How to Structure your App Stack for Payments: flinder’s 7-Step Process
Telleroo harnesses the data in your accounting software to save you time and de-risk client payments. But if you’re looking to automate payments, chances are you’re also automating data capture, approvals and other essential areas of the finance function.
With this in mind, a key question we get at Telleroo is “What processes should we have in place?”
We sat down with Luke Streeter, COO of flinder, to find out how they structure their app stack to ensure payments run smoothly.
flinder leverages automation to provide fast-growing tech clients with an agile finance function. But Luke says the key is “having a clear and standardised process which everyone can follow”.
There are 7 steps in flinder’s process:
- Inbox management in Outlook
- Invoice processing in Dext
- Approvals using ApprovalMax
- Remind clients of approvals using Slack
- Bank rec in Xero
- Discuss what to pay with the client using Xero, Slack & Float
- Suggest payments using Telleroo
Having a clear process allows the team to work efficiently across a large number of clients. Each client may have different needs and bookkeeping schedules (daily, weekly, monthly etc), but Luke says setting the bookkeeping frequency, discussing client needs and agreeing on responsibilities are essential first steps.
Step 1 - Inbox management (Outlook)
Inboxes are managed by the flinder team, answering supplier queries, escalating matters to the wider business and ensuring any invoices are forwarded to Dext for processing.
Step 2 - Invoice processing (Dext)
The team use Dext to process all invoices from client inboxes to Xero, saving time and reducing errors. For clients on a weekly bookkeeping and payment schedule, invoices are typically processed at the start of the week.
Step 3 - Approvals (ApprovalMax)
Where invoice approval is required, ApprovalMax is used. This is typically the case when founders/directors start to relinquish control of day-to-day matters. It’s not often used for smaller clients where the payment approval acts as the final check and approval step.
Step 4 - Remind clients of approvals (Slack)
Slack is used to communicate with clients throughout the process, here it’s used to send a friendly nudge to clients reminding them of any invoices awaiting approval. It’s often found that ‘missing’ invoices from payment runs are a result of unapproved invoices.
Step 5 - Reconcile bank accounts (Xero)
Now that the invoices and receipts are in Xero, and have passed the approvals process, the team will reconcile the bank accounts so they have the most up-to-date information. There is nothing more embarrassing than proposing an invoice for payment that has already been paid!
Step 6 - Discuss what to pay with the client (Xero, Slack, and Float)
Payments are prepared using scheduling functionality in Xero, showing everything that should be paid if cash were unlimited. Next, they check the weekly cash position to see what the client can afford to pay.
The team then sends this info over to the client and has a conversation about what payments to prioritise.
Step 7 - Suggest payments to the client (Telleroo)
Now that the team have clarity on what needs to be paid, the payments are set up and sent to the client to approve and fund. Luke does this directly in Telleroo for the Xero invoice scanning feature, which imports the sort code and account number into Telleroo. Luke says, “This is a key feature that I love as it reduces the risk of errors when paying new suppliers”.
By Rebecca Fowler, Telleroo
Telleroo will be exhibiting at Accountex Summit Manchester on the 19th September 2023 on stand B14.
You can register for a free ticket here.
The top five reasons to migrate
Over the years, we’ve talked with many customers that made the decision to come over to Sage Intacct. Through that process, five themes emerged as key drivers to move to the cloud. Let’s take a closer look at what they are.
1. You’re doing too much of your reporting in excel. Let’s start off by saying that the reporting that comes with Sage 50cloud is great at doing what it is designed to do. Financial statements and reports based on the chart of accounts? No problem. However, as the customers we spoke to developed a need for more complex reporting, they outpaced what Sage 50cloud provides. Additionally, they were unable to ‘slice and dice’ their data in the ways they needed, because they lacked dimensions and calculated fields.
Key sign: A significant amount of your reporting happens in Excel.
2. Your multi-entity consolidations take hours to days. Developed as an on-premises solution, Sage 50cloud wasn’t built to handle the needs of organisations that often have multiple business entities. Customers mentioned that starting up a new entity often felt like a new implementation. Customisations had to be reconfigured, the chart of accounts had to be rebuilt, and all the entities were siloed off from each other.
Key sign: Your closing of books takes several days and you have more than two entities.
