How Intuit's Agentic AI is Changing Business Automation

Automation is advancing rapidly, and Intuit is leading the way with its innovative Agentic AI. This new technology aims to automate complex tasks, offering significant financial management benefits for businesses of all sizes.

Top benefits for businesses

1. Streamlined Processes: Agentic AI automates repetitive tasks like cash flow management, accounts payable, and receivables, freeing up time for more strategic work.

2. Fewer Errors: Reducing manual data entry lowers the risk of mistakes and improves overall efficiency.

3. More Time for Growth: Business owners and teams can dedicate more time to higher-value activities when routine tasks are automated.

4. Improved Financial Insight: AI delivers real-time insights into your business's financial health, helping with smarter decision-making.

What is Agentic AI?

Agentic AI refers to AI-powered agents that autonomously complete tasks on behalf of businesses, using data to learn and improve efficiency over time. It’s not just a tool that follows instructions—it understands and processes complex workflows without requiring constant human intervention. Think of it as having a team of AI-driven assistants handling key operations.

Who does Agentic AI help the most?

While small and medium-sized businesses are expected to be the biggest beneficiaries, larger companies with complex workflows will also find value in Agentic AI. From automating invoicing to onboarding, it minimizes repetitive admin tasks so businesses can focus on what truly matters—growth.

Problems solved by Agentic AI

• Time-Consuming Tasks: With AI handling routine work, businesses can save hours in data entry, invoicing, and financial record-keeping.

• Reduced Human Error: By automating these tasks, the chance of costly mistakes is significantly reduced.

• Resource Optimization: With AI covering administrative duties, businesses can allocate their human resources to more strategic tasks.

Will it be a separate product?

No, Intuit’s Agentic AI will be integrated into its existing products, such as QuickBooks, TurboTax, and Mailchimp. Business users won’t need to buy a separate product; instead, they’ll see new features and functionalities within the tools they already use. Some of these capabilities, like automated accounts receivable and payable, are expected to be available in late 2024 with additional features rolling out in 2025.

How long has Intuit been working on this?

Intuit has been investing in AI for over a decade, with Agentic AI being the latest evolution. This builds upon its Generative AI Operating System (GenOS), which powers personalized AI-driven insights and automates complex workflows.

The bottom line: Why businesses need Agentic AI

Businesses will want products that include Agentic AI because it saves time, reduces errors, and delivers actionable insights—allowing you to focus on growing your business. With this technology integrated into QuickBooks, TurboTax, and Mailchimp, businesses of all sizes will benefit from automation that handles routine tasks, simplifies financial management, and enhances customer engagement.

Investing in AI-powered products from Intuit means embracing efficiency and staying competitive in an increasingly automated world.

Preventing accounts payable fraud: A guide for business owners & accounting managers

Accounts payable (AP) fraud is a significant risk that can harm your company's finances and reputation. This article will cover the essentials of detecting and preventing AP fraud.

Understanding AP Fraud Vulnerabilities

AP fraud can manifest in various forms, including billing schemes, check tampering, and expense reimbursement fraud. Traditional manual processes often leave room for these frauds due to issues like:

• Lack of segregation of duties

• Inadequate controls over vendor master files

These vulnerabilities can allow fraud to go undetected, impacting financial stability and stakeholder trust.

The Role of AP Automation in Fraud Prevention

AP automation is becoming a crucial tool in fraud prevention by:

• Enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of the AP process.

• Reducing errors that could lead to fraud.

• Providing secure and auditable trails.

• Enforcing controls and segregating duties to prevent fraud.

Additionally, Peak Advisers can assist small businesses in implementing an Automation plan tailored to prevent AP fraud and save significant time. By automating tedious data entry tasks for QuickBooks accounting software, employees can redirect their energies towards more critical business functions, enhancing productivity and reducing the risk of manual errors.

Common Examples of AP Fraud

Understanding how fraud occurs can help in prevention:

1. Billing Schemes: Employees might create false invoices through a shell company, especially for non-physical goods like consulting services.

2. Check Tampering: Employees could steal checks, forge them, and divert funds.

3. Expense Reimbursement Schemes: Employees might falsify receipts or claim expenses not incurred.

4. Vendor Fraud: Vendors might overbill or double bill for services.

5. Phishing and Email Scams: External actors might attempt to access company systems or misdirect company funds through fraudulent emails.

Recognizing Red Flags

Stay alert for these indicators of potential fraud:

• Unexplained increases in vendor payments.

