Accountex IT benchmarking results

Reflecting back on Accountex 2025, we summarise the emerging tech trends and the results from this years Pro Drive IT in Accounting Benchmarking Survey.

Accountex is the premier event for accountants, finance professionals, and bookkeepers.  The 2025 event was the busiest ever with over 12,000 unique attendees and the Pro Drive stand was busy throughout the two days.

The key trends identified by our team both from speaking to practitioners and the presentations at the event were:

• The potential commoditisation of some services provided by firms through the use of AI and how firms will need to pivot to meet the demand for more advisory services.
• Making Tax Digital is the most immediate challenge for most firms and will create a lot more complexity which Accountants will need to help their clients manage – representing both a challenge and an opportunity.
• The accountancy profession still does not fully understand their responsibilities around cyber security and protecting client data and there is a big gap between best practice and what is happening.

The 2025 IT in Accounting Benchmarking Survey

Pro Drive IT once again conducted its annual IT benchmarking survey, offering a snapshot of how accountancy firms are managing their technology infrastructure. This year we have presented the results against those from Accountex 2024 as well as the current rolling 2 year results. Here are the key headlines:

• We had a wide variety of firms completing the survey, from small practices with around 10 staff to businesses with just under 100.
• The responses showed a continuation of a worrying trend from the previous year’s survey with a significant deficit in terms of cyber security resilience.
• The average IT maturity score was 49 (compared to 50 in 2024). This ranks as below average on our scale of IT maturity.

Basic IT maturity

IT support is mostly reactive, responding when things go wrong or changes need to be made. No continual service or proactive systems improvement.  Basic levels of security such as antimalware and multifactor authentication. Key IT procedures and policies missing. No financial or strategic planning.

Average IT maturity

There is a more proactive element to IT support with ad hoc work to improve the provision of service and IT systems.  Security is more advanced and includes awareness training, some proactive monitoring and lockdown of cloud systems.  Cyber Essentials certification often achieved.  Key IT procedures and policies in place but may not have been tested or reviewed properly. Basic budgeting and IT roadmap.

Mature IT

IT has a continuous improvement process which is documented with risks and opportunities around IT being reviewed by partners. IT security is embedded in the firm’s culture with regular reviews of risk and mitigations in place. Cyber Essentials Plus, IASME Cyber Assurance and / or ISO 27001 certification in place.  There is a budgeted IT strategy that is reviewed regularly at partner level.

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About the survey

 The Pro Drive IT maturity benchmarking assessment has been designed to show businesses how well they’re managing their technology and provide instant, actionable steps on how to improve.

• It takes just 5 minutes
• It’s completely free
• You will receive customised results instantly

If you would like to benchmark your IT, complete the survey using the button below.