3. You need to access your system remotely. Numerous customers touched upon the flexibility of being able to work anywhere, anytime, as a big advantage when migrating to Sage Intacct. Previously, they only had two choices; work from the office or set up a remote-access server. The former often led to long hours and weekends away from their families, while the latter meant investing in the infrastructure and additional IT headcount to keep it up and running. As an on-premises solution in Sage 50cloud, as the number of users and transaction volumes grew, the performance of the solution began to decline.
Key Sign: You’re forced to be in the office to work, your system has slowed to a crawl, or you’re not on the most current version.
4. Your integrations have been replaced by manual workarounds. A lot of small to medium-sized businesses aren’t looking to replace all of their business-critical solutions with an all-in-one suite. And, as is often the case, industries have specific needs that are only met by those best-of-breed vendors. When those systems aren’t able to communicate, integrations are replaced by manual workarounds.
Key Sign: Manual workarounds have taken the place of integrations.
5. You have unscalable, error-prone manual processes. It’s really easy for inefficient processes that work when you’re just starting out to gradually become ‘standard operating procedure’ even though they are unable to scale, often requiring you to hire additional headcount as your business grows. Without automation for processes like PO approvals, invoice generation, payment processing, and currency conversions, it’s easy to lose days of productivity to manual processes. These manual processes ultimately impacted their ability to grow efficiently.
Key Sign: Manual processes have become standard operating procedure.
This is a guest blog from X3 Consulting. They are exhibiting at Accountex Summit North 2021 on stand J10.
Scanning solutions boost MTD efficiency for accountants
Making Tax Digital Is Simple With Fujitsu ScanSnap Scanners
If you represent a business, you'll be aware of HMRC’s Making Tax Digital policy. To recap, it's a plan to ensure every business and individual has access to their own digital tax account. As of April 2019 businesses operating above the VAT threshold of £85k will have to use this system to digitally keep their VAT records and file their VAT returns using MTD compatible software.
If you’re used to dealing with paper, this can sound like a daunting proposition. Fortunately, Fujitsu’s cutting-edge scanner hardware and the ScanSnap Cloud are the ideal solution for HMRC’s Making Tax Digital plans. Read on to find out more…
What exactly is Making Tax Digital?
If it’s not something you’re already thinking about, it’s important to know that businesses are now mandated to use the recently announced Making Tax Digital platform to meet their VAT obligations.
If you’re running a small business with a turnover below the VAT threshold, you can choose to use the system but you won’t have to. The deadline has been extended.
Benefits of the online portal
So what are the benefits? Well, apart from the end of the dreaded tax return, this change means users won’t have to give HMRC information it already has access to – such as from employers, banks and other government departments.
It also enables people and businesses to keep an eye on their tax in real time. No more waiting till the end of the financial year – or longer – to find out how much tax is owed to HMRC or due in repayments.
Just as with online banking, with Making Tax Digital, businesses will be able to access a comprehensive online account. Digital record-keeping software will be linked directly to HMRC systems enabling people to send and receive information using the software – and that’s where your Fujitsu ScanSnap scanner comes into play.
Fujitsu ScanSnap scanners
Scanning documents is a simple and effective way to ensure all the documentation you need for your VAT and tax returns is stored securely in one place and is easily accessible for your online accounts.
ScanSnap Scanners from Fujitsu enable everything from printed receipts to invoices and even parking or train tickets can be quickly and simply scanned in. ScanSnap Cloud will even identify the type of content you upload and route it directly to your preferred cloud service, so there’s no need to even boot up your PC.
You can rest assured everything you need is held securely online and all in one place, making it easy to submit your VAT and online tax return when the time comes. It’s organised, effective document-keeping – ideal for businesses large and small.
Check out our comprehensive selection at www.ScanSnapit.com. Until 12 May anyone purchasing a ScanSnap iX1500 can claim a free ScanSnap iX100.
Why add scanners to your product portfolio?
Digital transformation has been around a while but it is only really just starting to come to the thinking and realisation of small and medium sized businesses who are looking at ways of becoming more efficient, working smarter and saving money.
There are several advantages to scanning documents and merging them with digitally born material, all of which can help open up a conversation with your customers around document scanners and the need for a dedicated scanning device.
Save Money - Document scanning eliminates the need to maintain paper based filing systems. This reduces the costs associated with filing, archiving and long term storage of paper records
Productivity Gains – Studies have shown that employees spend twenty percent of their day searching for information. Using document management software, users can access decision making information in seconds, saving time and improving productivity.