• Large, unauthorized purchases on company credit cards.

• Duplicate payments to the same vendor.

• Complaints from suppliers about late payments.

• Unusual employee behavior that could indicate internal fraud.

Ways to Prevent AP Fraud

Implementing strong internal controls is key:

• AP automation tools: Use technology to improve accuracy and flag suspicious activities.

• Segregation of duties: Ensure no single employee controls all aspects of the AP process.

• Strong signature controls: Require multiple approvals for transactions.

• Regular training: Educate your staff about fraud detection and prevention.

• Vendor verification: Always check and confirm vendor details before processing payments.

Best Practices for Reducing Accounting Risk

To safeguard your business, consider these key strategies:

• Conduct regular risk assessments to identify potential vulnerabilities.

• Develop and implement clear procedures and policies.

• Train your staff to recognize and respond to signs of fraud.

• Engage in continuous communication with stakeholders and regularly review and improve your strategies.

Prevention is always better than cure. By understanding vulnerabilities, implementing best practices, and leveraging technology like AP automation, you can significantly mitigate the risk of AP fraud. Vigilance and proactive management are crucial for maintaining your business's financial health and reputation.

10 things QuickBooks Online does to help run your business better

QuickBooks Online has become an incredibly powerful tool that business owners can rely on to be the hub of the financial side of their operations. Its capabilities help automate so many tasks that can be labor-intensive when it comes to accounting and data entry. It saves valuable time and provides insights that help you make your business grow.

Check out these 10 features that show why it’s time for any business not using QuickBooks Online, to make the switch.

1. Easy Accessibility: QuickBooks Online is cloud-based, allowing small business owners to access their financial data from any device with an internet connection. You can manage your finances on the go, providing convenience and flexibility in today's fast-paced business environment.

2. Real-time Collaboration: Multiple users can access QuickBooks Online simultaneously, enabling real-time collaboration between business owners, accountants, and bookkeepers. This feature streamlines communication reduces the risk of errors, and ensures everyone is working with the most up-to-date information.

3. Automatic Data Sync: QuickBooks Online connects with your bank accounts and credit cards to automatically import and categorize transactions. This eliminates manual data entry, saving time and reducing the risk of human errors.

4. Invoicing and Payment Solutions: The platform offers customizable, professional-looking invoice templates and supports multiple payment options, such as credit cards and bank transfers. This makes it easier to manage accounts receivable and improve cash flow.

5. Payroll Integration: QuickBooks Online integrates seamlessly with popular payroll solutions, simplifying the process of managing employee salaries, taxes, and benefits. This integration ensures payroll accuracy, compliance with tax laws, and saves time on manual calculations.

6. Tax Preparation and Compliance: QuickBooks Online simplifies tax preparation by automatically tracking and categorizing income, expenses, and sales taxes. The software also provides tax liability reports, making it easier to file taxes accurately and on time.

7. Advanced Reporting Tools: The software offers powerful reporting and analytics features, including customizable financial reports, such as profit and loss statements, balance sheets, and cash flow statements. These tools provide valuable insights into your business's financial health and help you make data-driven decisions.

8. Scalability: QuickBooks Online offers different subscription levels to accommodate the needs of small businesses as they grow. This ensures you only pay for the features you need, and you can easily upgrade to a higher plan as your business expands.

9. Third-party App Integrations: QuickBooks Online supports over 650 third-party app integrations, enabling you to streamline your business processes by connecting with other tools you already use, such as inventory management, time tracking, and CRM software.

10. Robust Security: QuickBooks Online employs advanced security measures, including encryption, multi-factor authentication, and regular data backups. This ensures your sensitive financial information is protected, and you can have peace of mind knowing your data is secure.

QuickBooks Online offers an array of benefits that can help any small to midsize business efficiently manage its finances, stay compliant with tax regulations, and make informed decisions for growth and success.

Remember, whether you’re using QuickBooks Desktop or another accounting software platform altogther, Peak Advisers can make the migration to QBO painless for you.

Use QuickBooks to automate time-consuming tasks

Peak Advisers frequently addresses automation and how QuickBooks Desktop and QuickBooks Online can help you reduce manual labor inputs in our blogs and newsletters. Sometimes it takes short-term pain to enjoy the long-term gain.

A point that is sometimes overlooked is that it is possible that implementing automation may, in the short term, increase labor inputs. Why? Because variables affecting automation rules are not always understood at the beginning.

Here is an example that I am currently dealing with…

Email account hacked!

