FAQ
Questions, answered.
Practical answers to what tax firms and local CPAs ask us most. If yours is not here, email support@taxably.ai or open Help & Support.
About Taxably
Taxably is a tax technology company that helps independent CPAs and small tax firms turn every document a client sends in into a single bookmarked PDF prep sheet per client per tax year. The Taxably software runs locally on the firm's own Windows workstation and never sends client documents to Taxably's servers.
Taxably watches the folders a tax firm already uses for client documents (TaxDome, Canopy, OneDrive, Google Drive, a network share), recognises each document by form type, flags copies, and assembles a single bookmarked PDF prep sheet per client per tax year. Reviewers open the prep sheet alongside their existing 1040 software; Taxably is a first-pass review aid, not tax-prep software.
Yes. Taxably is a U.S. tax technology company. The Taxably tax platform is a desktop application for Windows, Taxably Connect, plus a small set of signed-in web pages for billing and firm management at app.taxably.ai. Taxably does not prepare or file returns; it is a document automation and review aid that sits next to whatever 1040 software a firm already uses.
Taxably was founded in 2026 by Sameer Shah. The company is incorporated as Taxably, Inc. in the United States and is privately held.
The Taxably tax platform is the combination of Taxably Connect (a Windows application that runs on the firm's workstation and sends each document's pages from it straight to the reading provider named on our subprocessor list) and the Taxably account at app.taxably.ai (where a firm manages billing, devices and members). The Taxably software runs on the firm's own computer; a document's pages are read by a provider that is not permitted to train on them, our servers are not on that path, and what persists on them carries no client names.
Traditional tax software (ProConnect, Lacerte, Drake, UltraTax, ProSeries) takes a return from data-entry through e-file. Taxably sits one step earlier: it watches the client folders, reads every document the client sends in, and produces the prep sheet a reviewer reads before touching the return. Taxably does not file. The reviewer opens the Taxably prep sheet next to the tax software they already use.
Taxably pricing is published in full at taxably.ai/pricing. Your first 10 clients are included at no charge. After that, $10 per return, plus $5 a month for the firm, billed monthly for what you actually built. The $5 monthly firm fee starts the day you add your card. The $10 per return starts after your first 10 clients. There are no page charges at any volume. No seats and no tiers.
Nothing. Pages are not metered and not charged for. A consolidated brokerage 1099 running 30 pages and a prior-year return running 50 cost exactly what a two-page W-2 costs, which is nothing on top of the $10 for that return.
AI and tax document software
Yes. Taxably Connect reads the W-2s, 1099s, K-1s, 1098s and other documents in each client's folder on your Windows computer and builds one bookmarked PDF prep sheet per client per tax year: every document filed in the order of the return, its figures beside its own pages, and the questions the paperwork cannot settle listed where they belong.
Keep one folder per client, wherever your firm already keeps them, and let Taxably Connect read it. You choose the folder that holds your client folders, each folder inside becomes a client, and every document in it is filed into that client's prep sheet. There is nothing to upload and nothing to rename by hand.
Taxably works alongside the document management you already have. TaxDome, Canopy, SmartVault, OneDrive, Google Drive and plain network folders keep and share the documents; Taxably reads what is in those folders and turns each client's documents into a prep sheet a reviewer can work from. It does not replace your client portal.
Taxably does not send clients a questionnaire. When a client returns an organizer, or any other document, Taxably files it in that client's prep sheet with the rest of their paperwork, so the reviewer reads the organizer next to the documents it describes.
Taxably uses AI to read and organize client documents for a CPA or enrolled agent; it does not prepare or file returns. The preparer reviews each figure against its source page in the prep sheet, prepares the return in the tax software the firm already uses, and signs it.
Not the way Taxably is built. Taxably takes on the sorting and reading: it files every document, puts each figure beside its source page and asks a specific question where the paperwork is unclear. The judgment stays with the preparer, who answers those questions, prepares the return and signs it.
Documents stay on your firm's own computer and in your own folders. To be read, each document's pages go from that computer directly to the reading provider named on Taxably's subprocessor list, which is not permitted to train on them. Under its standard terms that provider can keep content it flags for abuse monitoring for up to 90 days, unless an applicable agreement applies. Taxably's servers are not on that path, and what they keep carries no client names.
