TaxScout vs SurePrep 2026

Compared on 2026-09-23

How much does SurePrep cost?

SurePrep, owned by Thomson Reuters, does not list prices on its product page; pricing is quote-based and billed per return, per product. Its last public price sheet (May 2024) listed 1040SCAN at $13 (ORGANIZE) to $40 (PRO) per return, SPbinder at $6.75 and TaxCaddy at $15 per module. TaxScout starts at $49/month for the whole firm on a 12-month term. [source]

SurePrep is a set of 1040 workflow products — 1040SCAN for scan-and-populate, SPbinder for review, TaxCaddy for the client side — plus an outsourced preparation service. It is sold alongside the firm's tax software rather than in place of it. TaxScout is one platform for intake, AI document extraction, preparation workpapers, review and client workflow, priced on the returns your firm processes rather than per product per return.

Feature	TaxScout	SurePrep
Pricing model	From $49/month for the whole firm, on a 12-month term — metered on returns, unlimited internal users	Quote-based; billed per return, per product [source]
Public price list	Yes — on /pricing	No current list; last published sheet is May 2024 [source]
AI document classification & extraction		[source]
Hands 1040 data to existing tax software	Drake, CCH Axcess, UltraTax, Lacerte (export)	CCH Axcess Tax, GoSystem Tax RS, Lacerte, UltraTax CS [source]
Client portal for document gathering		Yes — TaxCaddy [source]
E-signatures		Yes — TaxCaddy [source]
Digital review binder / workpapers		Yes — SPbinder [source]
Outsourced return preparation		Yes — SurePrep Outsource [source]

SurePrep pricing, in detail

Thomson Reuters' SurePrep page invites firms to contact sales rather than publishing prices. [source] The most recent price list SurePrep itself published is dated May 2024 and marked “subject to change”. It charges per return, per product, with lower rates for firms that buy earlier in the season. [source] At list (the October–December rate) it showed:

1040SCAN ORGANIZE $13, ORGANIZE+ $15, PRO $40, PRO+ $45 per return
SPbinder $6.75 per return; Leadsheets $20 per return
TaxCaddy Gather $15 and Deliver $15 per return
An extra vendor API fee per return when used with CCH Axcess Tax ($0.33 to $3.95 depending on the product)
Outsourced preparation, estimated per return: $370 offshore, $825 onshore, $475 business offshore, $355 for a Form 990 — final fees depend on page counts, data entry fields and complexity

We could not find a public 2025 or 2026 SurePrep price list, so treat these as the last published figures, not today's quote. A firm running 1040SCAN PRO, SPbinder and both TaxCaddy modules on a return would have paid the sum of each per-return fee at that list.

What SurePrep is

Ownership. Thomson Reuters agreed to buy SurePrep for $500 million in cash in November 2022 and closed the acquisition on January 3, 2023. At the time, SurePrep said over 23,000 tax professionals used its products. [source] [source]
1040SCAN is a scan-and-populate product; Thomson Reuters states it automatically verifies data for 65% of standard documents. It integrates with CCH Axcess Tax, GoSystem Tax RS, Lacerte and UltraTax CS; only the ORGANIZE tier works with any tax software. [source]
SPbinder is a digital binder for workpapers, with tick marks, annotations and cross-references. [source]
TaxCaddy is the 1040 client collaboration portal — document gathering, questionnaires, e-signatures, tax payments, invoicing and return delivery. [source]
Business returns (1065, 1120, 1120S and others) are handled through SurePrep's outsourced Business Tax Returns service rather than the 1040SCAN automation. [source]

Who each fits

SurePrep suits a firm already standardized on CCH Axcess, GoSystem, Lacerte or UltraTax that wants to add scan-and-populate, a review binder or outsourced capacity to that stack, and is comfortable paying per return, per product. TaxScout suits a firm that wants intake, extraction, workpapers, review and the client portal in one system, at one price for the whole firm, and is willing to work with an early-access product.

Explore TaxScout

AI Document Extraction

Classification, extraction and source links

Review Hub

Reviewer workflow before anything is final

Client Portal

Branded portal for document upload

E-Signatures

Form 8879 and engagement letters

Pricing

Metered on returns, unlimited users

All Features

See the full platform

More background: SurePrep vs alternatives guide.

Sources

Compare the cost for your firm

One price for the whole firm, metered on returns — not per product per return.

View Pricing

·/The other side

Where SurePrep still leads.

If none of this applied, we would not have written it down.

Scale and backing. SurePrep has been part of Thomson Reuters since January 2023 and was used by over 23,000 tax professionals at the time of the acquisition; TaxScout is in early access with a handful of design partners.
An outsourced preparation service — onshore and offshore teams that prepare the return for you. TaxScout is software only.
Deep, long-standing scan-and-populate integrations with CCH Axcess Tax, GoSystem Tax RS, Lacerte and UltraTax CS.
SPbinder's review tooling — tick marks, annotations and hyperlinked cross-references across supported file types — is mature and widely used in large-firm review.

·/Methodology

How this comparison was built.

Compared on	2026-09-23
Firm size assumed	Six internal users — preparers, reviewers and admin combined.
Return volume assumed	300 federal return workspaces in a filing season.
Billing terms	TaxScout figures are one of twelve payments on a 12-month term. Competitor figures are the vendor's published per-seat rate at the billing mode named in each cell; annual-billed and monthly-billed rates are never mixed within a row.
Price source	Competitor prices are the lowest published per-seat rate on each vendor's official pricing page, normalized to the billing mode shown. Figures we cannot verify from an official source are labeled rather than estimated.
SurePrep figure	Quote-based, billed per return per product (last published list, May 2024: 1040SCAN ORGANIZE $13, PRO $40 per return) — Thomson Reuters' SurePrep product page publishes no prices. SurePrep's May 2024 price sheet ("subject to change") listed per-return list prices of 1040SCAN ORGANIZE $13, ORGANIZE+ $15, PRO $40, PRO+ $45; SPbinder $6.75; TaxCaddy Gather $15 and Deliver $15; lower rates for earlier-season purchase; plus a vendor API fee per return with CCH Axcess Tax. Outsourced preparation was quoted from $370 per return (offshore) and $825 (onshore), estimated. Current 2026 pricing could not be verified from a public source.
Verification status	not independently verified
Cell values used	Yes · No · Limited · Add-on · Planned · Not independently verified

Source: SurePrep pricing source. Vendors change prices without telling us. If a figure here is wrong or out of date, tell us and we will correct it and re-date the page.