When evaluating a new accounting provider, most people ask: does it have the features I need? Is the UI good? What's the pricing?
I had one extra question: does it have an API?
Smart Accounts does. That single answer changed everything about how I interact with my finances.
The Problem With Most Business Software UIs
If you've used accounting or invoicing software, you know the routine. Log in. Navigate the dashboard. Click through to invoices. Filter by date. Find the one you need. Go back. Find the report section. Export. Close six tabs you accidentally opened.
It's not broken. It's just friction — small, consistent, and completely unnecessary. Every interaction costs time. Not thinking time. Not decision time. Just navigation time, spent moving through a UI designed for the median user, not for you.
The data you need is in the system. The software just makes you work to get it.
Why API Access Changes Everything
Smart Accounts publishes their full API documentation. Every endpoint, every parameter, every response schema — documented and accessible.
I spent an afternoon reading through it. Then I did something simple: I fed the API docs to an agent builder and generated a working set of financial tools.
Check invoice status. Create a new expense. Pull a financial summary for any time period. Flag overdue payments. All of it wrapped into clean, callable functions.
Then I connected those functions to Slack.
What It Looks Like Now
Now, when I need a financial overview, I type a message. The agent calls the right Smart Accounts API endpoint, formats the response, and replies in plain language.
No logging in. No navigating through menu layers. No context switching between tools.
One message. Done.
The Smart Accounts UI still exists. I just never open it.
More importantly — because the agent has access to the same data, I can combine it with other context. Ask it to cross-reference invoice dates with project timelines. Flag any client where payment is overdue by more than 14 days. Generate a quick end-of-month snapshot that would have taken me 20 minutes manually.
The platform didn't change. My relationship to it did.
The Broader Lesson
This is an underrated way to evaluate business software: not "does it have the feature?" but "does it have an API?"
Because if it does, you can build the interface you actually want — and bypass the one they designed for someone else.
I've started applying this filter to every tool in my stack:
- Does it have an API?
- Is the documentation any good?
- Can I build agent tools on top of it in an afternoon?
If yes to all three, it's worth considering. If the answer is "we have a Zapier integration," that's a different conversation.
This Is What Agent-First Operations Looks Like
The finance agent isn't the only one. The same pattern applies across the business — website analytics, client reporting, content workflows. Each one started the same way: find the API, build the tools, wire it to wherever decisions actually happen.
The goal isn't to eliminate software. It's to eliminate the friction between you and the information you need to make decisions.
Most business software has the data. Most of it just makes you work too hard to get to it.
An API, a few agent tools, and an afternoon is usually enough to fix that.
Running your own agent setup or thinking about it? Get in touch — this is exactly what we build at Codeline Studio.