Pricing & plans
A client is one client folder you build a prep sheet for, charged once for each tax year however often you rebuild it. A joint return, or a household with dependents, kept in one folder is one client; a household split across two folders is two. A small hidden file in the client's Taxably Prep folder records each year's charge, so while that folder is kept, building the same tax year again after the client's folder has moved, or on another computer, is not charged twice; where Taxably cannot tell whether an earlier prep sheet was charged, it asks you in Build prep or holds the charge for Taxably support to check. Renaming or moving a client's folder, or building it on a new computer that starts without the old computer's records, makes it a new client for billing from the next tax year it is built for, unless you or Taxably support have confirmed it is the same client. Business folders give Taxably context and get no prep sheet and no charge, and a folder Taxably reads but you never build is not charged.
No. There is one plan. Your first 10 clients are included at no charge. After that it is $10 per return, plus $5 a month for the firm, billed monthly for what you actually built. The $5 monthly firm fee starts the day you add your card. The $10 per return starts after your first 10 clients. A return is one client for one tax year. Every feature is included, and there are no seats and no tiers.
No. There are no tiers and no client caps. Your first 10 clients are free, then it is $10 per return, plus $5 a month for the firm. The rate is the same at ten returns and at ten thousand.
Returns are billed monthly for what you actually built, on a rolling cycle, alongside a $5 monthly fee for the firm. Cancel anytime. A card goes on file at sign-up to activate your account. The $5 monthly firm fee starts the day you add your card. The $10 per return starts after your first 10 clients. A return is one client for one tax year.
Your first 10 clients are free of the per-return charge, for as long as you like. The account itself is not free: a card is added at sign-up to activate it. The $5 monthly firm fee starts the day you add your card. The $10 per return starts after your first 10 clients.
Yes. Every firm that signs up gets the first 10 clients free, no approval or invite required.
No, and they do not run out either. The first 10 clients your firm builds prep sheets for stay free every tax year you build them. Each client after those 10 is $10 per return, every tax year you build it. A client is one client folder you build a prep sheet for.
Some professional associations arrange member pricing with Taxably and give their members a code. If yours has one, enter it when you add your card, and the payment page shows the member rates before you pay. We do not publish which associations take part or their terms, so ask your association.
The $5 monthly firm fee starts the day you add your card. The $10 per return starts after your first 10 clients. Returns are billed monthly for what you built, on a rolling cycle, and a return is one client for one tax year. The payment page shows the first charge before you pay.
Billed monthly for usage, cancel anytime. To cancel, open Billing in your account (app.taxably.ai/firm/billing) and choose Manage billing. If that page does not open, email support@taxably.ai. Once the subscription ends, Taxably Connect stops building prep sheets. Nothing you have is deleted: every prep sheet already built is a PDF in its client's own folder, and Taxably's records stay in the records folder on your computer until you remove them. No exit fees.
They stay where they are. Every prep sheet is an ordinary PDF saved in its client's own folder on your computer or your firm's drive, and it opens in any PDF reader without Taxably or a Taxably account.
How it works
Taxably Connect lives on one Windows workstation in your office and watches the locations where your clients already live (TaxDome, Canopy, OneDrive, Google Drive Desktop, or any mounted drive). It reads each document it finds there, recognising the form and reading the figures, and when you build a client it assembles a single bookmarked PDF prep sheet for that client's tax year. You open the prep sheet next to your tax software.
Anywhere your clients live on the workstation that runs Taxably Connect: TaxDome, Canopy, OneDrive for Business, Google Drive Desktop, Dropbox, network shares, plain folders on disk.
Common ones include W-2s, the 1099 family (NEC, MISC, INT, DIV, B, R, K, S), K-1 (1065, 1120-S, 1041), 1098 family (interest, tuition, T), 1095-A, SSA-1099, brokerage 1099-B / composite statements, and closing statements (1099-S / HUD), and a document that is not a standard form is read too. Taxably reads PDFs, scans and photos (JPG, PNG, TIFF, BMP, GIF and WebP), spreadsheets (XLSX, XLSM, XLS, ODS, CSV and TSV), Word and text documents (DOCX, DOC, ODT, RTF and TXT) and slides (PPT and PPTX). It does not open other kinds of file, such as HEIC photos, emails, ZIP files and Apple Numbers, Pages or Keynote files: the prep sheet names each one it finds in the client's folder and says what to do, such as saving the photo as a JPEG or PDF.
A single bookmarked PDF per client per tax year. Four kinds of page: a cover (filing status, tax year, document count, open-item count, sections in play), a contents page listing only the sections this client actually has documents for, a section page per active section with one card per document (received items carry the headline value like Box 1 wages; missing items carry a NEEDED badge), and the original source documents embedded inline after each section. See the walkthrough at /how-it-works.
