--- title: "Software for fiduciaries and accountants ยท Elchi Studios" description: "Receipts that arrive without chasing: a website, a client portal and business email for fiduciaries, run on our own servers in Switzerland and the EU." url: https://elchi.dev/en/loesungen/branchen/treuhand language: en --- Fiduciaries and accountants # Receipts that arrive without you chasing them. A fiduciary office rarely loses its time on the bookkeeping itself, but before it: collecting receipts and documents. We build websites, portals and email that shorten that path, and run them on our own servers in Switzerland and the EU. ## Where the time goes ### Receipts arrive late and incomplete EXPERTsuisse surveyed fiduciary firms and their clients in 2021 and 2022. By that survey, around 46 per cent of clients still handle their finances and accounts mainly on paper. In the office that means folders, envelopes, photos by email, and before every year-end a round of chasing what is missing. ### Documents travel as ordinary attachments Salary statements, tax papers and bank statements often travel by email. In the same survey, 51 per cent of fiduciary firms said in 2021 that they used no extranet. Confidentiality adds weight: under the revised Data Protection Act, anyone who wilfully discloses secret personal data learned in their profession can be fined up to CHF 250,000 on complaint (Art. 62 FADP). That covers professions outside the professional secrecy of Art. 321 of the Criminal Code too. ### Deadlines bunch the work together Since 1 January 2025, VAT returns can only be filed electronically through the Federal Tax Administration's portal (Art. 123 VAT Ordinance). The path to the tax authority is digital; the path from the client to your office often is not, and the gap gets closed by phone before the deadline. ## What we build instead ### A website whose enquiries arrive. A form for new mandates that asks for legal form, scope and deadlines and lands in the admin area and in your inbox. CHF 6,000 fixed price, then CHF 300 a month for running and keeping it current. No cookie banner, because the visitor statistics store no IP address and set no cookie. ### A client portal with secure sign-in. One place where clients upload receipts, see what is still missing and collect finished documents. Sign-in runs through EAuth, our sign-in for applications: with a passkey or a password, and a second factor for everyone if you want it. EAuth itself is free and has no user limit. ### Business email in Switzerland. EMX (Beta) on your domain, messages stored encrypted in Geneva, shared mailboxes such as info@ at no extra licence, in Outlook, Apple Mail and on the phone. CHF 4 per mailbox and month. ### A slow process replaced. As a mandate: one goal, one period, one price and what will be measurably different at the end, on a single page. Each week you get a short update with figures. ## What you can expect from us **Data location.** Stored data sits on our own servers at European providers in Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and France. The exceptions are named on our Trust page. The most important one: notification mails, such as the message about a new enquiry from the contact form, are sent by Resend, a US service that stores them there. **Contract.** A data processing agreement under Art. 9 FADP and Art. 28 GDPR is part of our legal texts. It names every sub-processor with its location. We announce a new one at least 14 days ahead for websites and 30 days ahead for EAuth. **Retention.** Books and receipts must be kept for ten years (Art. 958f Code of Obligations). Electronic storage is allowed where integrity and time of storage can be proven (Art. 9 Ordinance on Business Records). EMX is not an archive in that sense. If a portal is to keep receipts, we write those requirements into the offer before building. **Export.** Accounts, mailboxes, texts, images and data can be exported in full at any time, without asking us. **What is missing.** We hold no ISO 27001 or SOC 2 certification and have had no independent security audit. ## Questions we hear ### Is our data stored only in Switzerland? No. We store data in Switzerland and the EU. With EMX, messages are stored encrypted in Geneva and the database in Frankfurt, with copies in Nuremberg and Paris. If you need a Swiss-only location, tell us early and we will say whether we can provide it. ### Does the portal replace our accounting software? No. The portal collects receipts and documents and passes them on. The bookkeeping stays in the software you use today. ### What does a client portal cost? There is no list price; it depends on the process, not the hour. You receive a one-page offer with goal, period and price. That page is the contract. ### Can EMX cover the ten-year retention duty? No. EMX is not an audit-proof archive for business records. For retention you still need an archive that meets the Ordinance on Business Records. ## Tell us which process costs you time A few sentences are enough. Within two working days someone from the team that would replace it replies. Write to us at [elchi.dev/en/kontakt](https://elchi.dev/en/kontakt) or call +41 58 513 63 11, weekdays from 8 to 18. [Talk to us](https://elchi.dev/en/kontakt) [+41 58 513 63 11](tel:+41585136311) [contact@elchi.dev](mailto:contact@elchi.dev) ## Sources 1. [EXPERTsuisse digitalisation study 2021/2022, summarised in KMU-Magazin](https://www.kmu-magazin.ch/wissen/digitalisierung-transformation/heterogener-entwicklungsstand-digitaler-finanzprozesse) 2. [Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP), Art. 9 and 62](https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/2022/491/de) 3. [Online commentary on Art. 62 FADP](https://onlinekommentar.ch/de/kommentare/dsg62) 4. [Swiss Criminal Code, Art. 321](https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/54/757_781_799/de) 5. [VAT Ordinance, Art. 123](https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/2009/828/de) 6. [WEKA, electronic VAT return](https://www.weka.ch/themen/finanzen-controlling/mehrwertsteuer/buchfuehrung-und-abrechnung/article/elektronische-mehrwertsteuerabrechnung-der-neue-standard/) 7. [Code of Obligations, Art. 958f](https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/27/317_321_377/de) 8. [Ordinance on Business Records, Art. 9](https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/2002/216/de) 9. Elchi Studios: [websites.elchi.dev/de/preis](https://websites.elchi.dev/de/preis), [elchi.dev/de/eauth](https://elchi.dev/de/eauth), [elchi.dev/de/emx](https://elchi.dev/de/emx), [elchi.dev/de/loesungen/e-mail](https://elchi.dev/de/loesungen/e-mail), [elchi.dev/de/engineering](https://elchi.dev/de/engineering), [elchi.dev/de/vertrauen](https://elchi.dev/de/vertrauen), [elchi.dev/de/ueber-uns](https://elchi.dev/de/ueber-uns), [legal.elchi.dev/de/avv](https://legal.elchi.dev/de/avv), [elchi.dev/en/kontakt](https://elchi.dev/en/kontakt) [See all industries](https://elchi.dev/en/loesungen/branchen)