Case study client and engagement acceptance for accountants

Grant Thornton

We ensured new Grant Thornton clients get accepted much faster

3x
faster client acceptance
4 months
from design sprint to live app
Control
Up to date insight in onboarding status

Services

UX/UI design, Product Development

Screening new clients is an important process for Grant Thornton. There was an opportunity to make this process more efficient since the process is labour and time intense. Lead time is high as well as high costs and additionally to guarantee a first time right process towards clients. With one clear app, the whole process has become structured and way more clear for all involved parties. Instead of weeks, it now takes days for a new client to be onboarded, improving efficiency.

Challenge

Grant Thornton is an international accountancy, tax and advisory company. To ensure their clients get the best help possible, they combine the power of a wide international network with the personal approach of local branches.

Extensively screening new clients is very important for Grant Thornton, but this process had become inefficient and there was enough potential for improvements with more clear responsibilities, better requirements and standardized documents: this process needed more structure.

Solution

We kicked off with a design sprint to answer our million dollar question: ‘Why does it take so long to accept or decline a customer?’ The results were loud and clear. With those in our pocket we got to building a new application. With one sleek app we provided clarity and structure to all involved parties.

Now customers know within one week if they are accepted or not.

Keeping the users involved

Kicking off with a design sprint was one of our best decisions, as it ensured that we truly got the users involved. But we didn’t just stop there, we contintued talking with them every step of the way. Because of that we were able to create designs that are intuitive, easy to use and ensure the user won’t require any manual anymore.

Want to see how the design sprint went?

Responsibilities are clearly divided and displayed

Having to constantly check-in with colleagues to get status updates is time consuming. On top of that, doing this via e-mail caused information to be missed or even lost. We created a dashboard that leaves no doubt about the status of your prospective client, what needs to happen next and by whom.

Necessary documents and actions get pre-defined

Continuously asking the client for extra documents gives an unorganised impression. Grant Thornton has a lot of unique clients and therefore lots of different requirements. It is hard to remember all the exceptions that are at play. By starting with a simple questionnaire our tool will tell the user exactly what information they need from their client.

Dealing with external sources

One key element of KYC customer acceptance applications is the ability to gather data from external sources (e.g. company details, ultimate beneficial owners (UBOs), sanction lists). Therefore, we’ve implemented a flexible module that can connect to all kinds of external sources (e.g. chamber of commerce and company data) and eliminates manual data entry.

I expect frustrations concerning the client acceptance process to dissapear. In any way, it won’t be caused by this tool.

One of the first users

Results

We have created an application in OutSystems that standardized the client onboarding process and brought down the duration to days instead of weeks, improving effiency, increase process control and improved the process quality in order to ensure first time right towards clients.