Ernst & Young (EY) has been recognized as a WBA Winner for Process Improvement in the World Business Awards 2022. The World Business Award for Process Improvement [BPI] recognizes organizations that have successfully implemented initiatives that demonstrate excellence in business process improvement.

At EY, their purpose is to build a better working world. The focus is on creating long-term value for clients, people and society and building trust in the capital markets. Through their four integrated service lines; Assurance, Consulting, Strategy and Transactions, and Tax, EY help clients to capitalize on new opportunities and assess and manage risk to deliver responsible growth. EY’s high-performing, multidisciplinary teams help them fulfil regulatory requirements, keep investors informed and meet stakeholder needs. Enabled by data and technology, over 300,000 diverse people in over 150 countries work together to provide trust through assurance and help clients grow, transform, and operate. EY works continuously to improve the quality of services, investing in people and innovation. Hence EY is proud to work with others – from clients to wider stakeholders, using their knowledge, skills and experience to help fulfil their purpose and create positive change.

At the beginning of 2018, EY Tax started to pursue an aggressive agenda designed to help address their overarching needs. EY identified the need for overall process improvement that considers the people, process and technology elements. Hence, EY Tax needed a proactive, forward-looking approach to respond to their client’s evolving needs and demands. EY recognized the need to change what they deliver and how they deliver, in an agile manner, to help their clients become future-ready. EY’s answer to transforming EY Tax’s operating model to meet today’s competing demands is ‘EY Tax Smart Delivery’.

Launched in 2018, Tax Smart Delivery is EY’s mandatory multi-year initiative that has transformed how EY deliver tax services to bring greater value to clients, people and their business. Tax Smart Delivery is one of EY’s most unique and large-scale transformation initiatives and is in alignment with EY’s global strategy – the NextWave ambition of driving client-centricity with data and technology-enabled service offerings. The initiative combines the power of Process, People and Technology and aims to transform the way EY delivers Tax services by building a standardized global service delivery model that is optimally automated through the Global Tax Platform (GTP) and other enabling technologies.

Tax Smart Delivery is enabled by three pillars Standardization, Automation and Centralization. The EY Tax Smart Delivery standardizes processes globally and across the board through Runbooks, and its automation efforts are powered by the EY Global Tax Platform and other enabling technologies. The third pillar, centralization, is reflected in their services that draw on an exceptional, diverse and scalable talent pool across. Over the years, EY has become a more globally connected organization with a strong culture of teaming — and this is a real advantage for EY clients and people alike. The initiative very uniquely brings together the collective power of our people, processes, and technology to make EY Tax more strategic, digitally advanced, and insightful. Tax Smart Delivery assists in differentiating EY’s offerings and elevates the EY client experience.

During the first phase of roll-out, Tax Smart Delivery successfully transformed and improved Tax processes in four major countries – the US, the UK, Australia and Germany. Since then, ten more countries have been onboarded into Tax Smart Delivery with a significant impact on the way EY Tax operates in these countries. Evidently, EY’s Account Margin on their top 50 client accounts has increased to 31.4% in FY22. Additionally, EY’s pace of centralization has been increasing steadily as their total hours of Global Delivery Services(GDS) participation increased by 33% in client engagements from FY20 – FY22, and as a result, GDS client service hours have increased by 125%. As of August 2022, EY has 2704 clients and EY Tax teams in 156 countries using the Global Tax Platform (GTP).

Beyond numbers, Tax Smart Delivery also provides value to their people by providing more time for Tax professionals to focus on high-value activities and opportunities. EY’s Tax Smart Delivery has also benefited EY Tax teams as the initiative provides a single source of information with all data available in one place, as well as enables teams to focus on the growth of business in the local market. Moreover, the initiative has successfully provided high-value service with excellent quality at a competitive cost, thereby maximizing value to EY’s clients.