Practice management is a bread-and-butter application for the tax and accounting professional. It's time and billing element is what is needed to get the bill to the client for all those hours worked, while the data collected has potential for learning more about their needs and providing services. With links to portals and mobile devices development, this veteran breed of software appears ready to undergo a major change.

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The idea that the Internet levels the playing field for business is a bit overblown: there seems little chance that the smallest businesses can serve the largest. Still, cloud-based products do represent the chance for small businesses to significant increase their markets and their capabilities of serving them.

Customer Relationship Management software, almost always referred to as CRM, has probably been seen by many small- and medium-sized accounting firms as something for large corporations. But increasingly, CRM is a function that is finding its way into almost every application that tracks people and companies, whether they are client or prospects.

Sage may not have added much functionality to its small business desktop accounting software this year, but it's changed the product names and expanded its line of solutions. All of the company's small business applications now go under the name Sage 50-US (Simply Accounting is Sage 50-Canada). The old lineup stays the same, but it now ranges from Sage 50 First Accounting 2013 through Sage 50 Quantum Accounting 2013.

At the dawn of office automation some 20 years ago, scanners arose as an essential office business tool to help transition paper files into digital formats. Large, expensive and taking up an inordinate amount of desk space, the scanner was an investment for the office that sometimes exceeded what was spent on a computer and printer. Not so today.

LexisNexis says that the State of Georgia is utilizing one of its products in a pilot program aimed at fighting identity fraud. The LexisNexis Tax Refund Investigative Solution has been used since the program was launched in January and utilizes identity verification and authentication tools to find and hopefully halt the filing of fradulent tax returns.

The Internal Revenue Service has again expanded its "Fresh Start" initiative by offering more flexible terms to its Offer in Compromise program. According to the IRS, the changes will enable some taxpayers to cut the resolution of their tax problems to as little as two years from four to five years previously.

Intuit's recent purchase of DemandForce, which provides a variety of outsourced services to small businesses, raises a question. What's next? Outsourcing is a time-tested way of handing off duties that a business does not want to handle

You are all involved with technology and likely track new products and services on a regular basis. Consequently, my focus is to discuss new technology products can provide benefits for our advancing 24 hour Work-Life wheel. How you choose to draw boundaries between work and life is a conversation that you should have with many. Here are a few products that can be effectively used for what you do and where you do it.

There is a lot of confusion in the market when it comes to the cloud and hosting and software licensing. Particularly with new mobile devices adding to the mix, software developers are recognizing that the additional machine licenses they used to sell aren't being purchased any longer.

Xero, which markets low-cost online business software, said it intends to continue investing in the company to fuel growth. That came as the New Zealand-based company reported that its loss for the year ended March 31 widened by 5 percent on a 107-percent increase in revenue.

A Buffalo, N.Y., accounting firm, whose former partner got it into the business of auditing Chinese companies and then faked documentation, was censured and its registration with the Public Accounting Company Oversight Board revoked. Brock, Schecter & Polakoff was pulled into the business, along with former director of auditing and accounting, James R. Waggoner, even though the firm had no auditing experience and no one on the staff understood Chinese. The firm must pay a $20,000 civil money pen

New Zealand-based Xero is entering the United States market for practice management software. The company, which launched its online accounting package in this country last fall, entered that application segment through its acquisition earlier this year of WorkflowMax.

Thomson Reuters has introduced a new workpaper product, Workpaper CS. And while the company will continue to maintain its Engagement CS product, that product will not get much further development.

The Progressive Accountant talks with Jack LaRue, SVP Thomson Reuters, about their payroll processing services available to tax and public accountants.

Fujitsu's Kim Hogan, Business Development Manager, talks about their mobile and network scanners for accountants.