Book accounting appointments without offering a filing day
Quick summary
- The assistant reads the diary before it offers a time, so a filing day is never offered as a review.
- A time to leave papers and an E1 sitting are different bookings. Get that wrong and a director sits in ten minutes reserved for a folder.
- Moving a time starts with individual or company, then the name on the books — a director can have both on one phone.
- Anything that sounds like a tax position stays a callback. The accountant will call back.
- If the assistant cannot read the diary, it takes a callback. It does not guess.
- The assistant texts the time, the book, and what to bring, so the folder that arrives is one you can use.
TL;DR
In a VAT week you cannot pick up, and a caller who wants a time will not wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday is free. An assistant can book those times if it reads the diary first, treats a drop at the door as different from a review sitting, and asks individual or company before it places or moves anything. A filing day is not a review day. A tax question is not a new appointment type — the accountant will call back. If the diary cannot be reached, the assistant does not guess. It takes the request and says so. The assistant texts the time, the book, and what to bring, so the folder that arrives is the folder you can use.
Key takeaways
- Give the assistant the types and their real durations before you let it book — drop at the door, individual review, company review, formation intake.
- Mark filing days and sitting days in the same diary it reads, including August.
- Test a move on an existing company book and on an individual, separately, before you test a new engagement.
- Turn on the SMS at the moment of booking, with the document list for that type.
- If the diary cannot be reached, the only answer is a callback.
- Check the first fifty bookings by hand. That is when you find the accountant who does not take formations.
When someone wants a time and you are in a return
Both of you have a return open. The VAT send is this week. The phone rings.
A director wants Thursday at eleven to drop the company invoices. A foreign resident wants next Tuesday to sit with you about an E1. A founder wants a meeting this month to start a company. You cannot pick up. The return has a date on it.
Those three callers are asking for a time. They are not asking for the same time.
The first one needs ten minutes at the door and someone to take a folder. The second needs you, an hour, and the individual book. The third needs a longer sitting with the person who actually does formations. If the assistant treats them as the next free hour, Thursday morning fills with a formation, the invoices arrive while you are in that sitting, and the E1 is offered on the morning of the send.
The assistant books only if three things are true. The type is one you offer. The time is free in the diary the firm works from. Nothing in the call is a tax position. If any of those fail, it takes a request and says the accountant will call back.
A founder who has to wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday works has time to ring the next firm. That is why the time has to be finished on this call. It is also why a guessed confirmation is worse than no confirmation. The person arrives. Nobody is free.
A time to leave papers is not a sitting
You already know this. The assistant does not, until you teach it.
A time to leave papers is ten minutes at the door. Someone is there to take a bag. You stay in the return. The caller is told what to bring, they hand it over, they leave.
A review sitting is you, a folder, and an hour. You have closed the return. You have read the papers. The caller sits down.
A company payroll onboarding is longer than an individual E1. A formation is longer again, and it is not the same person.
If the assistant cannot tell these apart, you spend Thursday on people who only needed to drop a bag, and the director who needed an hour is given ten minutes at the door.
Give it the types and the real durations before it is allowed to offer anything:
- Time to leave papers
- Individual review
- Company review
- Formation intake
- Anything you do not want booked at all
Individuals with an E1 often call after work. The assistant can offer a sitting day next week. It cannot offer tonight if you are not sitting tonight. Do not give a company payroll hour to that evening caller, and do not give an office manager a ten-minute drop when they asked to sit.
Individual or company, then any time
The first question on this line is not when they are free. The first question is individual or company.
Those are two books. Two piles of papers. Usually two people who should sit. An individual E1 is not a company payroll meeting. The confirmation, the reminder, and what to bring are different. The duration is different.
A director who is both still gets two notes. If they want two sittings, they get two times. Do not squeeze personal and company into twenty minutes because they arrived as one call.
On a change it is the same question, first. “Move Thursday” is not enough. Thursday might be the personal E1 or the company invoices. Both can share one mobile number. If the assistant picks the first match, it moves the wrong meeting.
Ask individual or company. Then the name on the books. Then find the existing time. Then move it.
Two clients with the same surname are common. Two companies with similar names are common. Individual or company plus a surname is not always enough. Take the AFM if they offer it. Take the company name as it stands on the books. Do not invent a match because the first three letters agree.
If they will not say which book, it is not a booking yet and it is not a change yet. Take the name and the number and say the accountant will call back. Do not guess.
Filing days are not review days
You already know which days you sit with clients and which days the diary is closed because a send is due. Put those days in the diary the assistant reads. If they exist only on a whiteboard next to the kettle, the assistant cannot see them.
On a filing day you still take the phone, or the assistant does. A review sitting is not offered. A time to leave papers can still be offered if someone will be at the door.