The sections follow the order of the return, so a reviewer reads the prep sheet the way they read a 1040. The contents page only lists sections in play for that client; a wages-only filer might see two, a multi-property couple with K-1s six. You never wade through empty sections.
A NEEDED card is a document the client's own paperwork points to that has not arrived. Last year's return, when it is in the client's folder, adds each carryover balance it states, and each income source it shows that no document this year accounts for (the same kind of form from the same payer, for the same person), asking whether that income continued; last year's documents do the same for a source no return lists. A document that did arrive adds its usual companions (a W-2 adds a check that there are no other employers or 1099 payers), and so can an organizer answer or a document binder that lists something as still required. Apart from asking for the organizer and questionnaire, Taxably does not list a document only because returns like this one often have it. Skim the prep sheet, send one email with the punch list.
New documents are read as they land in a client's folder, unless Settings in Taxably Connect is set to read them once a day or only when you start a build. On Manual, which is how Taxably Connect starts, a prep sheet is built or rebuilt only when you ask for one: when you press Build prep, or when you answer the last question Taxably has about that client. On Auto-pilot it is rebuilt without asking, after nothing in the client's folder has changed for 12 hours, or for the shorter wait you choose in Settings. A sheet already on disk shows its last completed build.
Each prep sheet is saved in its client's own folder, in a Taxably Prep folder for the tax year, and there is no setting to save it anywhere else. When a build draws a client's sheet again, the new sheet replaces the earlier one, so keep a copy of any version you send out. While a client's sheet is out of date, unfinished or being built, a short PDF in the same Taxably Prep folder, Taxably - Prep sheet status, says so, and it is removed once a current sheet is saved.
Yes. Taxably is a prep accelerator, not an unsupervised filer. Every prep sheet is built so a preparer or reviewer can verify in minutes; we surface flags (mismatched totals, missing forms compared to last year, suspicious amounts) so the partner can sign off with confidence.
Sign up and add a card, then install Taxably Connect on the Windows computer that can reach your client folders, link it to your firm and agree to the terms when asked. Connect the folder that holds your client folders and say that each folder inside it is a client: that lists your clients without reading a document. Then open Build prep, choose all of your clients or tick the ones you want, and confirm: Taxably reads their documents and builds their prep sheets. How long reading takes depends on how many documents there are.
What Taxably handles
Yes, with the Smart Splitter. It divides a file at the blank separator sheets between documents, or at the pages you mark, and shows you every page before anything is written. It never divides a file by guessing from what its pages say. It either accounts for every page exactly once or it leaves the file whole and tells you why, so a split never quietly loses a page. Each separated document carries a fingerprint of the pages it came from, which is how you show a reviewer months later that those are exactly the pages that arrived.
Documents arrive without saying who they are for. Taxably works out which taxpayer, which member of the household, and which entity a document belongs to, and where its figures land. When the documents themselves cannot settle that, you get a specific question naming the file rather than a confident guess. Nothing is placed on a return by assumption.
No. There is no portal, no migration, and no bulk upload step. Taxably reads the client folders where your files already sit, on the drive you already use, and writes the prep sheet back into that same folder. To be read, each document's pages go from your computer straight to the reading provider named on our subprocessor list, which is not permitted to train on them; our servers never receive them. Under its standard terms that provider can keep content it flags for abuse monitoring for up to 90 days, unless an applicable agreement applies. Everything Taxably has learned stays on your own machine.
Taxably works in the client folders your firm already keeps. Nobody has to change how documents arrive, where they are stored or who can open them. Connect the folder that already holds your client folders: a folder on the computer, a network drive, or the folder your storage app or practice portal keeps on the computer, such as Google Drive for desktop, OneDrive or Dropbox. Clients and staff go on saving documents where they do now, and Taxably reads them there. Each prep sheet is saved in its client's folder, in a Taxably Prep folder for the tax year, the same way a file your staff save there is. The sharing and permissions your firm has set on that folder apply to it, and if the folder is synced to your cloud storage or portal, the sheet reaches it the way your other files do. Taxably does not send the prep sheet itself anywhere else. Taxably leaves your documents where they are and as they are, and renames them only if you turn on Rename my files in its Settings. Its own working records, including the working copy of your documents it reads from, are kept on the computer it runs on, apart from your client folders.
