# Planner CS Review: Pricing, Features, Alternatives Planner CS: Multi-year federal and state projection software sold inside the CS Professional Suite. Pricing from On request, SOC 2 unconfirmed, and how it compares to the alternatives, for US accounting and bookkeeping firms. Source: https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/planner-cs/ --- [Accounting Tools](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/) · [Tax Planning & Advisory](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/) # Planner CS Dated · Thomson Reuters Multi-year federal and state projection software sold inside the CS Professional Suite [Visit Planner CS](https://tax.thomsonreuters.com/us/en/cs-professional-suite/planner-cs) [All 13 tax planning & advisory tools](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/) Best for Firms already standardized on UltraTax CS that need multi-year projections rather than a client-facing advisory deliverable Starting price On request SOC 2 Unconfirmed Multi-factor auth Unconfirmed Ownership part of Thomson Reuters Integrates with UltraTax CS, Virtual Office CS, SaaS for CS Professional Suite The read ## What Planner CS does Thomson Reuters lists Planner CS in the tax and asset management group of the CS Professional Suite, next to UltraTax CS, GoSystem Tax RS and Fixed Assets CS. The work inside it is scenario-based. A preparer builds a plan for a client, projects federal liability across the next several years, carries forward items into those years, calculates estimated payments, and sets scenarios beside each other, joint against married filing separately being the example the vendor uses. State projections cover the 45 states that levy an individual income tax, resident and nonresident. A Result Finder applies a percentage or dollar change across a whole plan in one action, which is the quickest way to answer a question about an extra distribution without rebuilding the scenario from scratch. What comes out is comparative reports, graphs and letters. The natural buyer already runs the rest of the suite. Thomson Reuters sells the CS products as one system that shares data across the workflow, and for a firm whose returns sit in UltraTax CS that shared plumbing is the whole argument for choosing Planner CS over a standalone planner. Firms preparing in Drake, ProSeries or CCH Axcess have little reason to consider it, because it is not marketed as a tool that reads a 1040 PDF from anywhere. It is also a calculation product rather than an advisory one. There is no strategy library, no ranked list of opportunities, and no fee proposal to hand a client. The gaps are in what the vendor will not say. No price appears anywhere on the product page, and there is no per-seat figure to sanity-check before a phone call with sales. The page names the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, now nearly a decade old, as the legislation it was updated for, and says nothing at all about alternative minimum tax, net investment income tax, the qualified business income deduction, or the excess business loss limitation. Those four are what separate a real projection from a bracket estimate, and a buyer has to establish their treatment on a demo. The page likewise does not describe how return data gets into a plan, which is the question that decides whether staff re-key a return for every engagement. Against BNA Income Tax Planner, the other long-established multi-year engine, Planner CS trades depth of published specification for suite integration. Firms on Lacerte or ProConnect face a different comparison entirely: Intuit states that a Lacerte Fast Path or ProConnect Tax User Access license is what is needed to build Intuit Tax Advisor plans, so those firms already hold a planning tool on the license they pay for, and Planner CS has to beat it. The tier moved from strong-option to dated. The product is still listed, still sold and still updated for federal and state law, so a firm using it today has no reason to rush off it. But Thomson Reuters put its new investment in this space into Ready to Advise, a separate AI advisory product built on Checkpoint content rather than an evolution of Planner CS, and Ready to Advise is not part of the CS suite. Adopting Planner CS fresh in 2026, with no published price, no published computation detail, and the vendor's own attention plainly elsewhere, is a hard case to make. Capabilities ## What you get Multi-year federal projections with carry-forward items tracked into future years State projections for the 45 states with an individual income tax, resident and nonresident Side-by-side scenario comparison, including joint against married filing separately Result Finder applies a percentage or dollar change across an entire plan at once Comparative reports, graphs and client letters as the plan deliverable Hosted delivery through Virtual Office CS or SaaS for CS Professional Suite Pricing, security, integrations ## What it costs and what it connects to Thomson Reuters