Client data that keeps itself current: the KVK connection

Client data ages quietly. A client moves, changes a statutory name or converts its legal form, and reports that to the KVK, the Dutch chamber of commerce — but not always to the firm. Usually it only surfaces when post comes back or a confirmation goes to an old address.

The KVK connection in Offsoo solves that at the source. It is not a module that has to be switched on and does not sit among the integrations in the settings: it is on by default for every client.

What maintaining it by hand actually costs

The problem is not the action itself — changing an address takes a minute. The problem is that nobody knows when that minute is needed.

• Changes are not reported. To a client, an address change is not news the firm needs.
• It sits in several places. What gets updated in one place ages in the other.
• New clients get retyped. Copying name, address, KVK number and legal form from an extract is exactly the kind of work that produces typing errors.

Creating a new client

When adding a client, the company name is enough. The name field carries a search that queries the commercial register; choosing the right result brings the company details across — name, address, KVK number and whatever else is on record.

The fields around it stay editable: client number, VAT number, turnover-tax number and IBAN sit in the same screen, as do the contact details and the period during which the client is a client.

That saves time, but above all it avoids the errors introduced at first entry that then sit there for years.

Staying current

Once a client is linked to the commercial register, the company details keep up. Changes of address or name arrive in the client file without intervention.

Because the client file sits next to the planning and the hours, that carries through to everything attached to that client: the activities in the planning, the recorded hours and the contact details looked up during a phone call.

What the connection does not do

The commercial register holds public company data, and no more than that. Contacts, notes, tags, the delivery arrangement and the company structure the firm records itself remain manual entry — that is the knowledge the firm builds and that belongs in the client file.

So it does not replace client management; it removes the part already maintained elsewhere.

What it delivers

• Less entry when creating clients, and no retyping errors.
• Current company details without anyone having to chase them periodically.
• One client base instead of a version per system.
• Fewer of the errors that only become visible when something goes wrong: post to an old address, a confirmation under an outdated name.

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