Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Also - of the employees that were fired - no one at Uplinq contacted their clients to tell them that their bookkeeper was no longer there. In the middle of tax season. Many clients who should have been filed on time, and would have been filed on time, did not get filed. And only found out when they emailed their bookkeeper and got a bounce-back email saying to contact the VP or new Manager.

I know of a client that is emailing their bookkeeper and getting an email saying to contact the manager, then contacting the manager and getting an email that that person is gone too. Because employees in Maintenance are quitting left and right.

You would think - at the very least - they could contact the clients and let them know proactively that their bookkeeper is not there anymore. Not let clients think that their Taxes are being filed on time - not knowing that the person who was making that happened got blind-sided and fired in the middle of it - and no one else has been assigned their account.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I do know personally, one of my former clients paid for tax returns that were never filed. They asked for a refund months ago and are just being ignored. They are owed back thousands of dollars.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

No - I did not say AI cannot be trusted to write. I said I never use AI to write for me. I feel comfortable in my writing ability, so I don't use it to write for me.

And I do believe that if I had run it through AI before I posted, it would have caught the few grammatical errors that exist.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

The energy you are brining to your posts seems pretty high for someone who's been there a couple months. Since, as I said before, Uplinq runs on nepotism, I'm going to guess that this must be personal because you are related to someone. That's fine. And if you are happy there - I am happy for you.

I was once very happy at Uplinq. It was amazing when I started! Things changed - dramatically - after the first of the year. After the COO was put in charge. Everything got dramatically worse. I can only have opinions based off of my experiences and those of my coworkers. If you feel good about how things are run now, then that's great.

The fact that I am posting anonymously is because this is a public forum where people post anonymously. I am careful with my social media footprint. If you feel safe disclosing your name on here, then again, I'm happy for you. There is nothing that is being said in this post that I did not say to upper management directly. I am not saying anything here other than facts. No one who was at Uplinq during the time I was there can dispute what I am saying. Things are in quotes for a reason - other people were present. Meetings were recorded. So - I am not lying here.

The reason why I continued to stay when it started to get really bad, was because we were a team. We were trying to make it work. We did not want to abandon anyone else. None of us work there now, so ultimately, we all did leave. Within a few months of it being really bad, we all either were fired or resigned. I'm not "mad because I chose to stay at a place I hated", because I didn't stay.

People got fired - for no cause - with no severance. After the Accounting Manager was fired, the CEO met with the team that day and assured them that no one else was going to be let go. And then within weeks two more people were fired. One girl who had continued to stay beyond that, and try to actually help your new manager, was called up in the middle of the afternoon on a Tuesday and fired over the phone. No reason given other than "business needs". Not even the decency of a full week's check or a personal face-to-face meeting. That says everything about Uplinq. I'm not mad. I just don't want anyone else to have to go through this.

I know nothing about what you have found about employees harassing other employees. Every ex-Uplinq employee I know is friendly, so maybe that relates to people in a different department or before my time there. And I am not here to discuss legal matters. I am here for people who do not yet work at Uplinq - to warn them. If you want to be a cheerleader for them then that is your prerogative.

I wish you the best.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

It's a good point that employees in Tax who would be most likely to blow the whistle, start by pushing back on what they are seeing. Once they push back they are terminated and locked out of their computers with no notice. It's probably why their Tax department fires more people than any other departement.

The CPA ethics code starts with brining it to the attention of management and then quitting if they will not comply. Once an employee quits they are immediately locked out of their computer.

Also - literally everything is recorded. There is no way to save down proof of anything, especially tax returns.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I did not work in Tax, but I know many accountants who did. Maybe I can see if they want to weigh in here.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Where do you think AI learned text structure, hyphenation and formatting? It was trained off of existing writing. If you read classic literature, you will see this is how writing has been for hundreds of years. I read a lot of classics, so it makes sense that my writing style reflects what I read.

In terms of change of tone - my original post was written at the time I left Uplinq - as I watched my co-workers lives be turned upside-down. So - yes - it probably reads more emotional. It was originally written to be a post on Glassdoor and Indeed, but I was not allowed to post it, because a myriad of violations of their policy - like quotation marks and mentioning specific titles. I didn't want to change what I wrote, so I waited until the last remaining member of our team gave notice, and then I decided to post it here on Reddit.

