Overall Satisfaction with Avalara
Currently, I am the primary user, with my manager as back-up. I do have plans to roll out the application to billing personnel in my company and to sales for tax calculation.
- Calculate real-time sales tax for invoices.
- CertCapture for managing my TEC's.
- Transaction sales tax detail.
- Local jurisdiction exemption certificates.
- Avalara online university classes are not interactive and do not provide for practice applications.
- I feel that I spend the same amount of time & energy on sales tax, but now my time is more on reconciling than getting data for returns filing.
- I do believe that with time and learning this will improve, and also when we move forward with returns filing.
- Microsoft Dynamics SL 2018
Not too difficult, Field Service module had to have custom integration built and there were several bugs to work out once we went live.
- Avalara Returns
- CertCapture
Yes, helped me reduce my returns filing calculation time and improved accuracy of returns and payments. CertCapture has eased the availability of requesting certificates and finding expired certificates.
RSM already had a connector and CCH did not; we were also using RSM for SL2018 implementation.
Avalara Feature Ratings
Cross-Border Tax Compliance with Avalara
Nexus alerts and standard reports available to show sales & tax by state.
No - n/a
Using Avalara
2 - Accounting
1 - myself
- more accurate sales tax calculations
- faster returns calculations & filing
- nexus research
- taxable/non-taxable sales by state
- sales tax registrations
Evaluating Avalara and Competitors
- Price
- Product Usability
- Prior Experience with the Product
- Third-party Reviews
We were already using Avalara rate tables import and RSM as our SL upgrade 3rd party implementation vendor.
Not sure I would change it.
Avalara Implementation
- Third-party professional services
RSM & Plumline
- bugs had to worked out once we were live that didn't come up in test
- sales tax calculations were not showing up on our invoices there were completed
Avalara Training
Configuring Avalara
Yes, make sure to completely understand Avalara and your company. We were told we had to do a complete import of our customers by our Avalara implementation coordinator with their shipping addresses but after we went live I found our we should have only imported our customers and not the shipping addresses. I could not get the shipping addresses deleted in bulk. I was told we would have to re-do the whole import and lose some of our data for sales tax transactions and/or re-import the transactions. I can only delete shipping information on a customer by customer basis which is a pain.
Some - we have added small pieces of custom code - Yes it was relatively easy with supports assistance once we talked to the right person. We have some customization for a few local taxes.
Avalara Support
Pros | Cons |
---|---|
Quick Resolution Good followup Problems get solved Kept well informed Support understands my problem Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response | None |
No - Not cost effective for us and the support we need.
No, not really. I had some difficulty with Avalara in the beginning and support was difficult to obtain. I had to go above my customer service representative be get the immediate support we needed. I did attend the Avalara Crush a while after going live and I believe it was extremely important in my knowledge of Avalara. They was a lot of information I learned that I wish had been provided to me when we first implemented as what reports to use to reconcile and how to correct Avatax transactions to reconcile to my general ledger. I also think Avalara online training could be improved. The videos go too fast and don't allow for practice transactions and training materials.
Using Avalara
Pros | Cons |
---|---|
Like to use Relatively simple Easy to use Well integrated Consistent Quick to learn Convenient Feel confident using | None |
- adding transactions
- running reports
- deleting information in bulk
- importing transactions, template is not user friendly
Integrating Avalara
- Mircrosoft Dynamics SL 2018
yes
- File import/export
not sure, we are now on direct/live integration with Avalara in real time
Have good communication within your organization and between integration team, your company and Avalara. Get in writing exact details of who will do what and when exactly.
- Solomon 2018
- Field Service module
We had to have an RSM custom builder connector for the Field Service module; it was not part of the standard SL2018 connector.
Relationship with Avalara
We did not negotiate with Avalara. We were told the price for the product. We did negotiate with RSM/Plumline for the Field Service custom Avalara portion.
Yes, deal not only with your customer service representative but also their manager and make sure to get all the specific details regarding support before you go live. Ensure you have adequate date and time allotment for testing. Go live near the Avalara Crush and attend the classes on returns, reporting and reconciliations.
Upgrading Avalara
Yes - We were using the Avalara rate tables prior; now we are fully integrated with Avalara.
- Streamlined sales tax process
- Improved accuracy of sales tax calculations & returns
- easy way to import transactions