White-label full-stack CAS (Client Accounting Services) delivered under your CPA firm's brand. Bookkeeping, AP, AR, payroll, close, and reporting for your clients – staffed offshore, reviewed by your US team, invoiced by your firm. Typical CAS margin jumps from 15–20% to 45–55%.
CAS scope
CAS (Client Accounting Services) has been the fastest-growing practice area in US CPA firms for a decade, but it's also the most margin-constrained. A typical CAS engagement bills $1,500–$5,000 per month per client. Behind that, a US-based senior bookkeeper handling 30–40 CAS clients costs $75k–$95k loaded. At scale, you end up with a practice generating meaningful revenue but barely-healthy margin. Most firms we meet running CAS at 15–25% margin with US staffing.
Shifting CAS production offshore rebuilds the economics entirely. A senior offshore CAS specialist handling 40–60 clients at $2,400–$3,000/month fully loaded produces equivalent output at roughly one-third the cost per client. Practice margin typically jumps from 15–25% to 45–60%, without changing what you charge the end client. The margin compounds as the practice scales because each additional CAS client adds roughly the same revenue but incremental labor cost under $75/month in offshore staffing (versus $200–$300 in US).
The thing that makes CAS valuable to end clients isn't the bookkeeping – it's the monthly advisory call with the CPA partner who knows their business. That relationship stays with your US staff. Offshore CAS staff produce everything that feeds into the advisory conversation (clean books, monthly reports, KPI dashboards, variance flags) but don't touch the client relationship. Your partners spend advisory time on strategy, not on verifying the bank reconciliation tied out.
Most firms start with 1–2 offshore CAS specialists handling 10–30 of their smaller, more process-heavy clients (the ones that take the most bookkeeper time but generate average CAS fees). Within 6 months, the model expands to cover the bulk of the CAS book. Within 12 months, US CAS managers are focused purely on advisory, client relationships, and new-client onboarding – with offshore staff handling all production.
Sits on the same infrastructure as offshore bookkeeping, AP, payroll, and close. For the full CPA firm engagement economics see our CPA firm page. Offshore accounting overview on the homepage.
FAQ
Only via the §1.150.040 disclosure in your engagement letter (which is required ethically). Day to day, offshore staff work under your firm's brand, email, software logins, and templates. Your clients interact with your US-based CAS managers.
40–60 clients for a senior. Simpler clients (service businesses, under 100 monthly transactions) push toward 60. More complex clients (multi-entity, ecommerce, construction) push toward 30–40.
Production and data prep for advisory. Client-facing advisory conversations stay with your US CAS partners. Offshore staff produce the analysis, KPI packages, and cash flow models that feed into those conversations.
QBO is the most common (55–60% of our CAS book). Xero second. Sage Intacct and NetSuite for larger clients. Bill.com, Ramp, Gusto as the typical app stack. We work in whatever your firm has standardized on.
Yes. CAS onboarding is one of our most common engagements – historical cleanup, chart of accounts rebuild, software configuration, process documentation. Typically 2–6 weeks per client depending on state of existing books.
CAS engagement is a portfolio model – one offshore specialist handling many clients with common processes, tools, and templates. Individual bookkeeper engagements are usually client-specific. Portfolio model scales better for CPA firms with 15+ CAS clients.
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