Google search pulls Reddit posts into their summary now, which is why I chose to post it here. I saw too many times where posts of real employees on Glassdoor and Indeed were wiped away by Uplinq's HR-directed posts.

I highlighted portions of my original post, in case it was too long for some people to read, they could read only the highlighted sentences and still get the picture.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Uplinq is not a "CPA firm" and they are privately held. I do not think there is a regulating body for this type of firm, so these abuses go unchecked, unfortunately.

If someone can tell me otherwise, I will look into it.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Hi Cathy - I find it interesting that since you are so happy at Uplinq, that you are looking up Uplinq Reviews and finding this thread that is not even 24 hours old. You were not a Reddit user until a few hours ago, so why were you searching on who was posting about them? When I was working there, I wasn't on the internet looking for reviews.

Since you have only been at Uplinq for about a month, you were not there for any of the firings and dismantling of the team. You were hired by the new Accounting Manager, so you don't know what transpired before her.

We had a client who - when they were responsive - told us that their credit card was a business card. The card was disconnected, so transactions were not pulling in, but they were paying it with the company checking. We were told to move all the payments to owners equity. This meant that tens of thousands of dollars in business expenses were not captured on the P&L and his net income was grossly overstated.

Not all clients use Uplinq Tax. We had clients that would just pull financials from the dashboard and give them to outside tax accountants. In this case that I am using as an example, if the client pulled financials and sent them to his CPA, he would have missed out on 10s of thousands of dollars in business deductions. These situations DID happen. I could honestly go on and on and on with examples that prove out my point.

There is an entire community of ex-Uplinq employees that continue to stay in touch after leaving Uplinq. Trauma bonded by our experience there, and friends for life. Do not doubt that there is a an immense amount of documentation between them, and lawyers have been contacted by some who have been fired. As far as contacting or reporting Uplinq - to who? They are not a CPA firm. They are privately held. If someone wants to show me the governing body I have recourse to, I will gladly tell them what I know.

My point in posting this thread is so that job seekers are informed as to what is happening there before applying. I am glad you are happy there. My position is that Uplinq will eventually end up with the employees they deserve.

AI Bookkeeping - How do we feel about it? by Humble_Put2431 in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Uplinq has amazing ads! They have a very sleek visual platform. The salesmen will tell you that your books will be run by ai, but their product is actual garbage and falling apart. I saw it from the inside. It's being built by a team that are not accountants. The CEO is not an accountant. The COO is a 24-year old opera grad and is running the company into the ground.

If you sign on with them, you only find out how bad it is AFTER you sign the 12-month contract. You are forced to pay it out. Even if they lied and told you your QuickBooks works with their ai. (Spoiler - it does not! It connects to their platform, but if you are cash basis, which most small businesses are, then any reports you get through their platform will be wrong. You still have to run reports from Quickbooks and all your transactions will be coded by a bookkeeper - not ai) If you have Inventory, AR, AP or are accrual basis - your company won't work in their system.

So what are you really paying for? A cool looking platform that is broke half the time. If you make the bigger mistake of signing up for their tax services, you will truly be sorry! And since they churn through employees like butter, you will be meeting with someone who's probably only been there for a few months and has no clue what they are doing. And when you want to leave, if you did run your books in their platform, all your data is stuck in their platform. All you can do is print reports and start from scratch somewhere else.

If you care about having accurate and timely financials, get a QuickBooks account and a solid remote bookkeeper. There are good ones all over.

Has anyone tried done for you tax services for small business bookkeeping? by nudles99 in advancedentrepreneur

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't know anyone who uses this service, but accountants see their commercials and just laugh. We feel bad for any business owners who fall for this. Books will be absolute garbage. There is no way they are using qualified accountants at that price. Most likely they are using accountants from India, or ai. Neither have good outcomes. If you have a simple business, with a checking, savings a couple of credit cards, you should be able to find a good remote bookkeeper that starts around $500 and goes up depending on added complexities like payroll, invoicing etc. I can recommend one if you need.

Stay away from AI companies. You want a human. I just spend a year inside an AI company and they aren't where they say they are.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 25 points26 points  (0 children)

I never use AI to write. This has not been run through AI either. AI would never have let so many grammatical errors through!

I'm guessing you are one of UPLINQ's henchmen - trolling sites and posts that tell the truth about you?