Collaboration – Many document scanning systems integrate with business applications allowing faster access and the ability to share information in real-time.
Easy organization - Electronic documents can be organized much faster, better, and more easily than paper documents. In addition, finding, viewing, and sharing electronic documents can be achieved with unprecedented speed and ease – instantly.
Smarter working – The proliferation of mobile technologies and the ability to scan and view directly to either smart devices, via a cloud service or via a network means more efficient ways of working can be adopted enabling you to build a business around your employees rather than the other way round. Costs could be saved for example in office space and office overheads should staff be based at home. Adopt a more proactive and forward thinking approach ready to embrace the challenges of operating and competing in the 21st century.
Free your Space - Space has become an expensive asset. Save time and money on expensive office relocations and free your space and make the paperless office dream a reality.
Disaster Recovery Planning - Would your customer’s business cope in the event of a fire or flood? Can they afford to lose those valuable documents if they are filed incorrectly after use? Document scanning allows them to keep a set of their records on cd or dvd in another location or office or in the cloud to reduce the risk of losing their valuable information to natural disasters.
Deterioration of Quality - When information is currently on paper there is a problem of deterioration of the original page. Paper can fade over time and be torn through excessive use. A scanned image will not fade or deteriorate
Efficient Retrieval - Enables access to important information from a desk. It can be shared through offices and other branches saving time and money on physical page retrievals, copying and faxing.
Legal Admissibility - General opinion is that scanned images are likely to be admissible in court, with the same weight as of evidence as photocopies which are considered as secondary evidence. There is a potential reduction in the weight of evidence if the authenticity of the copy is questioned (e.g. if a signature is being disputed).
Document and Records Retention - Records need to be retained not only for the purposes of business use, but also to meet legal and regulatory obligations such as for GDPR compliance. For example, in the UK, Acts like Sarbannes Oxley and The Companies Act 1985 (Section 221) requires companies to keep accounting records sufficient to give a "true and fair view of the state of the company's affairs and to explain its transactions." It also requires adequate precautions be taken against falsification of records and to discover any falsification that occurs.
Recent legislation directives are really becoming focussed on the virtues of operating a digital workplace, embracing mobility and collaboration.
Equally digitised and searchable content allows a public sector body to respond to Freedom of Information and Subject Access requests promptly and within permissible time limits.
Greener - Scanning is a paperless process, and often there is no environmental cost when documents are distributed electronically. If documents are scanned less paper is wasted, transport of documents is reduced and the amount of landfill used is reduced. Reducing paper, its transport and the amount of bleaches used in recycling benefits the environment.
Customer Satisfaction – Response times are reduced, information is available in seconds from a computer, remote locations and global business offices are connected and able to respond to customer needs faster and more efficiently.
Fujitsu are exhibiting at Accountex on 1-2 May at ExCeL, London, on Stand 1031.
Managing change in an evolving industry
As the industry evolves with the rapidly changing times, your practice will have had to adapt to big and small, internal and external pressure to transform.
Change is constant and relentless and requires your employees to change how they communicate, learn new skills and transform their perspective on their work. In addition to adapting to new ways of working, your employees will have had to maintain focus on the day job and remain calm and professional.
What to do with an IT change
One change that might leave businesses feeling anxious is a software change or full suite migration. It’s easy to underestimate how much behavioural change is needed to successfully implement software or process changes. It is more important than ever to manage change when IT is at the heart of the transition.
Managers tend to focus on the software and logistics rather than people who will be operating the new systems.
To succeed you need to:
- Invest time and resources in training for your employees on how to use the software or new processes and how it will improve the way they operate.
- Spend time explaining the new processes and bring people onboard as change ambassadors.
- Develop your employees' collaborative capability both with the software provider and colleagues who may be help with the transition.
- Create regular opportunities for employees to feedback on the progress of the transition.
- Ensure that you’ve managed expectations of employees, particularly during transition phase as some might expect immediate success.
- Ensure that everyone is using a common language so that the transition plan is fully understood by all.
- It is helpful to appoint one project manager to oversee the process from beginning to end. This person will be responsible for pulling together all the different processes and ensuring that it keeps on track.
