Accounting firm pricing is under more pressure this financial year than it has been in a decade. AML/CTF Tranche 2 obligations commenced on 1 July 2026, and the Federal Budget changes to CGT, trusts, and negative gearing are to be rolled out over the next 3 years. That’s a lot of confusion for your clients, which means more work for you.
If you've been putting off a proper repricing conversation, FY27 is the year that decision catches up with you. The good news is that repricing doesn't need to feel like a fight with your clients, or with your own conscience.
This guide sets out eight practical pricing strategies for accounting firms that want to move away from guesswork and towards a model that reflects the real complexity, risk and value of the work.
Key takeaways
- Price around entities and complexity, not just hours. Consumption and entity-based pricing scales naturally as transactions, staff numbers and risk profiles change.
- AML/CTF compliance needs its own line item. A flat, upfront company fee covers the ongoing due diligence work Tranche 2 now requires, rather than absorbing it into existing fees.
- Education builds the case for your price before you ask for it. Clients who hear from you throughout the year push back far less at renewal time.
- Confidence is a pricing strategy in itself. Firms that believe in their pricing lose fewer clients over it than firms that apologise for every increase.
- Repricing works best as a habit, not a once-a-year event. Put it on the same calendar as your lodgement deadlines.
Why accounting firm pricing needs a rethink in FY27
Most pricing models for accounting firms were built for a simpler compliance and regulatory environment. But the environment has changed.
Firms providing designated services now carry ongoing customer due diligence, risk assessment and monitoring obligations that didn't exist in previous years, and compliance is not optional. Civil penalties for getting AML/CTF compliance wrong can run up to over $30 million dollars per contravention. AUSTRAC may also issue enforceable undertakings, infringement notices, and remedial directions.
There are also significant budget changes to negative gearing and CGT that will impact individual and business clients in different ways, prompting a slew of new planning, paperwork, and consultations on your part as their accountant. You’ll need an actual FY27 accountant’s survival guide to get through it all.
Most importantly, none of that work is free to deliver. If your pricing hasn't moved to reflect it, you're funding a new regulatory obligation out of your own margin. The eight strategies below are about closing that gap, while also giving you a stronger approach to pricing accounting services more broadly, not just the AML/CTF piece.
1. Ground your pricing in your firm's own numbers, not client guilt
Before you touch a single client fee, work out what your firm actually needs to earn. Map your team costs, overheads and a genuine profit margin, then use that figure as your baseline rather than last year's invoice.
Many firm owners hesitate to raise prices because they feel they'll upset clients who are already under financial strain. That instinct is understandable, but it often means the firm absorbs rising AML/CTF, wage, and insurance costs indefinitely.
Instead, treat your target profit margin as a fixed input to your pricing model, the same way you'd treat any other cost of doing business. Reprice from there rather than from a place of guilt.
2. Educate clients all year, not just at renewal
The hardest client relationships to reprice are the ones that only ever touch your firm at lodgement time. If the engagement letter and the tax return are the only two things a client ever sees, there's no visible work to justify a higher price.
Build small, regular touchpoints across the year:
- A budget update after announcements that affect the client.
- A proactive flag when transaction volumes are climbing.
- A June 30 game plan sent every November or March to lay out the year ahead.
None of this needs to be billable in itself. It's what makes the eventual price increase land as reasonable rather than sudden, because the client has already seen the value building throughout the year.
3. Move from time-based billing to consumption and entity-based pricing
There are various pricing models you can choose to implement, each with their own pros and cons.
