Email setup for accountants and accounting firms
Accountant's email setup is a structure in which documents and instructions from dozens of taxpayers reach the right person, fake payment instructions are caught before they land in the inbox, and each taxpayer's information remains documented in the mailbox. SmartMail provides this with reasoned security analysis, taxpayer-linked team notes and an inbox separated by content type.
What is the email problem for accounting firms?
An accountancy firm receives hundreds of emails every day: invoices and payment receipts from clients, notifications from banks, letters from public institutions, and reminders during tax return periods. Three problems stand out at this volume.
Fake payment instructions. Accounting firms are targets for fraudsters because they sit right in the middle of the payment process. The typical scenario is: an email arrives from an address very similar to a supplier's or client's address saying "our bank account has changed, make payments to the new IBAN". The email carries a familiar signature, the language is proper, and it attaches an invoice. If this email is missed once, it means a loss that is very hard to recover.
Lost documents. A taxpayer sends an invoice, but the email stays in an employee's personal mailbox; when the tax return period arrives, the document is searched for and cannot be found.
Knowledge stays tied to one person. Information such as "This taxpayer sends their invoices in bulk on the 5th of the month" or "This company's payments are approved by a partner" lives only in one employee's memory; when that person goes on leave, the team asks the same questions again.
How to detect a fake payment instruction?
SmartMail runs every incoming email through three groups of checks and scores the signs commonly seen in fraudulent payment instructions one by one:
- Similar domainAn address with one letter changed, containing invisible characters or with a different extension is flagged if it imitates the address of a company you know.
- Reply address mismatchAn email that comes from one address but sends replies to another is the most typical sign of payment fraud; in SmartMail, such an email is directly to quarantine is received.
- AuthenticationThe SPF, DKIM and DMARC records of the sender domain are recalculated by SmartMail.
- Corporate identity from a free accountWriting on behalf of a company from a free email account is a warning sign in itself.
- First contactA payment request from an address you have never corresponded with is not assessed in the same way as one from an address you correspond with regularly.
The result is a badge next to the sender name; when clicked, it shows which signal affected the score by how many points. Email below the trust threshold does not reach the inbox; it is quarantined.
Technical controls alone are not enough; the following rule should also be written in the office: every email reporting a change of account details is confirmed by calling the client's previously registered phone number. When this confirmation is written next to the email as a team note, it is also recorded.
How does taxpayer information stay in the mailbox?
In SmartMail, a team note can be linked not only to an email but also to the sender's address or company. The note "This company's payments are made with two signatures, contact the partner for IBAN changes" reappears in every new email from that company. Notes are not sent to the recipient; only the team with access to the mailbox sees them.
Incoming emails are automatically separated by content type: first contact, invoice/payment, quote/tender, official, promotional and update. Invoice and receipt emails are collected in a single filter; bank and organization notifications do not overshadow customer correspondence.
The text of PDFs and office files in attachments is converted into a document card; the invoice's parties, dates and amounts are visible without opening the attachment. Binding figures should still be checked against the attachment itself.
How is work shared during reporting periods?
Shared mailbox can be distributed by taxpayer groups; rather than forwarding an email to a teammate, their attention is drawn and a notification is sent to them. A response time is set for tasks with deadlines; one hour before the time expires, a reminder is sent to everyone who sees the mailbox. Each employee's permissions in the mailbox are configured separately; delete permission comes disabled in new assignments.