Taking the plunge
If you are about to initiate a change in your practice, it’s important to remember that change can take many different forms and there isn’t a one size fits all plan to ensure success. Before hitting the ground running, businesses should analyse what other changes are taking place within their business and whether programmes dovetail or detract from each other.
Communication is key
Designing a communications strategy should be central to your change programme planning. The key to communicating change successfully is to create a story that demonstrates a vision, reduces uncertainty and creates a deeper understanding of the journey. Doing these three things could be the difference between a change which achieves its targets and one that fails.
Empathy and culture
Change and an organisation’s culture go hand to hand. When leading change, you need to bring people with you on the journey. Your aim is for your employees to feel valued and empowered through the changes, rather than disinterested and irritated. The true secret to success is considering your organisation and the most important assets, the employees, in context.
If you are considering changing your software suite, visit Wolters Kluwer at Accountex Stand 1060 for more tips on how to manage change in your practice.
Predictions for the future of accounting
The past 18 months have been another year of change for accountants, with many important moves - from Making Tax Digital for VAT being introduced, to IR35 affecting the labour market....
Making Tax Digital
Past
Making Tax Digital (MTD) is a key part of government’s plan to make it easier for taxpayers to get their tax right and keep on top of their affairs, moving tax information (and collection of taxes) online. All tax jurisdictions across the world are moving in this direction and APIs are the way of the future!
Following the implementation of MTD, HMRC has removed access to the “direct tools” submission for VAT (over 90% of VAT returns were submitted in this way). Accountants and businesses therefore need to submit VAT returns directly from their chosen software from April 2019, for those above the VAT turnover threshold £85,000.
Prediction
More people will transfer over to bookkeeping packages but not as many as HMRC would have wanted when they first announced the legislation. This is largely because software companies have developed “Bridging software” as a cheap short term solution. By April 2020 everyone will need to link their underlying transactions, however HMRC currently cannot see if a transaction has been linked which may make the process impossible to police.
IR35
Past
The Consultation Document (issued in May 2018) considers the effectiveness of the off-payroll working in the public-sector reforms introduced in April 2017 and, unsurprisingly, concludes that the new rules have been effective in reducing non-compliance.
Last year saw public sector workers move into direct employment role, following the rule change in April 2017 for a variety of reasons but mainly pressure from the end user, despite the fact that HMRC’s data shows that “the CEST tool delivers a self-employed outcome in ONLY 60% of cases”. The fear is that large companies in the private sector may take the same approach and, following the introduction of the new rules in April 2019, there will be ‘blanket decisions’ whereby workers will be forced into false employment arrangements.
As many celebrities work on a freelance basis IR35 has reached the headlines many times with BBC workers being pursued. HMRC’s aggressive (and apparently incorrect) interpretation has recently been highlighted by Lorraine Kelly’s success in a £1.2m case brought by HMRC claiming she was “inside IR35” when she clearly wasn’t.
Prediction
Many more cases will become public as contractors, end clients, recruitment agencies and, more likely Accounting providers gain more confidence to challenging HMRC due to their erroneous and aggressive interpretation of the rules.
The Off Payroll working rules will be extended to the private sector in the tax year beginning 6th April 2020. To be water-tight, you should have a record of your review attached to each contractor’s record which will probably mean using some kind of software solution.
Take it from someone who has conducted a number of IR35 cases, your chances of success against HMRC are high as long as you have an appropriate audit trail of your IR35 review process.
Watch this space for more guidance which HMRC has promised to publish soon!
My Digital Accounts are at Accountex on Stand 263
What’s the industry doing to stop failure?
50% of small businesses are still failing after five years. What’s the industry doing to change it?
“Advisory services” - the 2019 buzz phrase within the accounting profession. Every conference, event, blog, tweet, article and workshop is telling you that you should be doing it. Without it you’re failing your clients, failing your firm, ultimately just failing!
But, what is not being said about advisory services is that, as they stand today, you fail if you try and give it to every client.
Why?
Time. Garnering insights to position the value to every client (however small) takes time, building PDF reports takes time, educating those just starting out takes time, selling to every client takes time, talking clients through every report takes time, emailing out takes time, meeting monthly takes time. Even just educating yourself with ebooks like this takes time.
In an accountancy practice where time really is money, you simply do not have the time to do it.