No. Taxably does not enter anything into your tax software, and it does not prepare or file the return. It builds the prep sheet, one bookmarked PDF with its sections in the order of the return and each source page behind its section, and you key the figures into ProConnect, Drake or whatever you use from it.
Taxably builds prep sheets for individual returns (Form 1040). A business that files its own return, such as a partnership, an S or C corporation, or a trust, gets no prep sheet and no charge: Taxably reads its folder to learn who owns it, and an owner's K-1 goes on the owner's prep sheet. A business reported on its owner's Schedule C is part of the owner's prep sheet, and when nothing on file shows which kind a business is, Taxably asks you rather than guessing.
Taxably does not prepare state returns, but it reads the state documents in a client's folder, such as state withholding, estimated payments, refund notices and state K-1s, and files them on the prep sheet by state, several states for one client included. When it cannot tell which state issued a document, it asks rather than guessing.
Yes. Taxably Connect prepares the previous calendar year's returns unless you choose another tax year on Build prep's year line. Choose an earlier year for a client who still needs to file one. Each tax year is its own prep sheet and its own return. If Taxably is not set up for the forms of the year you choose, the sheet still builds and says so.
Taxably does not prepare amended returns, or any return. When a client's folder holds an amended return, Taxably reads it together with the original it amends, so last year's picture on the prep sheet is the return as amended. Where it cannot tell which version applies, for example two amended returns for one year, it says so in a note naming the files rather than picking one.
Yes. Ask for what you remember in your own words and Taxably returns the documents closest to what you typed, not only exact matches. It searches everything it has already read across the folders you connected, so a statement you cannot name is still findable.
We do not publish a single accuracy percentage, because one number hides the thing that actually matters to a preparer: what happens when a figure is uncertain. Taxably is built to be either right or explicit, never quietly wrong. Every document that came in is accounted for on the sheet. A figure whose role is unclear is reported rather than summed into a total. A total that may understate says so. Anything that could not be read is a visible finding naming the file. You are never handed a clean-looking sheet that dropped something in silence.
Yes, on the computer where Taxably Connect runs. In Taxably Connect, open Settings, then Your AI assistant. If the Claude desktop app is installed on that computer, press Connect to Claude Desktop, restart Claude, and ask it about a client. Taxably shows the steps for any other assistant that runs on the same computer. It can look things up and suggest an answer, a note, a business link, a rebuild or an export, and nothing changes until you approve it in Taxably. It cannot edit a tax figure or a document, it never sees a full tax ID, and it only knows about clients whose prep sheet you have built, so a client Taxably has merely read is not disclosed to it. Answers about a client can include the client's name, and what the assistant is told reaches the company that runs it, under that company's terms. Each firm's records are separate and nothing crosses between firms. The AI assistant page walks through the setup.
Security & compliance
The service that reads documents does see them: pages go from your workstation straight to it, and nothing is uploaded to our own servers. That provider is not permitted to train on them. Under its standard terms that provider can keep content it flags for abuse monitoring for up to 90 days, unless an applicable agreement applies. What we store is different. Names and addresses are replaced with placeholders before anything is written to storage, and SSNs, ITINs, and account numbers are never retained. The map between a placeholder and the real person lives only on your workstation, so we cannot match a stored record to a real name. Only your firm can.
On the workstation, where you put them. When it builds a client, Taxably Connect first copies that client's new and changed documents into its own records folder and reads them from there; Keep a working copy of connected folders, in its Settings, is on until you turn it off. While that copy is on, Taxably does not download a document your cloud drive keeps online only: it asks you to make the document available on this computer, then build again. It leaves your files as they are, and renames them only if you turn on Rename my files in its Settings, which is off until you do. Separating a combined scan saves each document as a new file in a Split folder next to it and keeps the scan. Pages go straight from the workstation to be read and never pass through our servers. If you uninstall, your files are exactly where they were.
Taxably has not engaged an independent auditor and holds no SOC 2 report, no ISO 27001 certification and no other independent security certification; our Data Processing Addendum says the same. The Security & Compliance Overview lists the safeguards in place today and what is not yet done.
Send it to legal@taxably.ai from your business address, with your firm's name, your role and any deadline, and leave out taxpayer documents, tax IDs, passwords and card numbers. We confirm who is asking, answer with what is true today, and say plainly when something you ask for does not exist yet, such as a SOC 2 report.
