Calculating AI’s impact on CPAs: New study quantifies time savings

The prevailing narrative regarding the role that generative AI can play in the life of a CPA goes something like this: Emerging AI tools can take care of busy work, freeing professionals to spend more time on value-added pursuits for their clients.

Research by assistant professors of accounting at Stanford and MIT turns the chatter into something CPAs love — data.

A recent study found that the average accountant who used generative AI to assist with foundational accounting activities was able to reallocate approximately 8.5% of their time from routine data entry toward high-value tasks such as business communication and quality assurance — a pickup of about 3.5 hours in a 40-hour workweek. The generative AI adopters in the study also recorded a 55% increase in weekly client support over those not utilizing AI.

“Generative AI serves as a powerful assistant — enhancing productivity and accuracy — while the accountant’s expertise ensures that the final outputs are sound and contextually appropriate,” the authors wrote.

The two authors surveyed 277 accountants and partnered with a firm providing AI-based accounting software to analyze hundreds of thousands of transactions at 79 small and midsize firms. The survey asked accountants to provide a comprehensive snapshot of three consecutive workweeks, sharing information such as clients seen, billable hours, a breakdown of time spent on a variety of tasks, and details about their AI use.

The study found:

• The accountants surveyed who used generative AI reported 21% higher billable hours.
• Accountants using AI closed the month-end books 7½ days sooner those who did not use AI.
• AI adoption was linked to a 12% increase in general ledger granularity, as measured by the number of unique accounts used to categorize transactions. “This finer granularity suggests that AI-enabled accountants can capture transactions in more specific accounts, enhancing the informational richness of financial reports,” the authors wrote.

“Overall,” the authors added, “our findings highlight AI’s role in potentially augmenting, rather than replacing, professional accounting expertise.”

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— To comment on this article or to suggest an idea for another article, contact Bryan Strickland at Bryan.Strickland@aicpa-cima.com.