As a former tax accountant, I know all too well the pains of getting handfuls of Excel spreadsheets right before a deadline and having to do my data prep, analysis, and data visualization within just a few days. Luckily, having Alteryx at my disposal alleviated a lot of stress and saved me a lot of time in these situations.
Alteryx is an analytic platform that allows users to easily access, transform, analyze and output data. Users can build repeatable workflows by dragging tools onto a canvas that can perform a desired function on your data. Below are just a few (of many) benefits I have seen leveraging Alteryx in a tax role.
Tax calculations can be complex and require gathering information from many different sources within your organization whether it be your ERP system, Excel spreadsheets, or a tax software. Alteryx has the capability to access many different data sources and join them together for even the most complicated tax calculations.
Data cleaning and preparation is time consuming and requires quite a bit of manual work in Excel spreadsheets. The data becomes very susceptible to human error and any mistake can easily get overlooked in a complex spreadsheet. Alteryx makes it easy to automate your data cleansing and preparation steps in just a few tools. Here, I was able to leverage the filter tool to focus only on my P&L accounts and used the formula tool to convert these accounts from their debit/credit balances to their natural sign.
Not only can Alteryx automate your data preparation steps, but it can also automate recurring tax calculations and adjustments. In this example, the formula tool allows me to limit my meals and entertainment charge by 50% and the join tool is used to bring in my tax depreciation and amortization.
Tax law is constantly changing, and depending on your business’s fact pattern a regulation may apply differently to you every year. Alteryx allows the workflow designer to turn a workflow into an Analytic App. An analytic app enables users to change certain parameters in the workflow and run it depending on their choices. The app provides an easy to use interface and allows a lot more flexibility when you are analyzing how the tax law applies to you.
Alteryx also provides the ability to build a macro that can be leveraged across multiple workflows. A macro is really just a group of tools built into a single tool that can automate a certain process in your analysis. In my example, I have built a macro that allows me to programmatically pull FX rates and I am able to do my functional currency conversion without having to manually enter any exchange rates. The benefit to building a macro versus building this process directly into your workflow is it allows you to use this tool in any other tax analysis you may need a functional currency converted. This saves you time by not having to repeat this same process in the future for another tax calculation.
Finally, Alteryx makes it incredibly easy to personalize the output of your data in various formats including PDF, excel, SQL Server, or even a Tableau extract. Here, I was able to output my data to Tableau and build a simple visualization that illustrates my analysis of an international tax inclusion.
Although tax calculations can become quite complex, Alteryx has many capabilities that can make any tax professional’s job easier. Just automating the data prep and recurring tax calculations can save an enormous amount of time. This allows tax professionals more time to focus on value-added work like tax planning and strategy.