If a filing day is missing from that diary, the assistant will offer 10:00 on a morning every accountant is inside a return. The client arrives with a folder. The send and the sitting are then the same hour.
Sitting days are for first meetings and anything that needs you in the room.
August needs its own dates. Some of you close for two weeks. Some of you leave one person on the books. The published number still rings. Set the closure dates. Do not let the assistant book a review into a week when nobody is in the office.
If you have closed new books this month, say so before a first sitting is offered. A firm that is closed to new work should say so on the first call, not after a booked meeting.
Moving a time that already exists
A caller who already has a Thursday is not making a new booking. They are changing one.
Handled as cancel-then-book, Thursday is still taken by their own appointment. The assistant tells them that afternoon is not free.
The order is: individual or company, name on the books, find the existing time, release it, place the new one. One change. Reversed, or split into two independent operations, the client is blocked by their own hour.
Let them cancel as well, especially on document drops in a filing week. A cancellation the day before is a time you can give to someone whose invoices are still missing. The same cancellation arriving as a no-show is an hour gone. Write cancellations back to the diary the same way bookings are written.
A same-day move in a filing week is tighter. If Thursday is the send and they want to move a review onto Thursday, refuse the review and offer a drop at the door, or take a callback. Do not squeeze them into the hour before AADE.
A tax question is not a reason to invent a sitting
People ask while they book. A director moving a company drop will ask whether this month is the quarter or the month for VAT. An individual booking an E1 will ask what to put in a box. A founder booking a formation will ask whether it should be an IKE.
None of those is a booking type.
The assistant says the accountant will call back. Then it finishes the time, if there is a type you actually offer. It does not invent a “tax chat”. It does not fill a box to win the booking. It does not say a return is “fine”. It does not name what anyone owes. It does not choose a company form. It does not pretend a deadline has moved.
If the only thing they want is the figure, there is no sitting to book. Take the request. Individual or company. Name and number. The accountant will call back.
What it must not do, even to be helpful:
- fill a box, name a figure, or say a return is “fine”
- choose IKE versus anything else
- book a formation against a person you did not mark as taking them
- confirm balances or last year’s numbers while it moves the appointment
- walk anyone through Taxisnet, MyDATA or a locked AADE account
Same-day payroll, a stuck send, a locked account still bypass ordinary booking. Those are flags to a phone, not a search for the next free review next Wednesday. If the only same-day capacity is a callback from an accountant, say that. Do not invent a 17:00 that does not exist.
Formations go only to the people who take them
Most firms should not let the assistant offer a formation against any free hour.
A formation needs a longer sitting and a person who actually does them. The assistant takes the intake — name, number, preferred language, whether they already have papers — and offers only the diary of the people you marked.
If nobody is marked, it takes the request and says the accountant will call back. A formation squeezed into a gap reserved for a drop starts late and finishes as a second booking.
The same rule applies to payroll onboarding and to any topic you turn away. A turned-away topic is a polite close, not a meeting you will cancel. A first payroll onboarding is a sitting with the person who runs payroll, not a drop at the door.
If they offer an AFM, take it. If they do not, do not interrogate them for one on the first call. You can ask when you call back.
What the confirmation has to name
At the moment the time is placed, the assistant sends an SMS in the language of the conversation. The text says the time, the office, individual or company, the type, and what to bring for that type.
The reminder goes out a day or two ahead, on the schedule you set. Its job is that the folder arrives. It is not advice about foreign income, not a balance, and not a way to fill the E1 in advance.
If a caller replies to the SMS with a tax question, that reply goes to an accountant. Configure the path so a person sees it.
If the assistant does not know which type it booked, it should not invent a list. Confirm the time, confirm individual or company, and stop. A caller asked for six documents they do not have will cancel, and you will read that as a no-show.
Individual, E1. Identity, AFM if they have it, last year’s papers if they have them, anything that looks like a notice. Not a request that they estimate income on the call.
Company, payroll. Company name, a list of people if they have one, contracts if this is a start, any change to an existing person. Not a conversation about rates.
Company formation. Identity of the people who will sign, whatever papers they already have, a preferred language for the meeting. Not a choice of legal form made on the SMS.
A document-drop that starts with “I brought the wrong folder” is a document-drop you will book again, usually in a week that has no room. The list at confirmation, and the same list in the reminder, is how that is avoided.
When the diary cannot be reached
Do not confirm.
If the assistant cannot read the diary at that moment, it takes the request as a callback and says so. “Probably booked” is not a state a client can act on, and it is not a state you can use in a VAT week.
A review the firm has no record of is worse than no review. The client turns up with a folder. Nobody is free. They will not book a second time.
