The 2026 Canopy Out of Office Award Winners
Arcadia earned the 2026 Canopy Out of Office Award for proving that a tax team can take real time off—even during busy season.
The firm’s motto is to live every day like it’s Saturday, and they encourage their clients to do the same. As a family office that helps people retire comfortably, they’re preparing clients for a lifetime of Saturdays. So they built a tax team that lives that way too.
Arcadia’s tax team works 9 to 5 all year, deadlines included. Everyone has unlimited PTO. And with Canopy keeping every return visible, nothing gets missed when someone’s out.
“Our company’s motto is to live every day like it’s Saturday and to encourage our clients to do so as well. So when we can offload things and work smarter rather than harder, that makes a world of a difference.”
—Arcadia Tax
Profile
Arcadia is a family office specializing in estate, finance, and tax planning. Most of their clients are retirees or people planning to retire in the next few years, and Arcadia also prepares their tax returns.
The firm has just under 40 team members, with about five on the tax team. Beyond client work, Arcadia gives back too. This year, they’re partnering with a charity that houses homeless veterans and helps them find jobs and housing.
Arcadia moved to Canopy in September 2025 and started using it with clients that November.
From Paper to Portal
Before Canopy, Arcadia ran on outdated practice management software over a glitchy remote desktop. Every box was checked by hand. Nothing was automated, and nothing flowed. Engagements and intake happened on paper, and documents went out by mail.
The team wanted something modern and web-based. They’d heard great things about Canopy from other firms, and it was their first choice from the start.
What sealed the deal was migration. Canopy’s implementation team moved Arcadia’s existing data into Canopy, which mattered a lot for a small tax team.
“The Canopy team, their integration team being able to help us out with that since we do have a small tax team—that is the biggest thing that sold us.”
—Arcadia Tax
Hours Back Every Day
Engagements, intake, and document requests now run through Canopy, and the admin team feels the difference most.
“They no longer have to spend their whole day doing just one thing. It’s become two hours of work compared to eight.”
—Arcadia Tax
The client portal has been a win for clients too. Retirees aren’t always comfortable with technology, but Canopy’s portal is easy for them to use, so the team spends far less time on tech support. And by sharing documents online instead of through the postal service, Arcadia saves roughly $600 with each mailing.
Document requests have been a team favorite.
“The document request with the automatic updates, the reminders every week—it takes so much work out of our hands, and people seem to respond to it much quicker than personally reaching out.”
—Arcadia Tax
More Clients, Fewer Accountants
This year, Arcadia served about 150 more clients with two fewer accountants. They still filed every return by October 15.
“So two less accountants and 150 more clients, and we were able to get that done in the same amount of time.”
—Arcadia Tax
How They Make Time Off Work
Unlimited PTO during tax season sounds risky. Arcadia makes it work.
Every return runs through a Canopy task with subtasks and assigned roles. When someone’s out, a teammate can open the task, see exactly which step it’s on, read the client notes, and pick up right where they left off. Some team members took weeks off during busy season, and nothing was missed.
The tax team also keeps normal hours. No late nights, even near deadlines. When needed, they file an extension instead of rushing a return.
“If you’re working all hours of the night, you don’t have a clear head to work on a tax return. We’d rather put our best foot forward than rush through things to get it done.”
—Arcadia Tax
Capacity Planning That Builds Trust
New accountants don’t always believe a 9-to-5 tax season is possible, and many try to work late anyway. Canopy helps change their minds.
Arcadia uses Insights and capacity planning to set a weekly target for how many returns they need to finish. Everyone can watch the count go down week by week, with no overtime required.
“Once people start to see those numbers dwindle down without having to stay extra hours, they lighten up and feel a lot less stress on their shoulders.”
—Arcadia Tax
Custom reports have been another big upgrade. Their old system only offered templated reports. Now the operations team builds reports from the ground up, including the custom fields they need for billing.
A Voice in What Comes Next
The Arcadia team is active in Canopy Community, where they request features and see how other firms use Canopy.
“I’ve seen things be implemented that I saw on the blog post. So that was really cool.”
—Arcadia Tax
Next up, Arcadia plans to roll out questionnaires for all incoming clients.
Advice: Build Your Own Adventure
Asked what they’d tell a firm considering Canopy, the team’s advice was to plan first.
“If you think about the process of what your firm plans to do ahead of time, it’s almost like a build-your-own adventure. You can really make it do whatever you need it to do.”
—Arcadia Tax
At Arcadia, the work gets done—and the team still gets to enjoy their Saturdays. Clients even send in vacation photos to show how they’re spending their time off.
“There is a way to be a young professional and get everything done without stressing yourself out. We have to be here eight hours a day. You should be enjoying it.”
—Arcadia Tax
