Tax season is here.
Many of us are in the midst of scrambling to collect the tax forms that arrive via snail mail and electronically. Once we believe we have all the forms that are required to complete our taxes, we log into one of the myriad tax preparation software applications on the market, send our documents to a CPA, or walk into a financial services company, such as H&R Block.
While preparing taxes may have become easier over the years with the proliferation of programs like TurboTax and TaxAct, it’s fair to say the tax code (over 74,000 pages) has become that much more complicated, with thousands of changes each year.
So, how can companies and the software they develop keep up with the enormous volume of ever-changing data? How can they can uncover more credits and deductions for clients, based on each individual’s unique situation?
IBM Watson. H&R Block recently teamed up with IBM to incorporate the cognitive computing technology into their tax preparation software, which is leveraged at H&R Block retail locations. In addition to H&R Block tax professionals using software powered by Watson to help reduce tax liability and maximize refunds, clients can also follow along on a separate screen, making the experience more engaging and transparent.
David Kenny, senior vice president of IBM’s Watson business, and Bill Cobb, chief executive officer of H&R Block, recently sat down with CNBC to discuss the partnership.
If you are interested in using Watson to improve internal/external operations and make better use of your or your clients’ data, please fill out the “contact us” form in the bottom of this page. We’d love to share how we have helped several companies, across different industries, make use of IBM’s wonderful cognitive and AI solutions.