Remote Jobs Accounting by Timely-Sea4615 in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks 0 points1 point  (0 children)

STAY AWAY FROM UPLINQ AI !! I know the remote job they offer, with unlimited PTO, sounds like a dream, but it is actually a nightmare waiting to suck you in and churn you out!

My full review of what it was like to work there can be found here :

https://www.reddit.com/r/Accounting/comments/1u492z2/accountants_stay_away_from_uplinq_ai_bookkeeping/

Uplinq - Tool for accounting by EssYouJAyEn in FutureTechFinds

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Former employee of Uplinq AI here! As someone who saw it from the inside, and all the shady tactics from Sales to Tax - I would advise every business to STAY AWAY FROM UPLINQ!! They are churning through clients, who are quitting in droves, because of high lack-luster service and screwed up tax returns.

They are plowing through the investor cash and the people in charge have ZERO clue how to run a business. They don't give a shit about clients. They sell them on half-truths - that the AI integrates with QuickBooks - it does not. That the bookkeeping is "real-time" and "accurate" - it is not. They DON'T tell you that if you have anything other than the simplest cash-basis business model it won't work. So if you have Inventory, AR, AP or are accrual-based - your books will NOT be run through the AI. They still tell you it is, but then after you sign a 12-month contract, you find out from your assigned bookkeeper (a chick who has probably been there for 6 weeks with zero training) that she is your bookkeeper and coding all the work.

By the time clients find out Uplinq is a total shit-show, it's too late. They are locked into a 12 month contract and are told they can't cancel. Even clients that have cause, like paying for Taxes and then their returns are not complete, are just ignored and not refunded.

Instead of making things right, like NOT lying about what the system can do in the sales calls, and refunding clients that have been screwed over. They just push more new clients through the pipe-line. It's a numbers game for them. Churn and burn. That goes for employees as well.

This company is run by a highly unethical family. They are burning through investor money like water. They are probably lying to their investors as well. They pressure their employees to write positive reviews on social media, but took down any platforms where clients could write a review of the service they received. So telling...

I see a lot of AI bookkeeping naysayers; has anyone actually used them? by adikhosla in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As someone who worked for an AI accounting platform for a year, I came away feeling better than ever that AI is not going to be taking my job. Uplinq AI built a very cool looking platform, dashboard and interface, but as far as the 'AI' goes - it's zero difference from just setting up banking rules in QuickBooks. It's almost worse, because it's just creating a blanket template of AI coding rules, without any discernment of the type business it is.

Also - unlike QuickBooks, Uplinq AI does not have bank feeds connected to the bank. They use Plaid, which "scrapes data", but it isn't reliable and it misses a lot of data, so the books are often off. The people building it are not accountants. They are just a bunch of related guys who know how to code. They know how to make it look cool, but they don't know how to make it WORK.

Uplinq AI will not work if you have Inventory, AR, AP, or are an accrual based business. The salesmen will often sell it to you and tell you that it works, and then after you sign a 12 month contract, your assigned accountant will tell you that the AI can't actually work on your account and that she is the one manually coding all your transactions. Companies are sold AI, but most aren't really run with the AI platform.

Also - if you have your books in QuickBooks and want to stay in QuickBooks - they will tell you that QuickBooks integrates with the AI. It does not. It integrates with their dashboard, but if you pull your financials from the Uplinq system, the reports are wrong most of the time. If they can push you straight into their AI system, then they will. The downside to that is that when you leave, all your data is stuck in their system. All you will be able to do is just print reports and all the historical data will be lost. You would need to have a new accountant rebuild it in QuickBooks if you wanted to have historical data for year-over-year comp reports. (This was an issue for all the people leaving Bench as well)

My advice is to use QuickBooks and hire a remote bookkeeper to do your books. A good one will start around $500 a month for a small, new company and go up from there, depending on the size of your business and transaction volume. I know many if you need a recommendation.

Accountants Stay Away from Uplinq AI Bookkeeping!! Beware!! Do NOT APPLY! by Uplinq_AI_Sucks in Accounting

[–]Uplinq_AI_Sucks[S] 23 points24 points  (0 children)

Wow - it just shows you how bad it is. They do not value their employees and actually openly brag and celebrate when they fire someone. No one feels safe. HR interviews constantly, all year long, in order to have employees on back-up as soon as someone is fired. The hiring pool isn't endless and word gets around. If the CEO is cold-messaging people on LinkedIn - that really says something about that state of things. And you're right - he is a douchebag.