does not publish a price for Planner CS; it is quoted per firm, usually on firm size or entity count. We could not confirm a SOC 2 report for Planner CS from public sources. Ask the vendor directly before it touches client data — an absence here means unverified, not absent. Planner CS does not integrate directly with a general ledger. On the tax side it works with UltraTax CS. Beyond that: Virtual Office CS and SaaS for CS Professional Suite. [Vendor pricing page](https://tax.thomsonreuters.com/us/en/cs-professional-suite/planner-cs) Our rating ## Why we rate Planner CS a Dated Planner CS is rated Dated: it is one of 1 of the 13 tax planning & advisory tools here that still works but is no longer keeping pace. Still sold and still working, but no longer keeping pace — thin investment, an aging interface, or a roadmap that has visibly stalled. Fine to stay on, hard to recommend adopting. [How these ratings are decided](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/methodology/). Same vendor ## More from Thomson Reuters ### [1040SCAN](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-workflow/1040scan/) Scan-and-populate OCR that turns 1040 source documents into workpapers and tax software input Dated ### [Accounting CS](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/general-ledger/accounting-cs/) Firm-side write-up, trial balance and payroll ledger for accountants running many client books Dated ### [Accounting CS Payroll](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/payroll/accounting-cs-payroll/) Multi-client batch payroll engine sold to firms that run payroll as a service line Dated ### [Thomson Reuters Checkpoint](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-research/checkpoint-ria/) Thomson Reuters tax research library built on RIA and PPC content, quoted per firm Strong Option Alternatives ## Planner CS alternatives ### [BNA Income Tax Planner](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/bna-income-tax-planner/) Multi-year federal, state and nonresident projection engine for complex individual returns Strong Option ### [Intuit Tax Advisor](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/intuit-tax-advisor/) Tax planning built into Lacerte and ProConnect at no separate charge Top Pick ### [Ready to Advise](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/ready-to-advise/) Thomson Reuters advisory tool that ranks planning strategies from an uploaded return One to Watch ### [Holistiplan](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/holistiplan/) OCR reads a 1040 PDF and returns a client-ready tax observations report Top Pick ### [Tax Planner Pro](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/taxplannerpro/) Low-cost projection engine covering AMT, NIIT, QBI, IRMAA and all 50 states One to Watch ### [Tax Maverick](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/tax-maverick/) Advisory training program with strategy-matching software attached, sold by application One to Watch [Compare all 13 tax planning & advisory tools](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-planning/) Sources ## Where these facts came from Researched from public sources. Pricing and security claims change without notice, so check the vendor before you buy. Last reviewed September 8, 2026. ### [Planner CS product page](https://tax.thomsonreuters.com/us/en/cs-professional-suite/planner-cs) Retrieved 2026-09-08 ### [CS Professional Suite product listing](https://tax.thomsonreuters.com/us/en/cs-professional-suite) Retrieved 2026-09-08 ### [Thomson Reuters Ready to Advise](https://tax.thomsonreuters.com/en/products/ready-to-advise) Retrieved 2026-09-08 ### [Intuit Lacerte product page, Intuit Tax Advisor licensing note](https://accountants.intuit.com/lacerte/) Retrieved 2026-09-08 Keep browsing ## Other categories [Practice Management (49)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/practice-management/)[General Ledger & Bookkeeping (26)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/general-ledger/)[Tax Workflow & Document Automation (26)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-workflow/)[Payroll & PEO (19)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/payroll/)[Tax Preparation (18)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-preparation/)[Tax Research (13)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-research/)[Month-End Close Automation (11)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/close-automation/)[Proposals & Engagement Letters (9)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/proposals-engagement/)[Spreadsheet Reporting & Ledger Sync (6)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/spreadsheet-reporting/)[Tax Resolution & IRS Representation (6)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/tax-resolution/)[AI Meeting Assistants (5)](https://node8.ai/accounting-tools/meeting-assistants/) ## Got the stack, still doing the work by hand? 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