CCH iFirm Contact Management System

What is CCH iFirm Contact Management?

CCH iFirm Contact Management is our Cloud Global Contact Management system.

It allows synchronization of clients/contacts from CCH Central to CCH iFirm. It is the cloud equivalent of CCH Central, in that it holds the contacts, client records, addresses, associations that have been pushed from CCH Central to CCH iFirm.

We have linked client and contact information up in to CCH iFirm Contact Management from CCH Central for existing users. 

Important Note:  There is no sending back from CCH iFirm to CCH Central - It is a one-way syncronization only

CCH Central to CCH iFirm Contact Management Integration

Syncing of Data from CCH Central to CCH iFirm Contact Management- Getting Started

The following items are synced from Central to iFirm Contact Management

Association mapping with CCH iFirm

Associations are automatically sync'd from CCH Central to CCH iFirm where possible. 

A new System Type column has been added to show the CCH Central system association name.  This will identify if an association name has been changed from the internal system name. 

Navigate to File > Maintenance > Internal > Association Types.  Click the drop-down for CCH iFirm Association and select the matching association.

There are two ways for associations to be synced to CCH iFirm. 

• Associations that are already present on a contact/client when that record is pushed into CCH iFirm
• New associations being added onto an existing contact/client with a iFirmId (contact/client already present in CCH iFirm)

Once the system is linked to CCH iFirm, associations cannot be removed from the contacts/clients.

If the mapping is removed, then any contact/client in CCH Central with the corresponding association is NOT pushed into CCH iFirm.

NOTE: Currently CCH iFirm does not support the same client code character length as CCH Central. Any client code greater than 20 characters will not be created within CCH iFirm

Address Mapping in CCH iFirm

Overview

Any address type as long as it is associated with the contact or client are migrated to CCH iFirm.

Adding a new address under the same address type

·         A user may add a new address for the same address type.

·         When this happens:

•     The existing address gets an "End Date" in Central.
•    A new address is added as the active address under that address type.

CCH iFirm Limitation: CCH iFirm does not support address history like Central.

·         Therefore, when a new address is added:

•    The existing address is overwritten in CCH iFirm with the new address details.
•   The "End Date" is not preserved in CCH iFirm; only the latest address is retained.

One Address per Address Type

·         Central only allows one address per address type for a contact.

·         As a result:

•     If the user adds an End Date to an address without adding a new address, then that address is removed from iFirm.

Data Security > Contact Security 

Note: There must be a user connected/signed-in to the CCH iFirm Authentication within the CCH iFirm Console

Data security in Central syncs seamlessly with Contact security within CCH iFirm. In other words, with Central being the definitive source, iFirm is linked to the security set in Central.

When Data Security is switched on in Central, it updates the Contact Security within CCH iFirm to match.  So, in essence, what contacts/clients the employee can see in CCH Central will match what the employee can see within CCH iFirm.  Employees should not need to access the settings area within CCH iFirm.  But for internal purposes, CCH iFirm Contact security is found under:  Settings > Contacts > Contact Security > (drill into a user).  You are then presented with the security for the relevant user.

When Contact Security is activated in CCH iFirm, all users are granted access to all contacts (contacts and clients) by default.  Contacts can then be blocked or allowed on a user-by-user basis.  Fortunately, this is all achieved by the link with CCH Central.

Central Find Contacts/Clients screen, CCH iFirm Icon

In Central, at the Find Contacts or Clients screen- note there is now a column showing whether the record is linked to CCH iFirm-you will see the CCH iFirm icon against the record- this icon will show when a client/contact has been uploaded to iFirm.

The CCH iFirm ID colum can also be displayed-this is the unique CCH iFirm identifier

If these columns are not showing, right click anywhere in the display and select Field Chooser

When the field chooser box opens, highlight the CCH iFirm logo/icon and drag and drop over to show as a column. You may also choose to do the same for the CCH iFirm ID column

To Start Linking to CCH iFirm

Go to Central > File> Maintenance > Service Settings > CCH iFirm Console

Ensure you are signed in. Ensure the organisation name is updated to the iFirm name and organisation ID flows through. 

For guidance on iFirm Console see CCH iFirm Console 

You are now set to push up clients and contacts in Central to CCH iFirm

Clients/contacts can be pushed up in 2 ways-

Option 1- Through an existing CCH iFirm product like AML, Tax, Accounts Production or

Option 2- Using the contact bulk upload facility.

Once clients/contacts have been pushed up to CCH iFirm, access to Contact Management can be done through the client/contact in Central OR by using the URL ukie.cchifirm.com

Option 1- Client/contact information sync'd through a CCH iFirm product

If we take the example of AML;

For an existing Central client that has not been pushed up yet to CCH iFirm, within the client record select CCH iFirm AML from the top ribbon.

A web browser will open and you will be prompted to log in to your CCH iFirm account

Once logged in, you are brought to the AML screen to perform the AML check on the selected client

Launching the CCH iFirm dashboard showing Contact Management

Within CCH iFirm AML, click on the CCH iFirm Home logo. 

You are brought to the CCH iFirm Dashboard showing Contact Management on the left-hand panel

Option 2- Bulk Upload to CCH iFirm

Firms can now perform a bulk upload of contacts/client from the respective Find window to CCH iFirm. In other words a bulk upload of client/contact information can be done, independent of any CCH iFirm product.

