AI has changed the landscape in many work fields, such as in data, law, finance and even accounting. Recently I have taken an assistant-accounting job at a firm paired with my master studies. I have discovered a lot about AI and what it could do for accounting that I thought were not possible. Having been there for 2 months, I have learned a lot about accounting itself, but also what AI did for me while I was at the job. According to an article by the open journal of business and management, accountants become more efficient in handling the bookkeeping and become more productive in their work due to the use of AI (peng et al, 2023). I found this to be true as well.
The first week I began working the invoices in the bookkeeping system, I was very reliant on my own knowledge. I tried categorizing each invoice in a specific item for the ledger, which was confusing sometimes. Because there were a lot of different items and different kind of invoices. With the help of ai however, it showed me what type of invoice belongs to what items in the ledger. For example, one particular invoice showed me a bill of the restaurant where a particular client of the accounting company was having dinner. At first, I was not sure where this type of cost could be booked in the ledger. I asked AI: “at which item does a restaurant bill belong to in a ledger?” The prompt I gave ChatGPT provided me with this answer:
I asked my employer, who is an RA (registered accountant) for verification is this was true, he confirmed that it was indeed true. From then on, I started using AI a lot more for bookkeeping. Especially for items I was unsure of. It helped me become more knowledgeable, but also helped me to become more efficient and productive.
Even though there are a lot of benefits of using ai in accounting, there are also downsides. Each bookkeeping for a specific client is different. Tailoring to these clients cannot be done always done through AI. My employer explained to me that the accuracy of knowledge AI has on accounting and bookkeeping is broad, but that I should not always rely on it to keep the books. Because clients sometimes require specific wishes in what purpose their ledger serves and on what books costs are categorized. For example, some clients want to receive a larger tax return. Therefore, they would categorize some cost to a specific item in the ledger that are relevant for that outcome, and others use It to justify cost that they made for the past few months that could be lost in other items, due to inaccuracy of the AI. This type of variety is sometimes very confusing for the AI making some prompts not always accurate to what the client needs. As accepting is also a type of consulting and advisory to companies.
In my opinion, AI is beneficial for the future of financial bookkeeping, and it will probably change a lot of aspects in the financial field. I do however think that when it comes to personalized tailoring to clients with jobs such as consulting and advice, especially in the tax field. It is still of relevancy that accountants or financial advisors take responsibility in helping clients themselves to keep them satisfied and use AI to their benefit. Becoming more efficient and accurate themselves due to the clever use of it.
Peng, Y., Ahmad, S. F., Ahmad, A. Y. B., Al Shaikh, M. S., Daoud, M. K., & Alhamdi, F. M. H. (2023). Riding the waves of artificial intelligence in advancing accounting and its implications for sustainable development goals. Sustainability, 15(19), 14165
A very interesting blog you have written. You write about the use of AI in bookkeeping. In my view, this is an industry that to some extent can make great use of automation using generative AI. It is, however, an industry that has a lot to do with laws and regulations. How do you think generative AI can deal with this? Could this not create very big problems if we assume from now on that generative AI makes bookkeeping choices? I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this.