emails get buried. Or because they weren't sure what format you needed. Or because they had to dig out a password for their bank's download page and kept putting it off.
For these clients — the majority — small improvements compound. A client portal that lets them upload a photo from their phone at 9pm on a Tuesday, when they finally get around to it, removes a real barrier. A document request checklist that shows them exactly what's outstanding (with green ticks for what they've already sent) turns a vague "we need your documents" into a specific, completable task.
None of this is revolutionary. It's just removing friction. And friction is the real enemy for most of your clients — not laziness, not incompetence, just friction.
The automation trap
Where firms go wrong is assuming that what works for the 80% will also work for the 20%. It won't. And trying to force it creates its own problems.
Automated reminder number seven to a client who's ignored the first six doesn't motivate them. It annoys them. Or worse, it makes them feel like they're dealing with a machine, not a person. The whole reason they hired an accountant — a human being — was because they wanted someone to talk to. Sending them an auto-generated email with "URGENT: Documents outstanding" in the subject line is the opposite of that.
For your most difficult clients, the fix is almost always a phone call. Five minutes, human to human. "Hi Janet, I know it's a busy time — what's actually holding you up? Let's figure out the easiest way to get this done." That call does more than any workflow automation ever will.
The uncomfortable reality is that some client relationships can't be systematised. They require judgment, patience, and the kind of soft-skill work that doesn't scale. That's fine. Not everything needs to scale.
The real question
The useful question isn't "how do I fix my worst clients?" It's "how much time am I spending on the 80% that could be streamlined, so I have more time for the 20% that actually need me?"
That's where practice management software earns its keep. Not by fixing the unfixable, but by making the routine stuff fast enough that you have breathing room for the human stuff.
If your team spends 30 minutes per client per week on admin — chasing documents, filing emails, searching shared drives for last year's accounts — and you can cut that to 10 minutes, you've freed up significant hours across 200 clients. Hours you can spend on the phone with Mrs. Henderson, or on advisory work, or (radical thought) finishing on time on a Friday.
Know when it's not worth it
There's a conversation most firms avoid for too long. Some clients aren't worth the cost of serving them.
Not in a mercenary sense — in a practical one. If a client consistently provides late, argues about fees, ignores requests, and generates three times the admin of an average client, the maths doesn't work. You're subsidising them with time that could go to clients who actually engage with your process.
The ICAEW's guidance on client engagement is clear that you have both the right and the professional obligation to assess whether a client relationship is viable. Sometimes the best thing software can do is give you the data to have that conversation honestly — here's how many chasers we sent, here's how late they were, here's the effective hourly rate once you factor in the admin overhead.
That's not a technology fix. It's a business decision supported by data.
The honest pitch
We're a software company telling you that software has limits. That probably seems like a strange marketing strategy.
But we'd rather you bought Fortium knowing exactly what it will and won't do than bought it expecting miracles and cancelled six months later. Technology makes good processes faster. It makes information findable. It gives your team visibility and your clients a simpler way to interact with you. It won't change human nature. The clients who send their records on January 30th will always send their records on January 30th. But for everyone else, it can make the whole thing a lot less painful.