From either the Find Contact or Find Clients window in Central you can see the clients not yet linked to CCH iFirm. There is no CCH iFirm icon showing for that record.

On the Find Contact or Find Clients windows, select either a single record or multiple records of contacts or clients by putting a tick against the record. Click the Upload to CCH iFirm button on the ribbon to push the selected records to CCH iFirm.

You will be prompted to log in to your CCH iFirm account if not done so already.

Once logged in, minimize the browser;

In CCH Central a pop-up box is displayed, showing how many records have been selected.  The number displayed, automatically excludes the following:

• Any records already uploaded (has a iFirmId associated, this can be found in the field chooser on the Find Contacts/Clients window)
• All employee records
• Any supplier records

Yes - Continues to upload the records to CCH iFirm

Cancel - Does not perform the upload and returns the user to the Find window

During the upload, a message is shown at the bottom right of the window, showing the progress.

Once completed, the progress displays either as:

All the records have been uploaded successfully.     
Bulk upload completed

Some records have failed to upload.  Navigate to File > Maintenance > Service Settings > CCH iFirm Console for more details on the reason for upload failure.
Update completed with errors. See CCH iFirm Console

Once a record has been uploaded to CCH iFirm the iFirm icon will now appear against that CCH Central client or contact record on the Find screen.

Accessing Contact Management using the URL ukie.cchifirm.com

Once contacts have been pushed up from Central, access to Contact Management can be done through the URL ukie.cchifirm.com

This will bring you straight to the Homepage and this display is what you will see

Note that dashboard tiles in the centre panel will vary depending on licensing and user display preferences

From the left panel you can select Contacts> All contacts or Clients- You are now in Contact Management

On the top right of the dashboard we have Help options. Any Open Support Cases can be viewed here by selecting the tab Open Cases

Also, on the top right of the dashboard there is a Notifications area. Selecting this will show any notifications relevant to the user

On the right side, there is a Toggle Sidebar option- Clicking on this shows Quick links- here you can quickly and easily access Contacts, Clients, Reports by selecting on the relevant option.

The centre panel shows the Dashboard. This can be customised per user. Select Customise dashboard 

Tiles can be added to show on the Home Dashboard by selecting on them and then Save. The items here are dependent on your firm's CCH iFirm licensing and your access rights to these.

There is also an Account area which can be selected to view User Profile details or to Log out

CCH iFirm Contact Management- walk through

From the left panel you can select the Contacts dropdown to see a choice of options

Selecting Clients to show the list of CCH iFirm clients. You can use the Search to find a specific client. 

 Note- Selecting All Contacts will show a listing of both Clients and Contacts uploaded to CCH iFirm

Other will show just Contacts

If you click on a particular client or contact, that record opens

You can select one of the various tabs, Summary, Relationships, Dynamic Fields, Notes & Reminders

NOTE: Information here is in Read-only format. To make any changes to the record, you would do so back in CCH Central, and the edit will get sync'd to CCH iFirm automatically 

If for example another association is to be added or an existing association needs to be edited, you would do so in the normal way back in CCH Central and this change will then sync across to CCH iFirm;

CCH iFirm Polling Settings 

This option allows firms to set the interval for checking for any changes made within CCH Central and pushing the relevant changes up to CCH iFirm.  

This polling setting is done through File> Maintenance> Service Setting> CCH iFirm Console

It is defaulted to polling interval of 1 minute, but this can be changed by your practice CCH iFirm administrator

Other areas within iFirm Contact Management- Reports and Settings

Reports

Reports can be accessed from the left panel

There are standard template reports which can be generated here.

To add a report to your Favourites you can select on the star, this will then be added to the Favourites tab.

Click on one of the template reports to open and use the drop down fields to tailor the report output.

To generate the report click Generate CSV.

Once the Export File is ready, click on the .csv file to download it. The download pop-up will appear to open the file.

As you get licensed for more CCH iFirm products, more tabs in Reports area will appear with corresponding relevant report templates.

Note- Reports are still best run in Central for now.

Settings

Settings can be accessed from the left panel.

Settings can be viewed, for eg. Firm Details.

Firm Settings > Dashboard Content

Here you can add or edit content on the Dashboard screen. For example the display of the widgets can be changed. An RSS feed can be added. Hyperlinks can be added. An example would be adding the firm logo to the dashboard display.

Firm Settings > Application integration

Here access to applications can be granted or revoked. The user can set down details for same.

Other areas include Contact Settings as per below;

Clicking in to Note Categories, we see that these can be edited, added to or deactivated.

Installation;

From here, Client Notes can be imported from a .csv. Once imported as per template structure, they will appear in the Client Record-Notes area.

Users; Here a list of active and inactive users can be viewed. 

Individual users can be selected on to view and manage their profile.

NOTE : The settings area is an area for your CCH iFirm administrator to view and get familiar with the area only. No changes should be made through here. Any changes needed to be made to your practice CCH iFirm settings remain to be done through Organisation Management. See screenshot below.

Export Data

Export Data can be accessed under Reports from the left panel.

Client Notes Data, Client Relationship Data and Contact Address Details reports can be generated and exported to .csv and can then be opened from the Downloads area.