When my business email was hacked recently, the cleanup process included deleting all Outlook rules. Unfortunately, many of these rules automatically deleted spam and unwanted emails that I would never read and did not know of their authenticity. 

Those email rules must be recreated; currently, my inbox is overflowing with unwanted emails. As I receive them, I recreate the automation rule for them; not all are deleted. Some are rerouted to other inboxes or people. 

The point is my manual input in managing email has dramatically increased in the past few weeks, but in another week or two, my automation will take full effect, and the labor input will plummet.

Two key takeaways

1. This is how you must think of automation in your business. Start small, realize the labor savings, and move on to another automation. This is the snowball effect, where something small in the beginning has hugely positive impacts. We help business operators implement the snowball effect all the time at Peak Advisers.

2. If you haven’t set up rules in your email system to automatically delete the junk you receive, maybe you should.

See how automation and QuickBooks make your business run better

Peak Advisers is honored to work with great companies like Webster Associates of Denver, Colorado on projects related to automating financial management systems and improving workflow and growth with applications that make sense.

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Linsey Ashby oversees order and payments processing as well as customer service at Webster Associates, an industrial distributor of filtration products and filters. Their main customers are big industrial operations like power plants, pharmaceutical companies, manufacturing plants, and food and beverage companies.

Linsey spent some time talking with Peak Advisers about her company and how we have been able to help improve Webster’s financial management and operations with automation and QuickBooks products.

Peak Advisers: “What makes your business operation unique?”

Linsey Ashby: “Most people don’t understand what we do. We get into very specific, technical filter applications, and it’s pretty cool.”

Automation and QuickBooks make running your business easier

Peak Advisers: “How is automation helping you regarding the overall accounting and financial management activities for your company?”

Linsey Ashby: “We’re now able to download our banking activity directly into QuickBooks and see real time transactions, which we’ve never had before. So, we really enjoy that feature. It keeps us in tune with our expenses and deposits. We also like that we're able to email invoices directly to customers with a payment link that is in line with a secure portal with credit card or ACH.”

Peak Advisers: “We’re talking about the addition of Intuit Merchant Services. What were the goals of this project?”

Linsey Ashby: “We were looking for an easier way to process payments — credit card and ACH — and offer our clients a more secure way to pay and allow Webster more ease of accountability. This new process has really made it easier for us to track all of these things as well.”

Major time and money savings from automation and QuickBooks

Peak Advisers: “What are the benefits for you of the change to Intuit Merchant Services?”

Linsey Ashby: “It has saved us a lot of time processing credit cards and ACH payments. Our previous accounting software wouldn't allow us to process any payments so we would have to use a different program and enter everything manually into our accounting software. So instead of minutes per transaction, it's seconds. Which is a huge time savings.”

Peak Advisers: “This has had a big impact on your company.”

Linsey Ashby: “It was a full-time employee’s job. Now the accounting team has time for more tasks, which saves me time.”

Peak Advisers: “What do you want to accomplish next?”

Linsey Ashby: “Actually, there was a recent update which auto-matched our payments into our deposits. I hope there are more updates like that coming in the future just to make everything easier and automatic.”

Peak Advisers QuickBooks knowledge and automation services make it happen

Peak Advisers: “Would you recommend working with Peak Advisers?”

Linsey Ashby: “I found Peak Advisers in December 2018 before we got QuickBooks into place and I worked directly with Michael Wallace and he transferred over all of our data. We went live within a few weeks and it was very fast and easy. It’s always easy to get a hold of Peak Advisers and we always get great service and all of our needs have been met.”

“Anytime I need something with QuickBooks I just call Mike on his phone. He always answers and has an answer for me. So, it’s made my life a lot easier. QuickBooks has been easy to learn, it’s very user friendly and we enjoy that. The program is outstanding,” Linsey concluded.

Peak Advisers deep experience with QuickBooks and automation services will keep your business moving and growing as innovation in accounting and financial management takes place. Automation is critical to the success of any business these days and we can make it happen for you.

Peak Advisers automation service saves global company 5,700 hours

Peak Advisers is proud to work with Eteam, a multi-national company with multiple entities dedicated to “connect world-class talent with marquee global companies in ways that make work incredibly meaningful, valuable and beneficial for everyone.”

Jagadesan Balakrishnan - Eteam Global CFO

Eteam’s global CFO, Jagadesan Balakrishnan conducted a Q&A with Peak Advisers about his business, the time consuming data entry issues they faced and how Peak Advisers created and implemented an automated solution that saves the worldwide company impressive time and money.

