TPS Software brings eSignature and KBA directly into the accounting workflow.
By embedding Verdocs into TPS Cloud Axis, TPS gives accounting firms a self-service way to handle engagement letters, tax-related forms, and identity verification directly within the platform they already use to manage their practices.
One connected system for accounting practices
For more than 25 years, TPS Software has helped small and midsized accounting firms manage their practices with greater clarity, structure, and control. The company began with time and billing, expanded into workflow and due-date management, and later rebuilt its platform for the cloud. Today, TPS Cloud Axis brings client onboarding, time entry, billing, workflow, staff management, payments, eSignature, KBA, and third-party integrations into one purpose-built environment. The product philosophy is straightforward: accounting professionals should complete as much of their work as possible without leaving TPS.
"We want customers to be able to stay in TPS and finish the work rather than jump to 12 different places or leave the program to get something done."
The challenge: eSignature worked, but the customer experience was disconnected
Before TPS offered an integrated eSignature capability, firms handled signatures outside the TPS environment: retrieving documents, sending them through a separate system, and bringing the completed files back. Integrations with traditional providers still required each firm to evaluate, purchase, activate, and maintain its own account with an outside vendor, which created particular friction for smaller firms and lower-volume users who might not find a separate API-enabled account worthwhile for a limited number of transactions. TPS also had limited control over the provider's pricing, onboarding, support, and roadmap.
"What piqued my interest was that it was going to be built in. If we wanted everything to work seamlessly, we needed somebody we could actually talk with."
TPS eSign, embedded and self-service
TPS selected Verdocs to power TPS eSign, an embedded and branded eSignature experience offered through TPS Cloud Axis. Instead of sending customers to another provider, TPS makes eSignature and KBA available inside the system firms already use. Customers activate and purchase usage through the TPS administration center, a self-service experience that needs no separate third-party API account, and KBA transactions are added the same way.
- Engagement letters
- Tax-related documents and electronic filing authorization forms
- Signer identity verification through KBA
- Other client documents requiring signatures
Engagement letters were the early use case, but TPS saw noticeably greater usage through the most recent tax season as firms folded eSignature and KBA into tax-related workflows.
A partnership designed around TPS customers
Large providers offered mature products, but TPS generally interacted with their technical-support organizations, and it was difficult to reach people who could adapt the product around TPS-specific workflows. TPS wanted the customer-facing interface to look and feel like part of TPS Cloud Axis rather than a third-party application inserted into it, so the two teams held collaborative working sessions to refine the experience. The relationship also lets TPS bring customer suggestions back directly, instead of filing them into an anonymous support queue.
"A couple of times, we jumped on the phone and it was all hands on deck to get it done. That impressed our technical team. You are not going to get that with a provider where the people who can make decisions are 12 levels removed."
What customers actually value
The value is not simply the ability to sign a document electronically. It is the ability to make signing part of the broader client process that accounting firms already manage inside TPS.
"The clients who are actively using eSign are thrilled that it is embedded and that TPS can now offer it as part of the client portal and their workflow."
From customer convenience to a business opportunity
TPS did not originally view eSignature as part of its revenue model. The integrated model changed that by giving TPS control of the commercial experience. Rather than directing customers to an outside provider, TPS can now:
- Include an introductory envelope allocation within its own plan
- Establish its own pricing and packaging
- Sell additional usage through a self-service experience
- Offer volume pricing to larger firms
- Maintain the direct customer relationship
- Participate in the economics of the service
"We are coming around to the idea that it can be a revenue source. Is it significant yet? No. That will be a few years down the road, but we can see the opportunity."
Toward more connected accounting workflows
TPS intends to connect eSignature more deeply with its client portal, client onboarding, and recurring accounting workflows. A workflow may involve several steps completed by different people, and TPS wants a document that needs signing to go out automatically at the right stage and advance the task when it returns.
"If something has to be signed, we want that built into the task. The task sends it, and when it comes back, it moves to the next step. Customers enjoy not having to go somewhere else, do the work and then come back."
For other vertical software companies weighing the same decision, Dawson's advice is to look past the feature checklist.
"The first time you call and ask whether something can be done, pay attention to the response. That is the test of where the relationship is going to go."
One integration. Every firm in their own brand.
The multi-tenant model in this story is the product: every firm gets its own branded experience, and TPS owns the SKU.