How organizers work

An organizer is the annual questionnaire you send clients to collect what you need before you start a return. LedgerOS builds them, sends them, chases them, and turns the answers into work.

The four tabs

Templates — the organizers you've built. One per client type, usually.

Sent — every organizer you've issued, with its status.

Library — reusable sections you can drop into any template, so you write the dependents section once.

Import prior return — pull last year's return in so this year's organizer arrives pre-filled.

The shape of a season

1. Build or adjust your template in the off-season, not in January.
2. Import prior returns so organizers arrive knowing what you already know.
3. Send — digitally, on paper, or both.
4. Chase what hasn't come back.
5. Review what has, focusing on what changed.
6. Start work from the submitted organizer.

The last step matters. A submitted organizer can create the job automatically, so answers turning into work isn't a separate act of remembering.

Why pre-filling matters more than anything else

A blank organizer asks a client to reconstruct their year from nothing. Most won't. The ones who do will get some of it wrong.

An organizer that already knows last year's dependents, last year's W-2 employers, and last year's rental properties asks a different and far easier question: what changed?

That single difference is the biggest lever on organizer return rates, and it's why Import prior return and Carry forward year to year exist.

Digital and paper together

Clients differ. Some will fill in a form on their phone the day it arrives, and some will never log into anything.

You can send digitally, mail paper, or do both across different parts of your book — and clients can record a preference so you honour it automatically.

Mailing organizers is covered in the Mail Center guides.

Notes and limits

• An organizer runs once per client per year.
• Templates are firm-wide.
• A submitted organizer's answers stay attached to the client and the year.
• Sending doesn't create work by itself unless the template is configured to.