Peak Advisers: Tell us about your business and what you do.
Jagadesan: Eteam Group is in the business of providing IT and non-IT consulting, staffing and recruitment services in 15 countries across the globe. We have our headquarters in the US and we’re present across North America, Europe, Middle East, Africa and the Asia Pacific region.

Peak Advisers: What is the project you worked on with Peak Advisers? It had to do with improving invoice creation.
Jagadesan: Peak Advisers helped in automation of our invoices whereby invoices get created in QuickBooks directly from our time and attendance system Job Diva. Previously, all invoices were manually created in QB by our finance team and there were at least four to five resources creating the invoices in QB throughout the month for us. The process was to first enter the hours in QB from our time and attendance system and then create the invoices manually in QB. The project goal was to eliminate manual invoice creation process and automate the same.

Peak Advisers: How are invoices created now?
Jagadesan: After the invoice automation, we now export the “hours worked” report from Job Diva on .csv and import the same into QB. We use an intermediate software which is known as TransactionPro.

Peak Advisers: What are the benefits of this new automation?
Jagadesan: Elimination of manual punching errors, reduced time spent on reconciliation, more reliability on data in QB. Reconciliation has become much easier, quicker and invoicing is more timely.

Peak Advisers: How much time are you saving?
Jagadesan: At least two resources are eliminated now and we expect another resource to be eliminated as we only need one resource now for creating invoices automatically in QB and doing the reconciliation. So we have saved at least 480 employee hours in a month, which will be 5,760 employee hours during a 12-month period which were spent by the three resources on invoice creation.

Peak Advisers: What do you want to do next?
Jagadesan: We would like to automate our Account payable and bill creation process as well as for automating the inward payment application.

Peak Advisers: Would you recommend working with Peak Advisers?
Jagadesan: Absolutely without any doubt! They are very capable.

Peak Advisers: Tell us about your experience working with Michael Wallace of Peak Advisers.
Jagadesan: Michael is a knowledgeable and qualified accountant and very reliable. We had a very good experience working with him and his team. His responses are timely and he always has solutions for our problems.

A story about my blindness to automation

We all know QuickBooks Online is feature-rich and that Intuit is constantly improving it, or in some instances, just making changes!

Even though we have QuickBooks Online Advanced Certifications at Peak Advisers, we, like most other users, miss some of the changes.

Or just as importantly we miss the implication or complete meaning of these changes.

However, I am going to open this series on automation with a story not necessarily about automation, but about being blinkered … about not stopping to ask, “Now what does that mean and how could I use it better?”

Background

In my prior life as CFO I was responsible for credit decisions by my staff and by me personally that resulted in granting around $2.1 billion in trade credit to customers. 

This was mostly unsecured credit.

Because of this I developed a habit of viewing customers from an “accounts receivable” perspective in these four classifications:

1. Good payers
2. Slow payers
3. Always have to follow up payers
4. Risky payers

Seriously, I could meet a customer at a trade show and one of the first things that would pop into my mind was what kind of payer the customer was. I learned over the years to constantly check AR and collections. Just as every other small business operator does.

What happened

Fortunately, Peak Advisers doesn’t have anything but good payers so recently looking at our AR aging I was surprised to see a number of customers had skipped invoices and not paid invoices from 45-60 days ago.

Just like I had done for years, I ran a current detailed aging and started clicking past due and reviewing. 

Was something off?  Had payments been misapplied? Had a credit card not processed? Had they viewed the invoice?

(You email all your invoices, right? And you know how to monitor if the client received and viewed it right?) 

Invoice status

While checking I noticed one had not been sent … then another. I thought, "THEY HAVEN'T PAID BECAUSE I DIDN’T SEND THE INVOICE!"

So, I started checking invoices. (Now those of you that know where I am going feel free to giggle.)

The light bulb turns on

Fortunately, after a couple of minutes I stopped and thought, “There has to be a better way.” Here I am in 2018 continuing a behavior that I have had for more than two decades … a behavior that had been very successful for me … a behavior that is in 2018 completely outdated. “How should I be doing this?” I asked.

Then it hit me. I should go to the dashboard, click through the “invoice panel” and then sort the list by “status.” Doing so would enable me to quickly identify any invoices that had not been sent.

Invoice status

I found them all in 15 seconds, selected them and sent them off to customers with a note of apology for being late. 

