Stop chasing client documents over email and WhatsApp.
Send your client a secure request link — they upload the returns, statements and IDs you asked for with no account to create, and every file is encrypted in their browser so only your firm can open them.
14-day trial, everything unlocked · then free for 1 open request at a time · no card · $29 per seat when you’re ready · Hosted in the EU
Email and WhatsApp are not a channel for confidential tax files.
Documents arrive through five channels
Returns, pay stubs, IDs and bank statements over email, WhatsApp and in person. A confidentiality exposure under the FTC Safeguards Rule or the GDPR, depending on where you practise — and a versioning mess every filing season.
The “serious” portals nobody uses
If your client has to create an account and remember another password, they won’t — and you’re back to email. The real problem is friction.
No control after you hit send
An emailed file can’t expire or be revoked, and nothing tells you when the client has sent everything. Confidentiality rests on nobody forwarding it.
How it works
You create a document request
Name the client, list what you need — last year’s return, three months of statements, a copy of an ID — and set a PIN. It takes seconds.
Your client uploads through the link
No account to create, no password to remember, no app to install. They open the link on a phone or a laptop and drop the files in.
Only your firm can open them
Every file is encrypted in the client’s browser before it uploads. We store ciphertext and never hold the keys — your firm does.
Why firms choose it
Your clients need no account
They open the link and drop the files in — no sign-up, no password, no app, from a phone or a laptop. The reason “serious” portals get ignored, removed.
The questions your regulator asks, answered
Database in Frankfurt, files in Amsterdam, a DPA ready to sign — “where does the data live” closed for EU firms. For US firms the screening questions are the FTC Safeguards Rule and IRS Pub 4557 instead, mapped requirement by requirement in our guide.
Encrypted before it reaches us
Files are encrypted before upload, so the server stores only ciphertext — only your firm holds the keys to open them.
You can verify it
The encryption library is open-source. We don’t ask for blind trust — anyone can audit how files are protected.
None of this is something you have to take on trust. The build log is the engineering record behind it: how the cryptography moved out of the product into a standalone open-source library, why post-quantum encryption became the default for new uploads, and what an adversarial audit of the product against its own source code turned up — sixteen must-fix items, written up with the fixes rather than quietly closed. If what you need to check is your own obligations rather than ours, the FTC Safeguards Rule and IRS Pub 4557 guide maps them requirement by requirement. It is not legal advice, and ShieldFive holds no SOC 2 or ISO 27001 report and signs no HIPAA BAA — the HIPAA guide says so in as many words.
Your firm decides who sees what, and until when.
Collection runs one way; sending the finished return back runs the other. Every outbound link carries an expiry, a download limit and a list of allowed countries. A confidential file only opens from where you say — and everything travels end-to-end encrypted.
Per seat, not per gigabyte.
Tax documents are small; your practice is not. You pay for the people in your firm who send requests — never for storage, and never per client. Your clients don’t pay and don’t create an account.
Or $290 per seat / year — $24.17 a month, $58 a seat off the monthly rate.
14 days with everything unlocked, then free for 1 open request at a time, with links that last up to 7 days. No card.
- Unlimited document requests
- Unlimited clients — they never pay and never sign up
- Up to two automatic email reminders to the client (day 3 and day 7)
- Your logo on client pages and emails
- Links open up to 90 days, or with no expiry
- Storage included, not metered
- Zero-knowledge encryption, EU hosting and the DPA on every seat
Fair use: 100 GB of storage per seat, and 50 GB of downloads per seat each month — both roughly fifty times what a working practice moves in a year. The two behave differently and it is worth knowing which: going over on storage never blocks a client’s upload, we tell you and ask you to add seats or clear space; downloads do stop at the monthly ceiling until the cycle resets or you add a seat.
$29 a seat — locked in.
Start with 14 days with everything unlocked. After that the free plan allows 1 open request at a time, links last up to 7 days and client reminders stop. Buy seats when you need more or add your team. Early firms keep the $29 founding rate for as long as they stay — no card to start, no call, no sales process.
Both buttons open a 2-seat checkout — the accountant who sends the request and whoever chases the client for the missing statement. Change the number on the next page before you pay.
Compare it, and read deeper
Weighing this against the tools your practice already knows? These honest, two-way comparisons put ShieldFive next to the incumbents — where each one leads, and where it doesn’t. Sending finished returns back as well? See CPA secure file transfer in both directions.
Secure file sharing for accountants and CPA firms
SmartVault, ShareFile, TaxDome, Suralink and ShieldFive, compared on encryption, audit trail, tax-software fit and price.
ShieldFive vs Content Snare
Two ways to collect documents from clients: reminder automation and templates, or zero-knowledge encryption by default.
ShieldFive vs ShareFile
Where a mature, provider-managed incumbent and a zero-knowledge, post-quantum alternative actually differ.
Try it on your next
client request.
Create an account, build one document request and send it to a client you’re already chasing. If it saves you the email thread, keep using it. No card, no call, no sales process.
Open-source encryption · DPA available · Hosted in the EU