Verity for CA firms
A CA firm’s exposure is not one calendar but one per registration per client. Verity tracks obligations at that level, alongside the audits and the notices that arrive without warning.
Verity runs the practice. Filing and audit software stays where it is.
Verity / Compliance
LiveObligations due
212
Not started
38
Open notices
14
Audits in fieldwork
9
Needs attention
Illustrative figures. Verity shows your own practice in this shape.
How the business runs
A CA firm does not have ninety compliance calendars for ninety clients. It has one per registration per client — and a single client group can carry several entities, each with several registrations, each generating its own periodic obligations with its own dates and its own penalties for missing them. The firm’s real exposure is the total of those, and most practices track it in a spreadsheet that one person maintains.
That structure creates a specific and dangerous failure. A client adds a registration, or an entity, or crosses a threshold that creates a new obligation, and it never enters the calendar. Nothing is late until suddenly something is, and the firm carries the consequence alongside the client.
The second distinctive pressure is that not all work is scheduled. Notices, queries and assessments arrive without warning, carry their own hard dates, and demand senior attention immediately — pulling exactly the people the scheduled work depends on. A firm planning only its known calendar is planning about seventy percent of its year.
The third is audit. An audit engagement is fieldwork with a team, a location, a timetable and a completion date, and it competes for the same articles and managers as the compliance work. Allocation decisions made for one silently damage the other.
Verity tracks obligations at registration level, treats notices as work with their own dates, and holds audit allocation against the same people, so the whole exposure is in one place.
What Verity calls these things
What gets in the way
A CA firm’s difficulties come from tracking obligations at the wrong level and from work that arrives unscheduled.
Obligations are tracked per client, not per registration
A client with three entities and eleven registrations appears as one row, so an obligation belonging to one registration can be missed entirely.
In Verity Obligations are generated per registration, so the firm’s exposure is counted at the level the penalty applies.
New registrations never enter the calendar
A client registers for something new or crosses a threshold, and the resulting obligation exists in law before it exists in the firm’s spreadsheet.
In Verity Registrations are records on the entity, and adding one generates its obligations into the calendar automatically.
Notices consume the people the calendar depends on
An assessment notice arrives with a hard date and pulls a partner and a manager off scheduled work for a fortnight, which nobody planned for.
In Verity Notices are work with dates and owners, visible in the same capacity view as the scheduled calendar.
Audit allocation collides with compliance peaks
Articles are allocated to fieldwork during a period when filing obligations peak, and both slip.
In Verity Audit fieldwork and compliance obligations draw on one modelled capacity, so the conflict is visible before it is made.
Client records arrive too late to work with
The work cannot start until the client provides records, and the request is chased personally with no visibility of how long it has been outstanding.
In Verity Outstanding records are items on the obligation with an age, escalating against the start-by date rather than the due date.
Sign-off and review are the hidden bottleneck
Completed work waits on partner review during exactly the period the partner is handling notices.
In Verity Review and sign-off are workflow steps with owners and ageing, so the constraint is measurable.
The complete system
One system across registrations, obligations, audits, notices and the people who deliver them.
Records
Each client carries its entities, and each entity its registrations, with the obligations that follow from them.
Why it matters here This hierarchy is the firm’s actual risk model, and it is usually collapsed into a single client row.
In practice Ninety-six clients producing four hundred registrations, each generating obligations on its own cycle.
Work
Every obligation and engagement is work with a deadline, a start-by date, an owner, a state and recorded effort.
Why it matters here Scheduled and unscheduled work compete for the same people, and only one of them is usually in a system.
In practice Two hundred and twelve obligations due in thirty days alongside nine audits in fieldwork.
Workflows
Unscheduled matters are workflow with their own dates, owners, escalation and document trail.
Why it matters here Notices carry hard dates and senior time, and a firm that does not plan them is planning most of its year.
In practice Three notices with hearing dates and no owner, surfaced nine days ahead rather than the week before.
People
The team is modelled once with availability, and every obligation, audit and notice shows who owns it.
Why it matters here Articles are a constrained, rotating resource and their allocation determines whether both audit and compliance land.
In practice Article allocation across fieldwork and compliance, so a conflict is visible before it is committed.
Relationships
Clients are records with their entities, obligations, responsiveness, fee basis, notices and balances.
Why it matters here A group is one commercial relationship and many compliance exposures, and both views are needed.
In practice A group whose entities collectively generate forty obligations a year, with recovery measured across them.
Control
One permission model and one audit trail, with review and sign-off as recorded steps.
Why it matters here Professional sign-off carries personal liability, and it should be a record rather than a signature at the end of a rush.
In practice Every sign-off carries the reviewer, the working papers referenced and the time.
Reports and analytics
Obligation coverage, deadline compliance, notice load, audit progress, capacity against calendar and recovery come from the operational records.
Why it matters here The number a CA firm most needs — total obligations against capacity in the coming quarter — cannot be produced from a client list.
In practice Committed obligation hours against team availability, including expected notice load.
Verity AI
Verity AI answers from your own registration, obligation, audit and notice records, respects permissions, and can create assigned follow-ups.
Why it matters here The questions worth asking cross registration, date and person at once, which no spreadsheet answers quickly.