Type of pricing models
| Pricing model | How the price is set | Best suited to | Main risk |
| Hourly / time-based | Hours worked (in 6-min increments) x charge-out rate. | Advisory work with undefined scope. |
|
| Flat annual fee | A flat price agreed upfront pre-engagement. | Stable and predictable clients. |
|
| Value-based | Priced to client outcome. | High-impact advisory and structuring. |
|
| Consumption / entity-based | Entity count adjusted by visible cost drivers. | Client groups whose complexity changes year to year. |
|
When it comes to accounting services pricing, a consumption and entity-based model solves both problems. Base the price on the number of entities in a client group, then adjust it against clear, visible cost drivers:
- Monthly transaction and invoice volume
- New suppliers or employees added during the year
- Payroll frequency
- Reporting frequency and bank reconciliation cadence
- Bookkeeping quality, since a poorly kept set of books shifts real work onto your team
- The client's AML/CTF risk tier, since enhanced due diligence clients need more ongoing monitoring
If transactions or entities increase, the price goes up. If they fall, it comes down. That two-way honesty is what makes clients accept the model in the first place.
4. Build AML/CTF compliance into a clear, upfront entity fee
Rather than trying to bill each individual AML/CTF search, risk assessment or monitoring task as it happens, set a flat annual fee per company that covers the ongoing due diligence work Tranche 2 requires. Invoice it upfront alongside your registered office and annual review fee.
Naming the work on the invoice matters here. A line such as "AML/CTF searches and monitoring as required under the AML/CTF Act" makes the cost tangible rather than mysterious.
A suggested structure for AML/CTF pricing is:
- $450 + GST per entity, per year, invoiced in advance at the start of the financial year. You may opt for higher rates for bigger entities.
- This covers: the annual review service, registered office provision, and any searches and work needed.
- Invoice upfront, run all your customer due diligence at the start of the year, then monitor on an ongoing basis.
- No refund if the client leaves mid-year.
This gives you:
- Predictable revenue
- No additional admin from per-search billing
- Transparency to client
- Scalability
Platforms like EngageAML are designed to run the required ongoing monitoring and risk assessment work in the background, which is what makes a flat fee sustainable rather than a guess.
EngageAML covers:
- Initial customer due diligence
- Ongoing monitoring for enhanced-risk clients
- Annual review searches most firms were already doing manually
It also integrates directly into your engagement letter process, ensuring all the right information is communicated clearly to your clients from the start.
5. Use pricing psychology in your accounting services pricing strategy
Small language choices shape how a price is received. Talking about your "price" or the client's "investment" lands differently to talking about a "fee" or a "cost", even when the number is identical.
Tiered options can help too, if used carefully. Presenting a client with a base, mid and premium option anchors their expectations around the middle tier, which is often closer to what the work is actually worth than a single take-it-or-leave-it number.
For example:
- Base-tier: ~$14,000
- Mid-tier: ~$20,000
- Top-tier: $30,000
A client currently paying ~$10,000 but should be paying around ~$15,000 will likely choose the mid-tier option, turning them into a high-value client.
This won't suit every client relationship, particularly long-standing ones built on a single trusted quote, but it's worth testing on new engagements where there's no existing anchor to work against.
6. Charge for urgency and complexity, not just for lodgement
A client who calls asking for next year's return "by next week" is asking your firm to drop other work and reorder its priorities. That has a cost, and it's reasonable to price for it.
Remember to:
- Flag the urgency loading before you start the work, not on the invoice afterwards.
- Apply the same logic to complexity, such as a trust that gradually went from a handful of transactions to over a hundred during the year.
- Get sign-off on the higher price before proceeding, so the conversation happens once rather than as a dispute later.
Being upfront about why the price has moved, before the work starts, is what keeps this feeling fair rather than punitive.
7. Use a repeatable fee calculator instead of gut-feel quoting
Quoting from memory or from what "feels about right" leads to inconsistent accounting firm pricing across your team, and it's hard to defend a price you can't explain.
A shared calculator, built around turnover, entity count, staff numbers and add-ons, keeps accounting services pricing consistent across partners and staff, rather than depending on the person who happened to take the call.
Fee calculators give firms a base rate once and then adjust automatically as a client group's turnover, entity count or complexity changes. The result isn't just a number. It's a document you can show the client, so they can see exactly what's driving their price and what would need to change for it to move.
