How Can Accounting Firms Stop Chasing Clients for Bank Statements?

Why is collecting bank statements such a problem for firms?

Every month-end close starts with the same bottleneck: getting statements from clients. Staff send reminders, clients forget or send the wrong month, PDFs arrive by email, text or a portal, and someone has to rename and file each one. The close can't start until the last statement shows up, so one slow client delays everything.

Firms surveyed by CPA Practice Advisor report spending an average of 9.3 hours per week on client communication, and in a 2026 survey, chasing clients for missing documents was the number one task firms wanted to hand to an AI agent, chosen by nearly 7 in 10 firms.

What are the options for collecting bank statements?

• Manual requests: Email or portal requests to clients. Free, but slow and unreliable.
• Client bank logins shared with the firm: Fast, but a security and liability risk most firms should avoid.
• Bank feeds inside accounting software: Good for transactions, but feeds don't give you the official PDF statement you need to tie out balances.
• Automated statement fetching: The client connects their bank once through a secure aggregator, and statements are retrieved automatically each cycle.

How do you set up automated statement collection?

1. Start with your slowest clients. Pick the 10 to 20 clients who delay your close most often.
2. Send a secure connection link. The client logs into their bank once through the aggregator; the firm never sees the password.
3. Choose which accounts to fetch. Checking, savings, credit cards and loans can all be included.
4. Set the schedule. Statements are pulled as soon as the bank publishes them.
5. Watch for connection alerts. Banks sometimes require the client to re-authenticate; a good tool flags these early so you can send a quick reconnect link.
6. Roll out to the rest of your book. Once the process works, make it part of client onboarding.

Why do original bank statements matter more than transaction feeds?

Transaction feeds can drop, duplicate or miss items. The bank's own PDF statement is the source document auditors, lenders and reviewers trust, and it's what you tie your ending balance to. Having both the feed and the statement lets you catch gaps before they become problems.

What about check images?

For many small business clients, the hardest transactions to categorize are checks. Fetching check images alongside statements shows you the payee and memo, so you can code a check correctly instead of guessing or asking the client.

How LedgerSync helps

LedgerSync fetches original bank statements from more than 5,000 banks and check images from hundreds, organizes them by client and period, and syncs to QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Thomson Reuters Accounting CS and Zoho Books. Pricing has no minimums and includes free checks.

Frequently asked questions

Is automated bank statement fetching secure? Yes. Clients connect through a secure bank-data aggregator, and the firm never receives or stores the client's bank password.

Do clients have to do anything every month? No. After the one-time connection, statements are fetched automatically. Clients only act if their bank asks them to re-authenticate.

Can I get statements for past months? Availability depends on the bank; many banks provide several months or more of statement history.

Does this replace bank feeds in QuickBooks? It complements them. Feeds bring in transactions; statements give you the official document to reconcile against.

Which banks are supported? LedgerSync supports statement fetching from more than 5,000 banks and check image fetching from hundreds.

Sources

• Liscio, citing CPA Practice Advisor survey
• DokuTrak: Client Document Collection Statistics 2026
• Uku: AI in Accounting Statistics 2026
• Bankrate: Who should have access to your business finance accounts?