Your firm account

For accountants: set up your practice, see every client on one screen, and open any client’s books.

A firm account is free. There is no plan to pick and no card to give. Each client’s business has its own plan, paid by the client or by your firm.

Go to the For accountants page and choose Create a firm account.
Enter your name, your firm or practice name (clients see it when you invite them), your email and a password.
Choose Create firm account, then confirm your email address.

If you are already signed in to CORE Books AI, the page asks only for your practice name. Choose Create my practice.

The firm dashboard

Choose Firm dashboard in the menu. It shows your whole practice on one screen:

Clients, Banks to reconnect, To review and Pending invitations: counts across every client.
Needs your attention: each client with a bank to reconnect or transactions to review, with Reconnect, Send reconnect request or Review.
Recently opened: the clients you opened last, with Open books.
Invited: clients who have not accepted yet.
Invitations to your firm: business owners who asked you to be their accountant. Choose Accept or Decline.
Your businesses: any business you own yourself. Only you see these.
Your team: your staff.

The Clients list

Choose Clients in the menu for every client, with their contact, status, plan, who pays and when the plan renews. Search by business or email, filter by Firm-paid, Client-paid or Needs attention, and order the list by any column. Choose a client to open their page, with their plan, who pays and Manage billing.

Invited: The invitation went out and the client has not accepted yet.
Payment not set up: You chose to pay, but no card was saved, so the invitation has not been sent.
Setting up: The client accepted and has not chosen a plan yet.
Trial or Active: The client’s plan is running.
Past due: The last payment did not go through.
Read-only: The plan ended or a payment failed. The books are kept and can be viewed and exported until the client chooses a plan.

Open a client’s books

Choose Open books on the dashboard, or on a client’s page choose Dashboard, Review, Reports or Bank & credit cards under Their books. You switch into that business and work in it as their accountant. What you can use there follows the client’s plan.

To get back, open the business menu at the top and choose Firm dashboard.

The Accounting tab

In a client’s books, Reports has an Accounting tab with the trial balance and general ledger, each with Download CSV. On Command, Journal entries is there too.

For your accountant: the trial balance and general ledger →

Ask a client to reconnect a bank

When a client’s bank connection stops working, you can reconnect it yourself in their books, or ask them to.

On the firm dashboard, find the client under Needs your attention.
Choose Send reconnect request.
Add a note if you like, then choose Send.

The client gets an email with a Reconnect bank button, saying your firm sent the reminder, with your note. A client is emailed about a broken connection at most once a day, so the button tells you when you can send another. It is not offered if the client turned off these emails.

When a business owner invites you

A business owner can invite you from their own Settings. Open the invitation email and choose Review invitation. The invitation waits on your firm dashboard under Invitations to your firm; choose Accept and the business joins your client list.

If you have no practice yet, you set one up first. If you already run your own business in CORE Books AI, you can accept from the bell instead, and a practice named after your email is created for you. Rename it from the dashboard.

Accept an invitation →

Firm settings

Choose Firm settings in the menu to change your Firm name and Contact email, then choose Save changes. The contact email is how clients and CORE Books AI reach your practice; a shared inbox is fine, and it does not change how you sign in. Nothing here changes any client’s books. Only the firm’s principal can change these.

You can also rename the firm from the dashboard heading with Rename.

On the phone app

The firm dashboard, Clients and Staff are on the website only. On the phone app you can accept invitations under Notifications and open any client’s books from the business list.