Avalara vs. CCH Axcess

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Avalara
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
Avalara AvaTax connects to the software that businesses already have and delivers sales tax decisions based on precise geo-location in more than 12,000 taxing jurisdictions in the U.S.
$21
per month
CCH Axcess
Score 5.3 out of 10
N/A
Wolters Kluwer offers CCH Axcess, a modular cloud-based tax preparation, compliance, and workflow management solution.N/A
Pricing
AvalaraCCH Axcess
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
AvalaraCCH Axcess
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Features
AvalaraCCH Axcess
Type of tax
Comparison of Type of tax features of Product A and Product B
Avalara
8.6
292 Ratings
2% above category average
CCH Axcess
-
Ratings
Sales and Use Taxes8.8285 Ratings00 Ratings
Cross-border Taxes8.862 Ratings00 Ratings
VAT / GST Taxes7.953 Ratings00 Ratings
Energy and Fuel Taxes8.924 Ratings00 Ratings
Tax Reporting & Compliance
Comparison of Tax Reporting & Compliance features of Product A and Product B
Avalara
7.9
271 Ratings
5% below category average
CCH Axcess
-
Ratings
Geolocation for Tax Assessment8.3164 Ratings00 Ratings
3rd-Party Software Integrations7.8215 Ratings00 Ratings
Tax Data Reporting8.2240 Ratings00 Ratings
Compliance Administration Management7.9185 Ratings00 Ratings
Tax Exemption Processing8.3196 Ratings00 Ratings
Tax Document Management7.9190 Ratings00 Ratings
Complex Tax Scenario Management7.2123 Ratings00 Ratings
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User Ratings
AvalaraCCH Axcess
Likelihood to Recommend
7.9
(403 ratings)
2.5
(5 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.4
(26 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.8
(395 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Availability
8.0
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.0
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
2.7
(18 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
8.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
7.3
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
6.3
(197 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
5.0
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
5.1
(11 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.0
(7 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
1.2
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
7.8
(8 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
AvalaraCCH Axcess
Likelihood to Recommend
Avalara
Multi state sales tax returns. I think the software is pretty good although it’s not intuitive. I found it takes some time to get used to using and you’re pretty much on your own. In my experience, they will not give professional advice. However, sometimes I think there is such a fine line that it is indistinguishable and, in my experience, they lead you right up to that line and then just stop.
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Wolters Kluwer
If you have a pro that uses the software then you should be fine. If you are using the software and need any support from THEIR customer support people or dedicated rep, be prepared to be frustrated! Horrible Customer Service but it is due to Wolters Kluwer not caring and purchasing various tax products but not having the ethics to make sure they are properly trained or overwhelmed
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Pros
Avalara
  • Calculates the correct tax regardless of state, county, or local jurisdiction.
  • CertCapture provides a site for managing all resale certificates, updating, renewing, and providing reports/backup in the event of an audit.
  • One stop shop for all things tax makes my life easier!
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Wolters Kluwer
  • Customer Service
  • Organization
  • Knowledge
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Cons
Avalara
  • I feel customer service in all areas needs drastic improvement - customer support, implementation, account management, etc.
  • Support for implementation; have the implementation team understand the business you are in and what products/ services you have purchased. Improve upon the sequence of implementation to make logical sense.
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Wolters Kluwer
  • Billing issues.
  • Customer service.
  • Deceptive information provided when placing order. Then turn around and said that’s not right.
  • Ability to listen to customers.
  • Sales rep doesn’t know what client ordered.
  • Reps who don’t care.
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Likelihood to Renew
Avalara
We need their help with filing and keeping track of things. It is very likely we are in the process of renewing right now. Autumn is our case manager and she has been a great help in keeping us updated on our usage and renewal. I feel we will be using this for a very long time.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Usability
Avalara
My usability rating 5 years ago would have been much lower. I jumped in to the sales tax world with little experience outside the state where my employer is located. I think a structured training program from the outset would have helped. I know tutorials were available, but where to find them, which ones to begin with, etc. made usability very frustrating. I was learning the system but also using the system at the same time to bring my employer into compliance with the new nexus requirements
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Reliability and Availability
Avalara
I have been using Avalara for years and do not remember ever having an outage during working hours. The service is accurate and dependable.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Performance
Avalara
We do have trouble tying Avalara's reporting back to our POS, but we just got a new POS system and there are bugs we are still trying to work out within the POS system. I do not believe this is an Avalara issue
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Avalara
Avalara is not consistent in giving us information timely. For instance, right now, we have a help desk ticket with them that's been open since October. They are still trying to figure it out and we haven't gotten any feedback on where they are at or what is going on. That seems to me a very excessive amount of time to be working on a problem. Was it forgotten? Is there something bigger going on? Do they need something from us? An update would be helpful.
Also, many times when we call with an issue or concern (wrong tax rate for instance) we generally feel like the help desk assumes it's of our doing instead of theirs and doesn't truely listen when we explain the problem because we end up repeating it over and over as well as sending examples. We expect more respect on our end.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
In-Person Training
Avalara
I wasn't here when they first started with Avalara.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Online Training
Avalara
The videos go too fast; I kept having to pause them and go back. They don't allow for any practice transactions or provide training materials.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Avalara
The implementation team from Avalara was very knowledgable and did a good job of passing along information so that we could maintain the system and be able to make future changes ourselves. We had asked for some custom tax setup and they worked with us to get additional taxes set up that they didn't previously have. They worked with us to pull our documentation on tax rules and make sure those were included. I had hoped more scenarios would be there out of the box to cut down on the configuration time.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Avalara
When I started with the company, they were using a version of CCH. This was my first experience with that program and I found it very cumbersome. It was unable to calculate multiple tax rates (this may have changed in the last 10 years) and while it filled out some of the tax returns for us, we still had to manipulate many and file them ourselves. Now we just verify that what we show in our system matches Avalara and hit approve and we are done for another month.
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Wolters Kluwer
Customer service is horrible for Axcess and getting bad for ATX. Wolters Kluwer has purchased these software products
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Scalability
Avalara
There is no change that has to happen as your company grows, Avalara continues to do it's job for any size company
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
Avalara
  • We are positively impacted by Avalara in having a central library to store our certificate files.
  • We spend very little time and resources to calculate and compile tax data for filing.
  • The electronic filing has helped insure we are on time with our filings and avoiding penalties.
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Wolters Kluwer
No answers on this topic
ScreenShots

Avalara Screenshots

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