How accountants can plan client meetings in tax season

Plan tax-season meetings weeks before the deadline, not during it. Open a limited number of short meeting slots early, ask clients to send their documents before the meeting, and keep whole days without meetings to actually prepare the returns. Offer regular clients a slot first, then open the rest to everyone, and close meeting slots in the last days before the deadline so the time goes to filing.

Filing deadlines come back every year, and so does the risk: meeting requests bunching up in the last two weeks. Your diary fills with meetings, and the work that follows them, preparing and checking the returns, gets pushed into evenings and weekends. Mistakes are more likely precisely when the stakes are highest.

The fix isn't to meet fewer clients, it's to meet them earlier and in a way that leaves time for the work.

Adapt the timing to your deadlines and your clients. The principle stays the same: meetings early, production late, and the booking page only offers what fits each phase.

Not every client needs an hour. An employee with a simple return may need 20 minutes to go through a few questions; a self-employed client with several income sources needs more. On Book, create separate services, for example "Tax return: short review (20 min)" and "Tax return: full meeting (1 h)", each with its own description and an optional price. Clients choose the one that fits, and you can open more short slots when time is tight.

A meeting where the client arrives with a shoebox of receipts is a meeting spent sorting paper. Write in the service description what to send before the meeting and how: your usual secure channel, a client portal, an agreed email address. Ask in the booking note for the type of return and anything new this year, like a new job, a property purchase or a move. You receive an email for each new booking, with the note, which is your cue to send the document checklist.

Remind clients not to put account numbers or tax identifiers in the booking note itself; those go through your secure channel.

A short review of a simple return rarely needs the client to travel. Offering it by phone or video saves them the trip and lets you fit more short meetings between work blocks, without clients waiting in reception. Create it as a separate service, say in the description that you'll call at the booked time or send a video link, and keep office meetings for new clients, complex files and anyone who prefers to come in. Book doesn't create video links, so send yours after the booking.

Your regular clients come back every year. Before opening slots to everyone, send them the link with a short message: "Tax season meetings are open. Please book before the end of the month." For those who prefer to agree a time by phone, book it yourself from your calendar. Only then open the remaining slots on your public page.

Decide which days are meeting days and which are work days, and open slots only on meeting days. Create a slot once and repeat it on the weekdays you choose until an end date, for example Tuesday and Thursday mornings until three weeks before the deadline. The other days stay empty on the page, and you know they're for the returns.

Keep a short list of clients who couldn't get a slot and call them if one frees up.

If a meeting has to move, reschedule it from your bookings list and tell the client yourself, since Book doesn't email them when a booking changes. Your calendar syncs with Google, iPhone or Mac, so meetings sit next to your filing deadlines. For clients abroad, your page shows times in your business's time zone and displays its name. Book costs €5/month, everything included: unlimited bookings and services, no commission and no contract. It doesn't invoice or store documents.