How to collect tax documents from clients securely
Stop chasing email attachments. Set up one upload link per client, a closing date, sorted folders and a record of every upload in a single afternoon.
If you want to know how to collect tax documents from clients securely, stop asking for attachments and give each client one upload link with written instructions. Files land in a folder for that client, a closing date ends the trickle, and you keep a record of who sent what. You can set the whole routine up in an afternoon, and it works for a small practice or a freelance bookkeeper.
This article walks through the flow in the order you will build it: prepare, collect, return, and keep a record.
Why email attachments fail at tax time
Email was built for messages, not for collecting a hundred sets of documents. Every season the same problems show up:
A client sends three of the five documents you need, and you only notice a week later.
Scans are huge, and the message bounces or the attachment never arrives.
Files arrive as
scan0042.pdfandIMG_8812.jpg, so you rename them by hand.Documents sit across your inbox, a colleague's inbox and a download folder, with no record of who sent what and when.
Email also gives you no place to put instructions that the client will actually read before sending. The fix is to move the collection step out of the inbox and into a page built for uploads. If you want the background on why sharing files and storing them are different jobs, read file sharing vs cloud storage.
Prepare: write an intake checklist for each client
Before you create any link, list what each client normally sends. A salaried employee, a sole trader with a few clients, and a small company each have a different list. Keep one short checklist per client type, then copy and adjust it per client.
A typical checklist names the document, the period it covers and who produces it. For example: income statements from employers, bank and card statements for the year, invoices you issued, receipts for expenses, last year's return, and anything that changed since last year such as a new address, a new business or a sold asset. What goes on your list depends on your clients and your country, so build it from your own engagement process and your own advisers' guidance, not from a template you found online.
Last year's list is the best start. Copy it, remove what no longer applies, and add what the client told you changed.
How to collect tax documents from clients securely with one link each
This is the heart of the flow. A file request is a public upload page. The client opens the link, reads your instructions, drags files onto the page, and types a first name and an email address. No account is needed.
In Tarkle, open the Requests page, click New request, and fill in the Title and the Description. The description is where your checklist goes, and it appears on the upload page under the title. Create one request per client and title it with the client's name, not with a tax identifier. You can then send the link yourself, or use Send by email on the request to email up to 100 addresses at once; each email carries the link, the instructions and the deadline. This is what file requests are for.
One honest limit: the link is shared by everyone who has it, and Tarkle does not check that the person uploading is the intended client. The upload page has no password. Send each link only to its client and do not post it anywhere public.
On the Free plan one request can be active at a time. A practice with many clients will want one request per client, which works on Pro, Agency and lifetime plans. On Free, you can run a single shared request for everyone, because each uploader's files go into their own subfolder named with their name and email.
Put your firm's name on the upload page
Clients are cautious about uploading financial documents to a page they do not recognise. The upload page shows your logo, your workspace name and your brand color, so the client sees your firm and not a generic tool. If you have set up a custom domain, the link uses your own address, for example files.yourfirm.com. Branding and custom domain are both on the Free plan.
You set the logo and color once under Branding, and every request page uses them. See custom branding for what appears where.
Set a closing date and a size limit
Without a closing date, documents trickle in until you start work and then keep arriving. Pick a date, tell clients in the instructions, and let the page enforce it.
In the Create new request dialog, the Deadline field takes a calendar date. After that date the link stops working. If a good client is a day late, Open request reopens it. The deadline has no time of day, so choose a date a few days before your own cutoff.
The Upload limit on each request sets the most one visitor can upload at once. That is a total per submission, not a limit per file, and it stops an oversized batch of scans from filling your storage. The plan's own maximum per file still applies. Details are on the deadlines and size limits for requests page.
Let every client's files arrive sorted
The second reason intake takes so long is sorting. In the dialog, Folder for uploaded files lets you pick where uploads go. Tarkle creates a subfolder named after the request inside it, and a further subfolder for each uploader, named "Uploads from" followed by their name and email. A client who uploads twice with the same email lands in the same subfolder.
So a tidy structure is a folder for the tax year, with one request per client inside it. Pick existing folders only, because the dialog cannot create a new one, so create your tax-year folder first. If you do not choose a folder, uploads go into an automatic folder called File requests.
Deleting a request does not delete the files, so closing out the season does not remove anything you still need.
Send finished documents back with a password and an expiry date
Collecting is half the job. The finished return, a summary letter or a signed engagement document also travels by link, so do not send it as a plain attachment.
Create a transfer, and in the access step tick Password protected and choose an Expiration date. After that date the link stops working. Send the password by a different channel than the link, for example a text message or a call. If you sent a link to the wrong person, you can disable it in one click. The features to read are password protection and link expiration.
Password protection is documented for transfers, and not for the upload page of a file request. Keep that in mind when you decide what to send as a transfer.
Remind clients without chasing
Tarkle does not send automatic reminders to clients who have not uploaded, so build the habit into your calendar. A simple routine is enough:
Day 1: send the link by email with the closing date in the first line.
One week later: check which clients have uploaded, and send a short reminder to those who have not.
Three days before closing: a second, shorter reminder, plus one line saying what happens after the date.
Closing day: close the requests and send each client a note listing what is still missing.
To see who has uploaded, open the Responses tab on the Requests page. Each row shows the person's name, email, number of items, size and time, and new submissions carry a "New" badge for 24 hours. By default you also get an email when files arrive, and the uploader receives a confirmation email from your workspace saying their files were received.
Keep a record of who uploaded and when
When a client says "I sent that in March", you want an answer that is not your memory. Each submission through a request adds an entry to the activity log with the uploader's name and email, the number of files, the total size, an approximate location and the date and time. The log is searchable and you can export it as a CSV.
The log records one entry per submission, not one per file, and it does not list individual file names. Use it alongside your own engagement records, not in place of them. How long you keep client documents is a question for your own advisers and local rules.
Where a practice-management suite fits better
This flow solves intake: collecting documents and returning finished ones. Tarkle is a place to collect and send files, not a practice-management system, and it makes no claim of regulatory certification. Bigger firms with deep compliance needs may prefer a dedicated practice-management suite, and that is a sensible choice for them. For a small practice or a freelance bookkeeper who mostly needs documents to arrive in order, a file request per client is often enough.
Set this up this afternoon
Write one checklist per client type and copy it per client.
Create a tax-year folder, then one request per client with the checklist in the description and a closing date.
Add your logo and color, and a custom domain if you have one, so the page carries your firm's name.
Send each link by email, put the reminder dates in your calendar, and watch the Responses tab.
Return finished documents as password-protected transfers with an expiry date.
The Free plan covers a single shared request, and one request per client needs a paid plan. Start for free, or see what else is available under features.
