Shadow AI is using tools like ChatGPT on private files, which can send confidential data to the cloud. What to do about it →

AI for your client records. Nothing leaves your office.

FirmDocs searches and answers questions about your client files on a machine that sits inside your firm, not in the cloud or on someone else's servers.

The problem

Client financials don't
belong in ChatGPT.

Every public AI tool works the same way: whatever you type or upload is sent to servers owned by someone else, usually outside Canada, where it may be stored, logged, or used to train future models. For most businesses that's a footnote. For an accounting firm, it's handing your clients' income, payroll, and shareholder affairs to a third party you've never met and can't audit.

Three steps. We handle the technical part.

A dedicated machine

About the size of a hardcover book, and quiet enough to sit on a shelf. It connects to your office network and nothing else: no cloud accounts, no outside services. One visit, usually under two hours.

Your team adds documents

Drag files in the way you'd move them into any folder: returns, financial statements, ledgers, CRA correspondence. FirmDocs reads and organizes them right there on the machine. Word, Excel, PDF, and scanned paper all work.

Answers with references

Type a question in plain English (“Which shareholder loans were outstanding at year-end?”) and the answer cites the exact document and page it came from.

Sign in. Add files. Ask.

A look at the interface your team works in: sign in, add files, ask, and every answer cites its source.

The solution

FirmDocs Dashboard Engagements Ask
On-premise · connected DA
Good morning, Dana. Today · your unit is installed and ready
0Open engagements
0Documents indexed
0Questions asked
Getting started
1 · Create your first engagementEngagements →
2 · Add its documentsWord, Excel, PDF, scans
3 · Ask a questionanswers cite sources
Engagements + New engagement
No engagements yet Create your first engagement to start adding documents.
Engagements / Northway Holdings Inc. — 2024 year-end Client records
Drop files to add them. They never leave this machine
Ask Choose an engagement… All engagements Northway Holdings Inc. — 2024 year-end click a source to check the passage
When did the CRA issue the 2022 reassessment?
The CRA issued the Notice of Reassessment for the 2022 taxation year on March 11, 2025. Your client forwarded it by email on March 12 and asked about filing an objection. Sources CRA Correspondence, Feb–Apr 2025 · p. 2 Notice of Reassessment — 2022 · p. 1 CRA Correspondence, Feb–Apr 2025 · page 2 “Attached is the reassessment we received yesterday, dated March 11 — they've disallowed the CCA on the warehouse addition. Can we still object, and what's the deadline?” The exact passage the answer relied on, opened in place from your local index.
Ask a question about this engagement…

See it in action

We discuss your firm's needs, show you the interface, and answer any questions about how it works.

Book on Calendly

Fair questions, straight answers.

What is FirmDocs?

FirmDocs is a private, on-premise AI document assistant for Ontario accounting and law firms. It searches and answers questions about your client files on a dedicated machine that sits inside your office, so nothing is sent to the cloud and no third party ever sees a file. Every answer cites the exact source document and page.

Why it exists: shadow AI, and what Ontario firms should do about it →

Where does our data live?

On one machine in your office, the same building as your filing cabinets. Documents are never uploaded anywhere; FirmDocs keeps working even if you unplug the internet. If you ever stop using it, the unit is wiped in front of you, and your original files remain exactly where they always were.

What hardware do we need?

Nothing of your own to buy or run. FirmDocs runs on a dedicated machine set up for your firm. It needs a power outlet and a network connection, nothing more. Your staff use it through a web browser on any office computer; there's nothing to install on their machines beyond a bookmark, and no server room or IT staff required.

What does it cost?

Early pilots are priced per firm, and we work that out together on the call. It depends on the size of your team and how you would use it. No usage meters and no charge per document or per question. The goal of the first conversation is to see whether it is genuinely useful to you before anyone talks about a long-term arrangement.

Does this meet our confidentiality obligations as CPAs?

It was designed around them. Rule 208 of the CPA Ontario Code of Professional Conduct requires you to hold client information in strict confidence, and the usual problem with AI tools is that they hand that information to a third party. FirmDocs doesn't: documents never leave your office or your custody, and nobody at FirmDocs can see them. We're glad to walk through exactly how it works with you, your professional standards advisor, or anyone else you'd like to satisfy, in plain English and in writing.

Read the Confidentiality & Architecture Memo (PDF) →

What happens if the machine breaks?

Your documents are never at risk. Your originals stay in your own folders, and FirmDocs only ever works from copies it builds out of them, so a replacement machine can rebuild itself from your files and pick up where the last one left off. Support is part of the arrangement, not an extra.

Ready to get started? Let’s talk.

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