The Firm
DKA is an accounting firm with about 15 employees located near Minneapolis. In business for nearly 20 years, the firm provides services such as tax planning and preparation, accounting assistance, estate planning and consulting services to individuals and businesses.
The Problem
In December 2019, the firm was looking to replace an in-house server. Steven G. Wormley, CPA with DKA, says the firm had to decide whether to purchase another server or seek a different solution for managing IT operations. “We were feeling vulnerable that our server was in only one location and dependent on our outside IT vendor for support,” Wormley says. And while the firm had a long-term, satisfactory relationship with its IT consultant, he adds: “We had experienced a fair amount of finger-pointing when things went wrong, between the internet provider, the IT consultant, and each of the individual software application vendors.”
The Solution
DKA chose Rightworks Cloud Premier, a premium hosting service that outsources a firm’s entire IT environment. “We were intrigued with the idea that Rightworks would support us in dealing with the major application software companies,” Wormley says. “We are a small player, but Rightworks would have much more clout in getting to real answers when things go wrong. When other support organizations are finger pointing, Rightworks can get answers faster than we can.”
Why Rightworks Cloud Premier?
“Ultimately, we chose Rightworks Cloud Premier because of your focus on and experience with CPA firms,” Wormley says. “We initially reached out to Rightworks because a client was using the Rightworks QuickBooks Desktop cloud, so we already had a subscription to that service.” That’s how DKA learned about Cloud Premier, the only dedicated cloud-based outsourced technology solution combining accounting and tax application expertise with world-class managed IT. “We were most impressed with the project management during the conversion from our in-house server. Communication and responsiveness during the transition was fantastic and continues to be great to this day.”
The firm worked with Rightworks to cut over to Cloud Premier on a tight schedule, choosing to complete the process before tax season began in January rather than after the season ended. “I was amazed at how fast it went,” Wormley says. “There was a lot of work to be done, both by us and by Rightworks. We were hugely impressed with the project management from Rightworks. We had to decide whether to cut over before or after tax season. We were on the edge. The timeframe was tight, but Rightworks set an aggressive schedule and hit everything on target. It was very seamless. I didn’t hear any complaints about the interface or platform from our team during the transition or during our first tax season using Rightworks.”
The Results
Rightworks Cloud Premier has delivered the consistent, reliable support DKA sought when it abandoned its internal server and previous IT support system. “Our experience so far has met the promises made to us during our decision-making process,” Wormley says. “On the rare occasions when applications were not running smoothly, Rightworks was able to provide us with timely and useful information about specific vendor outages, and to compare our experiences with other CPA firms having the same issues.” He adds: “The continued benefit is the constant communication. We submit a ticket, and unlike with every other app, Rightworks says, ‘If it’s important, call us.’ With other apps, it’s a black hole. We’ve learned a lot about customer service and communication.”
Of course, when the firm moved to Cloud Premier in December, nobody was anticipating what would come: a stay-at-home order from the governor of Minnesota in mid-March—right in the middle of tax season—in response to COVID-19. With Cloud Premier in place, the firm was able to rapidly set up as a remote organization. “Most of our staff had home offices,” Wormley says. “We borrowed monitors from the office and invested in one workstation. We were up and running remotely in 24 hours.” Now, just one employee reports to the office daily to handle paper documents. “It is working so well,” Wormley says, “that we are in no hurry to return to the office while we watch the results of loosening of the stay-at-home orders.”