Best Alternatives to Onesource Income Tax for 1065 Partnership Filings?

Thanks for the detailed response! We've heard good things about CCH Axcess but weren't sure about the transition difficulty. How long would you estimate it takes for staff to get comfortable with it coming from Onesource? And does their support have actual human beings who understand partnership allocations when you call?

Coming from Onesource, I'd say most preparers get comfortable with the basics of Axcess within 2-3 weeks. For more complex partnership allocations and special situations, maybe 4-6 weeks to feel truly confident. The big advantage is the interface is more intuitive. Their support team is definitely staffed with actual tax professionals who understand partnership allocations, not just generic tech support. They have dedicated partnership specialists available during busy season, which makes a huge difference when you're dealing with complex issues like special allocations or built-in gains.

Does it integrate directly with tax prep software or is it standalone? And how does it handle special allocations and guaranteed payments? That's where we keep running into issues with our current setup.

I'm intrigued but skeptical - there are so many "AI" tools these days that overpromise. Does it actually understand partnership tax concepts or is it just doing basic math checks? Our 1065s are pretty complex with tiered partnerships.

It works as a standalone review tool that you can use alongside any tax software, so you don't need to replace your primary system. You can export your workpapers and the completed 1065 for review or upload them directly through their interface. For special allocations and guaranteed payments, it's surprisingly good at checking these against operating agreements and flagging inconsistencies. It actually compares the language in your partnership agreements against the allocations you've entered to identify potential mismatches.

Wait, this is actually a thing? How does it work - do they just sit on hold for you? I literally wasted 3 hours on hold with the IRS last week trying to resolve a partnership EIN issue.

This seems too good to be true. The IRS wait times are legendary. I've tried calling about 754 elections and gave up after 2+ hours. Are you sure they're actually connecting to real IRS agents and not some third-party service?

They basically have a system that navigates the IRS phone tree and waits on hold for you. When they reach an actual IRS agent, you get a call to connect with them. It's that simple - they just handle the hold time so you can keep working. Yes, they connect you with actual IRS agents - not intermediaries or third parties. I spoke directly with an IRS partnership specialist about our 754 election issue and got the guidance we needed. It's the real IRS, you just don't have to waste your day on hold.

Did you have any data migration issues? We have 10+ years of client data in Onesource and I'm worried about losing historical information. Were you able to bring over basis info and carryforwards?

Data migration was our biggest headache. Most basics transferred okay, but partnership basis information had to be manually verified for every partner. We lost some of the historical allocation details and had to rebuild them. Carryforwards like capital losses and charitable contributions were particularly problematic - about 25% had errors we had to fix manually. If you do switch, I highly recommend running parallel systems for a year and comparing outputs before fully committing. Budget extra staff time for data verification during the transition.

I've used both extensively. For partnerships specifically, Lacerte is significantly better - especially for complex allocations and multi-tiered partnerships. The additional cost pays for itself in time savings and reduced errors. ProSeries struggles with more complex 1065s and the data entry flow isn't as intuitive.