Is this automation? Yes, it is. QuickBooks Online contained a process that facilitated breaking a habit of 20+ years and greatly reduced the human input (my time) required to find and fix a problem. This page is now my go to for collections. Sure I will look at an aging, but no longer will that be my first step and I will be more effective for it. 

4 benefits of automating with QuickBooks

Technology development, and before that, industrial development, strives to drive down the utilization of the costliest production inputs. Frequently the costliest input is human input. What reduces the need for human input?

Automation.

Here's how it is defined by Dictionary.com:

noun
1. the technique, method, or system of operating or controlling a process by highly automatic means, as by electronic devices, reducing human intervention to a minimum.
2. mechanical device, operated electronically, that functions automatically, without continuous input from an operator.
3. act or process of automating.
4. the state of being automated.

Automation: Save time, increase profitability

Automate with QuickBooks

Today QuickBooks, and apps in the QuickBooks ecosystem, have many features that allow the user to automate tasks. Tasks that in other software and in prior versions of QuickBooks require or required more human input than is needed today. 

To be clear we are not saying that QuickBooks automates all processes or fully automates any specific process, but significant steps are being made to automate the bookkeeping process.

4 benefits of automation

1. Gives you more time to focus on growing your business
2. Increase speed
3. Increase accuracy
4. Increase profitability

Now refer to the definition of automation and notice that automation results from “reducing,” not eliminating, human intervention.

QuickBooks does that today and will do even more of that in the coming years. Achieving automation is a process not an event.

In fact, it is not going too far to say that QuickBooks and especially QuickBooks Online are designed to automate many of the tasks that bookkeepers performed in years past and even still perform today.

As a result of Peak Advisers working with hundreds of QuickBooks users, we know most are not taking advantage of the opportunities to reduce human intervention.

Reduce costs, increase profitability with automation

Or to say it another way, many QuickBooks users are not taking advantage of the opportunities to increase accuracy, increase speed and increase profitability.

Peak Advisers has created a series of blog posts and related videos to address automation opportunities in QuickBooks. Some will be significant and some not.

Hopefully we all can learn from this series.

The first example is something that we completely missed until recently. See "A story about my blindness to automation" here.

Guess what? The future looks automated. Is your business benefitting now?

As one of my favorite sayings—an old Danish proverb goes—“Prediction is difficult, especially when dealing with the future.”

The automation of bookkeeping & accounting

Here is one prediction, which I am certain is accurate and is easy to make: More and more transactional bookkeeping and accounting tasks are going to be automated. At Peak Advisers, we are certain that is 100 percent true.

Why?

Because we are doing it today.

Receipt Bank automates data

All the products we recommend from the Intuit Ecosystem, in some manner, automate processes that until recently were always manual.

Take for an example, Receipt Bank, which syncs data from your receipts and bills with QuickBooks. Receipt Bank reads images, photos, PDF’s, emails etc., and converts images to a QuickBooks transaction.

Now, the first time you use Receipt Bank it won’t know what to do with a credit card receipt from your favorite restaurant, but if you take a couple of minutes and teach the application it will know what to do with the next receipt from that restaurant, and the next one, and the next one, and so on. It also files the receipt for you.

That, my friends, is automation.

Transaction Pro Importer automates data entry

Or, consider Transaction Pro Importer, which easily imports data and transactions from Excel into QuickBooks.

Recently, I spoke with a new client and asked about the data their bookkeeper enters. She described a twice-monthly journal entry that takes about 25 minutes to data-enter. I also asked several questions and learned:

The amounts and accounts affected by the journal entry change significantly from entry to entry. 

They receive the entry in an Excel spreadsheet from a third party.

The entry took 25 minutes to enter.

I said, "How about we automate that process with Transaction Pro Importer and complete posting the journal entry in, oh, a couple of minutes?" She liked that I idea. So, we did it.

That is automation.

We can help automate your accounting and bookkeeping today

How many hours do you and your staff spend completing tasks that could be automated? Not automated in the future, but right now, today. Call Peak Advisers. We can help.

Call Peak Advisers today and we’ll help you join the 1.2 million small businesses who rely on QuickBooks and we’ll help you choose the right payroll service and stop on top of new laws.

End the nightmare

If you feel like your business is managing you—instead of the other way around—and your books are a nightmare, call Peak Advisers today for a free consultation. We can help you with a full-range of value-added business and financial solutions.

Peak Advisers is Denver’s leading advanced certified QuickBooks re-sellers and consultants. We make QuickBooks work for you and your small business. All purchases include free training. Call us today at: 303-801-4772; or email: info@peakadvisers.com