In practice "Which obligations due inside fifteen days have not started?" returns thirty-eight, with records chases raised.
Communication
Requests, reminders, responses and notice correspondence attach to the obligation or matter they concern.
Why it matters here Correspondence with a client about a specific registration is evidence, and it should not live in one person’s inbox.
In practice The client’s response about a registration change, on the obligation it affects.
Locations
Offices and client premises are locations, with work, allocation and reporting following the same structure.
Why it matters here Audit fieldwork happens away from the office and consumes the same people the office needs.
In practice Articles allocated to fieldwork sites, visible against the office’s compliance load.
Work in motion
These already run. As records at registration level, the firm’s real exposure becomes visible.
This closes the most dangerous gap in a CA practice: an obligation that exists in law and not in the calendar.
Escalating against the start-by date rather than the due date is what prevents the last-week rush.
Notices are the unscheduled load that breaks the schedule, and treating them as work is what makes them plannable.
Audit and compliance draw on the same people, which is why they belong in one capacity model.
A firm planning only its known calendar is planning about seventy percent of its year.
Groups with many registrations and one negotiated fee are where recovery quietly fails.
Verity AI
Verity AI reads the same registration, obligation, audit and notice records the practice runs on. It answers from your own firm, respects permissions, and can turn an answer into chases and assignments.
Verity / Ask
Verity AI only returns what the person asking has permission to see.
Without chasing
Each runs from the registration and obligation records at the point the condition is met.
When
A registration is added to an entity
When
An obligation reaches its start-by date
When
A notice is recorded
When
Records remain outstanding past the start-by date
When
Audit fieldwork falls behind schedule
When
Work waits on review or sign-off past threshold
What you can understand
Exposure, capacity and recovery at registration level.
Verity holds the practice records. Filing portals, audit tools and accounting software continue to hold the technical work.
One system, different ways of seeing it
Everyone works from the same records, and each role opens on what they need.
Partner
What is our exposure and can we cover it?
Obligations by period against capacity, notices with hard dates, audit progress, recovery by group.
Manager
What is not started and what is blocked?
Obligations past start-by dates, records outstanding, review queue, fieldwork progress.
Article
What am I on this week?
Assigned obligations and fieldwork, records received, review points to clear, effort to record.
Administrator
Is every registration in the calendar?
Registrations against generated obligations, owners assigned, chases outstanding, filing confirmations.
Where it is used
Obligations generated per registration rather than per client, so exposure is counted at the level the penalty applies.
Adding a registration generates its obligations into the calendar, closing the gap between a legal obligation and a tracked one.
Unscheduled matters as work with response and hearing dates, visible in the same capacity view as the scheduled calendar.
Fieldwork and compliance drawing on one modelled capacity, so an allocation conflict is visible before it is committed.
Escalation against the date work should have begun rather than the date it is due, which is what prevents the last-week rush.
Scope, timetable, team, working papers, review points and sign-off on one engagement record.
Effort against fee measured across all registrations in a group, where a single negotiated fee usually hides poor recovery.
Plain-language questions across registrations, deadlines, notices and capacity, with chases assigned in the same step.
Getting there
Filing portals, audit tools and accounting software continue to run and are mapped during implementation. Clients, entities, registrations, recurring obligations and open matters are brought across, and Verity is introduced as the practice layer over them.
Implementation runs about four weeks: discovery and mapping, configuration, migration, then an ongoing operations partnership.
Questions
No. Filing portals, audit tools and accounting software continue to do that and are mapped during implementation. Verity runs the practice around them — obligation tracking at registration level, record chasing, notice management, article allocation, review, capacity and recovery.
Because that is where the exposure sits. A client group with several entities and many registrations appears as one row on a client list, and an obligation belonging to a single registration can be missed entirely. Verity generates obligations at registration level so the firm’s real exposure is counted.
Registrations are records on the entity, and adding one generates its applicable obligations into the calendar with an owner. That closes the most dangerous gap in a CA practice — an obligation that exists in law before it exists in the firm’s spreadsheet.
Notices are work with response deadlines, hearing dates, owners, documents and escalation, and they appear in the same capacity view as scheduled work — which matters because they consume exactly the senior time the calendar depends on.
Audit fieldwork and compliance obligations draw on one modelled capacity, so allocating articles to fieldwork during a filing peak surfaces as a conflict before it is committed rather than as two things slipping.
Verity AI answers questions from your own registration, obligation, audit and notice records: which obligations due inside fifteen days have not started, which registrations have no owner, which notices have hearing dates next month, what committed workload looks like against capacity. Each answer can become a chase or an assignment.
Effort is recorded against every obligation and engagement, so recovery can be measured across all registrations in a group — which is where a single negotiated fee usually hides poor recovery.
A two-partner firm with ninety clients still carries several hundred registration-level obligations plus unscheduled notices, and has less capacity to absorb a miss.
About four weeks: discovery and mapping of the firm’s obligation structure, configuration of the registration-level calendar, migration of clients, entities and open matters, then an ongoing operations partnership.
Most firms have some, and they are found the way nobody wants to find them. Tell us how obligations are tracked today.