The same rule applies to a move. If the assistant cannot see the existing Thursday, it cannot release it and it cannot place Friday. It takes the request. You do the change when the diary is back.
What you configure first
- Appointment types and real durations. Time to leave papers, individual review, company review, formation intake — and the ones you do not want booked.
- Which people take which intake topics. E1, payroll, company formation, and the ones you turn away.
- Filing days and sitting days, in the same diary the assistant reads. August dates as well.
- The individual-or-company step as mandatory on any booking, change or cancellation.
- The callback sentence, verbatim, so a tax question does not become a new type.
- What to do if the diary cannot be reached: take a callback, never a hopeful yes.
Then turn on the SMS at the moment of booking, with the document list for that type, and the reminder a day or two ahead, in the language of the conversation.
Checking the first fifty
Look at the first fifty bookings by hand. The diary entry, the type, individual or company, the person, the duration, whether a filing day sat underneath, whether a tax question was turned into a sitting.
You will find the accountant who does not take formations, the individual review that needs forty minutes rather than fifteen, the payroll onboarding that landed on the person who only does E1s.
Listen, in those fifty, for a figure. If the assistant has named what someone owes, or what a formation “usually costs the tax side”, that is a configuration failure, not a successful booking.
After that, spot-check weekly for a month, and then every filing week specifically. Keep anything that is a position as a callback until you have a reason not to.
See pricing for how the product is charged.
AI receptionist, in-house staff, or a call centre
| CITT | In-house | Call centre | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reads the diary before offering a time | Yes, the diary the firm works from | Yes | Usually not — takes a message |
| Books evenings and weekends | Yes | No | Sometimes |
| Treats a filing day as closed for reviews | If you marked it | Yes | Rarely sees the week |
| Starts with individual or company | Yes | Yes | A name, usually |
| Books a tax position | Never — the accountant will call back | The accountant does | Sometimes books "a tax chat" |
| Sends the confirmation and what to bring | Automatically, by SMS | If they remember | Sometimes |
What a month of empty document-drops costs
Worked from these assumptions — change any of them and the answer changes:
- Three people. About 40 booked times a month to leave papers or sit for a review.
- An empty time in deadline season is not given to someone else the same day.
- About 10% of booked times arrive with the wrong folder, or nobody comes. Check your own figure. Firms vary.
- Recoverable value of a used time, €90. Put your own figure in. A company review and a ten-minute drop are not the same.
- A reminder that names what to bring cuts empty times by a third. Challenge this first.
- 40 times × 10% = about 4 empty times a month.
- 4 × €90 = €360 of reserved time sitting empty.
- A third avoided returns about €120 a month.
- Over 11 working months — 11 × €120.
Roughly €1,320 a year, from a text that names the folder, not only the time.
What it costs
CITT is pay as you go: no packages, no minimum, no contract. The current rates — the monthly fee per number and the per-minute rate — are on the pricing section of the home page, which is the only place they are published.
Frequently asked questions
Can it book a review on a filing day?
It reads the same diary the firm works from and checks the time before offering it. A morning you have closed because the VAT send is due is never offered as a sitting, if you marked it. Times to leave papers can still be offered that day if someone will be at the door. If the assistant cannot reach the diary at that moment, it does not guess. It takes the request as a callback and says so. A review the firm has no record of is worse than no review. The client turns up with a folder and nobody is free.
What about someone moving an existing appointment?
The assistant asks individual or company first, then the name on the books, and treats the move as one change. Handled as cancel, then book, Thursday is still taken by their own appointment, and they are told that time is not free. A director who is both individual and company must say which meeting is moving.
Will it book a time to go through my E1?
It will book a time to leave papers, or an individual review, if you allow those types. It will not book a session in which the assistant itself goes through the return. What goes in a box is a tax position. The accountant will call back, or they will do that work in the sitting you booked — a person, not the voice on the phone.
Should it book company formations against any free hour?
That is your call, and most firms say no at the start. A formation usually needs a longer sitting and a person who actually does them. The assistant takes the intake, gathers what you asked it to gather, and offers only the diary of the people you marked as taking formations. If nobody is marked, it takes the request and says the accountant will call back.
Who sends the confirmation?
The assistant, by SMS, in the language of the conversation, at the moment of booking, including what to bring for that type. The reminder goes out ahead of the time on the schedule you set. Neither requires anyone at the desk to type a number.
Can clients cancel through it too?
Yes, and you should let them, especially on document-drops in a filing week. A cancellation the firm hears about the day before is a time that can go to someone whose invoices are still missing. The same cancellation arriving as a no-show is an hour gone. Cancellations are written back to the diary the same way bookings are.
