Tips and Best Practices

To help you start managing correspondence, we suggest reviewing the tips and best practices listed below. Correspondence Manager Help topics include many of these recommendations as a Tip ( ).

Libraries

• Update the tax year or return type to your desired selection, and then click to refresh the current libraries with any correspondence changes made by other staff.
• The Search function locates exact or partial matches in the Letter Template, Paragraph, and Keyword libraries. You can locate letter templates, paragraphs, and keywords by the following attributes:
  • Search letter templates and paragraphs by:
    • Document name
    • Matching words or phrases
  • Search keywords by:
    • Form name
    • Form category
    • Matching words or phrases

Letters

• Select Correspondence in the return configuration set to configure letter and label defaults. Some of these defaults include custom letterhead and the font for your standard and custom letter templates.
• To associate custom letter templates to a return print set, assign a default print set and return configuration set to an organizational unit (office, business unit, or region). Click Settings and defaults under Firm in Dashboard, and then select Tax > Return Defaults on the navigation panel. Then assign the client to the organizational unit on the General tab of the client profile.
• If you enable multiple K-1 letter templates, the performance of previewing and editing letters may be impacted in returns with large numbers of K-1 letters.
• Standard letter templates are distinguished from custom letter templates by the template name. All standard letter templates include the word Standard in the name. The default custom letter template name includes the word Custom in the name. You can rename the default custom letter name, but we recommend keeping the word Custom in the name to easily distinguish it from a standard letter template.

Paragraphs

• You can reorder the position of paragraphs in the Paragraph Library. The updated positioning is also applied to the order in custom letter templates that use the paragraphs. The Resequence command restores the system-defined order and will apply the original order to custom letter templates. Resequence is not available if you reorder paragraphs in a custom letter template instead of the Paragraph Library.
• Paragraphs in the Paragraph Library are color-coded as follows:
  • Black text. Standard paragraph
  • Pink text. Custom paragraph created from a standard paragraph
  • Blue text. User-defined custom paragraph, also referred to as a pure custom paragraph

  You can also use the Properties window to display the name of the staff that created or last modified a paragraph, indicating the paragraph is custom. For standard paragraphs, the value for Modified by staff on the Paragraph Properties window is System.

Condition Editor

• Transmittal, extension, and K-1 letters have internal conditions that do not display in the Condition Editor or Preview pane when paragraphs of these letter types are saved as a custom. However, you can append conditions to custom paragraphs of these letter types using the Condition Editor. See Using the Condition Editor for more information.

Word Pane

• If you display paragraph marks and other formatting symbols, such as and , in Word, the symbols display in your rendered letters for all paragraphs, even the ones that did not meet the conditions for the return. The additional characters can result in having to scroll unnecessarily to get to the area of the letter you want to review or edit. See Clearing Word Formatting Marks for more information.
• Enable the AutoRecover option in Microsoft^© Word. Correspondence Manager creates a recovery document if the system closes unexpectedly, as in the case of a power failure. Your work will be saved automatically in a recovery file if AutoRecover is activated in Word.
• Press the space bar on your keyboard to enter the free flow text content control in an open letter.