8. Put repricing on your annual calendar, not your someday list
Repricing tends to get treated as an occasional, uncomfortable project rather than a routine part of running the firm. Put it on the same operational calendar as your lodgement deadlines, so it happens every year, on a set date, whether or not it feels like the right moment.
A firm that reprices every year makes small, easy-to-explain adjustments. A firm that waits five years between reviews ends up trying to justify one large, difficult increase, on clients who have had no warning it was coming.
Where ChangeGPS CorePro helps
The strategies mentioned here are exactly what ChangeGPS CorePro is built to support. It brings together the bundles that every accountant needs throughout the year in one system: Year End, Practice Tools, and Tax Advice.
CorePro comes with 400+ supporting documents and client communication templates tailored by expert accountants with over 40 years of accounting experience.
For pricing specifically, it includes ready-made templates built on ChangeGPS’ Value-Plan-Price method, so the value conversation and the price conversation happen together rather than as two separate, awkward steps.
CorePro also includes:
- Collaborate: A secure, TASA-compliant document management tool for firms taking on more advisory and compliance work without adding headcount.
- Blueprint: A visualisation tool to show the full net worth view across a client’s group structure.
- CGT: Tools to model CGT applications and timing strategies, updated to reflect Federal Budget changes.
- Restructure: To make trust-to-company restructures as straightforward as possible, so any accountant can do it confidently.
Building an accounting services pricing strategy that holds up in FY27
Getting your firm’s pricing right in FY27 isn't about finding one clever tactic. It's about stacking several small, deliberate changes:
- Pricing that flexes with entity and transaction data.
- A visible AML/CTF fee that reflects real ongoing work.
- Year-round client education.
- A habit of reviewing prices before they fall too far behind your costs.
A resilient accounting services pricing strategy treats compliance costs, urgency and complexity as inputs, not afterthoughts.
Whether you build that model with a spreadsheet or with a purpose-built calculator inside ChangeGPS, the principle is the same: price for the work you're actually doing, including the AML/CTF work that's now part of every client relationship, and reprice on a schedule rather than by exception.
These strategies were outlined by our accounting experts in our Better Billing & Repricing webinars. Watch the Accounting! With Dave and Tim series for more examples and client communication tips.
FAQ: Accounting firm pricing
What are the best pricing strategies for accounting firms right now?
Consumption and entity-based pricing is generally considered the most sustainable approach, since it scales automatically with a client's transaction volume, staff numbers and AML/CTF risk tier. Pairing it with year-round client education and a fixed annual repricing date tends to produce the smoothest client conversations.
Should accountants charge a fixed fee or an hourly rate?
Many firms now use a hybrid: a fixed base price tied to entity and transaction data, with clearly flagged add-ons for urgency or complexity. This is because both approaches have trade-offs. Hourly billing is accurate but admin-heavy and can cause bill shock. Fixed fees are predictable for clients but risk hiding scope creep, since the firm absorbs any extra work at no extra charge.
How much should accounting firms charge for AML/CTF compliance work?
There's no single industry-standard figure, since it depends on entity numbers, risk tier and how much of the monitoring is automated. What matters more than the exact number is that the fee is separate, visible and tied to a specific line of work on the invoice, rather than absorbed into existing fees.
How should firms approach pricing accounting services for AML/CTF obligations?
Treat it as its own cost centre rather than folding it into general compliance fees. A flat, upfront annual fee per company, invoiced alongside your registered office and annual review work, tends to be easier for both the firm and the client to understand than billing for individual searches as they happen.
How often should an accounting firm review its pricing?
At least once a year, ideally on a fixed date tied to your other annual compliance milestones. Reviewing annually means adjustments stay small and easy to explain. Firms that leave several years between reviews usually end up needing one large, harder-to-justify increase instead.