The Safeguards Rule asks firms to know and minimize what vendors handle. With Taxably, pages are read straight from your workstation by the reading provider named on our subprocessor list, which is not permitted to train on them, and never pass through our own servers; what we store carries placeholders, never names or SSNs. Under its standard terms that provider can keep content it flags for abuse monitoring for up to 90 days, unless an applicable agreement applies. The Security page, the AI & Model Training Policy, the DPA, and the subprocessor list describe that vendor relationship in writing so you can attach them to your written information security plan.
Every pairing, every prep sheet, every device revocation, every plan change is logged with who did it, when, and from which device. You can produce a chain of custody for any work product from your account.
With Taxably Connect as it is installed, we never hold a copy of a source document: its pages go from your workstation straight to the reading provider named on our subprocessor list, and our servers are not on that path. That provider is not permitted to train on them. Under its standard terms that provider can keep content it flags for abuse monitoring for up to 90 days, unless an applicable agreement applies. The AI & Model Training Policy has the detail. What persists on our servers is records keyed by placeholders, with no names attached. Original documents on your workstation are never touched.
The Windows installer is signed under a verified 'Taxably, Inc.' publisher. Windows verifies the signature before install and again on every launch. Updates ship through the same signed channel; your IT lead can approve the publisher rather than individual files.
Sign in with Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 (the two stacks most firms already run), with optional time-based MFA and passkeys. Repeated bad attempts are throttled, and a session is short-lived and scoped to one firm at a time.
Devices & access
No. Taxably allows one Connect device per firm, on every plan. The one-workstation rule keeps things simple to defend: a single machine holds the map from placeholders back to real names. Each firm links one computer: the Windows computer that can reach your client folders, which reads the documents and builds the prep sheets. Every prep sheet is an ordinary PDF saved in its client's own folder, so anyone at your firm who can open that folder can read it, on Windows or a Mac, without a Taxably sign-in.
Yes, through the prep sheets. Each firm's Taxably account has one sign-in, the owner's. Each firm links one computer: the Windows computer that can reach your client folders, which reads the documents and builds the prep sheets. Every prep sheet is an ordinary PDF saved in its client's own folder, so anyone at your firm who can open that folder can read it, on Windows or a Mac, without a Taxably sign-in. Keeping your client folders on a shared network drive or a synced cloud folder is what lets everyone reach them.
Taxably Connect runs on Windows 10 or Windows 11 (64-bit). It does not run on a Mac today. A firm that works on Macs can run it on one Windows computer that can reach the client folders, and anyone at the firm who can open those folders can read the finished prep sheets on a Mac, because each one is an ordinary PDF in the client's folder. If you want Taxably on a Mac, join the Mac waitlist.
Relinking a new computer reconnects the account. It does not restore tax records. The firm must restore a verified backup through the supported process. Before you unlink, replace or reset the old computer, email support@taxably.ai and keep the old computer: its records stay readable there, and a new computer starts without them. If it has already failed, the new computer starts without its records. Your original documents and delivered prep sheets stay in your own folders and need their own backup.
The firm's owner. Each firm's Taxably account has one sign-in, the owner's. It manages billing, the linked computer and the record of prep sheets built. The prep sheets themselves are PDFs in your client folders, not in the web app.
Windows 10 (21H2 or newer) or Windows 11, 64-bit. 8GB RAM minimum. The application itself takes about 2.7GB, and wants about 3.3GB free while it installs. Choose a fast local drive for Taxably's records: Setup will not continue with less than 20GB free there, and recommends 50GB for a larger firm. Once your folders are connected, Taxably's rough guide is about 2GB for each client for each tax year in them, mostly for its working copy of that year's documents and the pictures of their pages, and it warns you when the drive has less free space than that. Automatic updates need about 8GB free on the drive that holds your Windows user profile. Your records are kept on this computer and grow with every document read, so the application is the fixed part and the room for your records is the part to plan for. An Intel Core i5 (8th gen) / AMD Ryzen 5 or newer is comfortable. ARM64 works via emulation.
Support
Every firm can contact support@taxably.ai or use the form at taxably.ai/help-and-support. Include your Connect version, the time, and the error message, without taxpayer documents or tax IDs. If support asks for a diagnostic from Taxably Connect (Settings, then About, then Export a diagnostic), read it before you send it: it names your clients and their files. Report security incidents to security@taxably.ai.
Yes. Email support@taxably.ai with any setup question, and the Help & Support page walks through the first steps. Before you sign up, a demo shows Taxably building a prep sheet on sample clients.
Yes. Book a 30-minute demo at taxably.ai/demo, or email support@taxably.ai.