Case Study
Consolidating the Audit Tech Stack with Suralink
How Windes replaced two disconnected tools with one Request-to-Review workflow and freed up more capacity than any busy season on record.
Request List Management
Workpaper Suite
~50%
of Windes clients had used Suralink previously
30 to 60
minutes saved per footing and cross-footing check
2 into 1
tools consolidated into one Request-to-Review workflow
The Challenge
Two tools that didn't talk to each other
For about two years, the Windes audit process ran on two tools. One solution managed request lists, and the other handled evidence matching. Both did their jobs. Neither one talked to the other.
Every step in between was manual: build the request in the portal, receive the support from the client, download it to a local drive, embed the files in the spreadsheet, then build the links by hand.
Workpaper Excel files crashed, went corrupt, and loaded slowly as file sizes grew from embedded support files. Documents sometimes became visible only to the person who created them, locking work to an individual instead of the engagement.
Because the request list solution was separate from the evidence matching solution, support documents were downloaded to local drives, then uploaded manually to workpapers, leaving client data sitting on personal computers.
New hires had to learn five or six separate tools before they could run the full Windes audit process, resulting in many training calls to keep everyone up to speed.
The Solution
One provider, fewer systems, less to learn
The objective was explicit: reduce the quantity of tools. That requirement disqualified point solutions, which would have meant trading one siloed vendor for another. Suralink replaced both the request list and the snipping function at once.
The request list now connects to the Excel add-in evidence matching solution, eliminating the manual work of transferring information between two systems. Comments made in the Excel add-in post automatically as request list questions, so teams stop batching questions and clients see exactly what needs clarification.
Workpaper spreadsheets no longer crash. Support documents are linked through Suralink's cloud-based solution rather than embedded, so file sizes stay normal. Client data stays in the secure request list site instead of passing through a user's desktop on its way to another platform.
Staff learning Workpaper Suite and Request List Management are only learning Suralink. Client familiarity made change management easy too: at least half of AJ's clients already knew Suralink from another firm, where their previous solution had always needed an explanation.
