Most accounting-software comparison tables read the same: feature checklists, ecosystem counts, headline pricing. They miss the questions that actually matter when you're running a firm with thirty or three hundred clients on the platform. Here's a checklist we'd use.
1. What does the BAS draft look like before staff log in?
Some platforms will surface a GST report. Others will fully assemble a BAS draft with low-confidence items flagged. The difference is several hours per client per quarter, and it scales with client count.
2. How is the audit trail captured?
If staff override a categorisation, what is recorded: by whom, when, with what reasoning? That's the working-paper file you'll need if a client is reviewed.
3. Where is the data?
Australian residency for primary storage and backups is increasingly the default expectation, particularly for firms whose clients include government, defence-adjacent and not-for-profit entities. Ask explicitly; the answer should be a region, not 'the cloud'.
4. How are TFNs handled?
Tax File Numbers are sensitive personal data under the Privacy Act and the Tax File Number Rule 2015. The platform should encrypt TFNs at rest, gate access behind explicit reveal actions, and log every access attempt.
5. Onboarding economics
Pilot the platform with three clients before you commit to ten. Measure how long each client takes to onboard end-to-end, including consent, chart-of-accounts mapping, and the first reconciliation. That number, multiplied across your book, is the migration cost.
Bottom line
For Australian firms in 2026, the real question is no longer 'what's in the feature matrix'; it's 'how much of each quarter is automated vs. retyped'. The right platform is the one whose answer compresses your team's quarter-end the most.