Item: Avalara
Rating: 9
Author: Tony Oliver

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Avalara for:
1) Excise tax filings (tax department)
2) For sales tax verification on live invoices (commercial department)

It addresses the ease of filing tax returns with various tax jurisdictions. Separately, it assists in calculating the proper tax amounts for our invoices sent to customers.

Pros and Cons

Effectively and efficiently handle sales tax billing on our invoices
Interface with the various tax jurisdictions for uploading specific tax return files

At times, we've had intermittent response time for general resolutions.
Haven't compared pricing to other competitors recently, but I'd be curious where it stands for similar products.

Key Insights

Do you think Avalara delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Avalara's feature set?

Yes

Did Avalara live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Avalara go as expected?

I wasn't involved with the implementation phase

Would you buy Avalara again?

Yes

Return on Investment

Overall we have been pleased with use of the products on the compliance and tax verification front.

Systems Integrated With

I was not directly involved (IT group mainly handled) when we integrated a purchased company, however, from what I was told, the integration was smooth. This is likely the case as we had SAP as an existing platform and this integration (AVATAX) was not started from the ground up.

Usability

While I am not fully engaged on day-to-day activities with Avalara any longer, I recall it having relative ease with functionality. Currently, I am not aware of any matters of concern from the staff and other members of the company who are currently using the products both for compliance and sales tax verification.

Additional Capabilities

Avalara Returns

The ease of electronic filing of returns certainly provides an efficient and effective way to maintain compliance with various tax jurisdictions. Recognizing many jurisdictions require efiling, the tables and other factors of setup within the Avalara system provide ease of use for our compliance obligations.

Likelihood to Recommend

Generally, at least for the products our company uses, Avalara is well suited. I am not sure if they are the most competitive in pricing but we have been satisfied with the products in most respects. I will say the interaction I've had with our reps has been helpful on all aspects. They are pleasant to deal with at all times.

Efficient use and ease of product

Modules Used

Overall Satisfaction with Avalara