How do we know this? We’ve supported over 1,200 accountants to roll out traditional advisory services to their clients with our Futrli Classic product. Most hit capacity at around just 10% of their portfolios. Leaving 90% without.
Yet every client would benefit from help and without it, they can struggle.
Look at the stats. 50% of small businesses are still failing by year five. This needle hasn’t changed in spite of tech advances because the 10% of clients that are given advisory services are the 10% that were probably getting the help before and can afford to pay for your time to provide it. It’s now just better with real-time information, easy to read dashboards and future-focused metrics.
But with no change, no added services, no support going to the 90% - nothing has changed for these small businesses and it is here that the failure rate remains.
Think of your own portfolio - based on these stats, up to 50% could fade away over the next fi years giving you a treadmill of new business headaches but more importantly closing the door on someone's dream, affecting their families and of course the communities they exist in. With 99.3% of all private sector businesses (at the start of 2018) being small businesses, the impact to us all is massive.
About two years ago we started looking deeper. Looking at how we can help these small businesses grow, moving towards needing month end management information packs, PDF reports, scenarios. And how do we help you move them into a space where you can advise them (for a fee!)?
Introducing the Futrli Platform. It helps small business owners who aren't ready to pay for advisory services understand more about their businesses. It does the heavy lifting of data analysis behind the scenes, and discovers, interprets and prioritises what they need to focus on today. A simple, beautiful and smart daily newsfeed keeps them on track each morning supporting, nudging them to into further insights and knowledge.
Starting with what they’re comfortable with, the first product to launch, Flow, reveals insights around their customers. How dependent they are on each one? Are there any risk areas? It shows how much they are owed or owe. Then, using AI, it will reveal cash flow predictions and forecasts, identifying areas of the business that are under or over performing. Once they have this up to date view of their cash flow, they can start to link their non-financial metrics to get the full picture.
This is the piece of the puzzle that was missing. This is how you affect your 90% and move the needle on their success.
The first four products in Futrli Platform to launch are:
Newsfeed - bringing together the day’s priorities
Discover what your clients need to know today across every data source and Platform product.
Flow - the cash flow management system
Flow helps small businesses who are stressed about not getting paid and how much they owe by using the power of AI to understand customer and supplier habits.
Predict - forecasting like you haven’t seen it before
This is forecasting totally re-imagined. Predict helps small businesses see the impact of their decisions, by combining their knowledge with machine learning to forecast their future.
Playground - scenario planning made simple
Playground stops your clients making decisions in silos with informed scenario planning. Bring teams and information together for coordinated decision making and execution.
See founder and CEO, Hannah Dawson, demo the platform on stage at Accountex on Wednesday 1 May, at the Business and Finance Theatre at 12pm. And to get on the preview list and be one of the first to explore Futrli Platform, head to preview.futrli.com
An app stack to put you in financial control
The importance of financial controls for financial service outsourcing (FSO) organisations
FSO organisations have a unique demand for financial controls because of:
● An increased time and effort to communicate and coordinate with multiple decision makers on the client’s side. This is because the decision makers are remote, but are nonetheless involved in daily authorisation activities.
● A demand for shared accountability for decision making with clients. This helps make sure they are not solely responsible for erroneous or fraudulent payments in such cases where they could not get timely approvals on the client side.
● The need to have exceptional data quality - all the correct coding, Bills matched with the corresponding POs, timely reviewed and approved Bills – in order to be able to deliver high value services such as cash flow forecasting, and financial advisory.
Keys to efficient financial controls: Digital and fully automated processes
Xero’s latest Cash Flow App Advisory Playbook outlined the importance of Data Automation. Modern cloud technology has been widely embraced, and manual interventions and paper-based processes all but eradicated. Functions such as invoice submission, practice management, client management, and approval management have all benefited.
To take the first step towards Data Automation, you must introduce digital data capture and cloud data storage for accounting documents.
Once you have your data in a digital form, you can start introducing Data Automation, which is essentially an extension of data digitisation with workflow driven data validation and decision control. This makes sure that your accounting data is complete, verified, and auditable.
Building a Xero-based Bill Automation app stack
A Xero-based Bill Automation app stack consists of the following:
● Xero as the cloud accounting platform. It should be used for cloud data storage, centralised document management, and accounting.
● Digital data capture tools, such as Receipt Bank, Datamolino, AutoEntry, and Hubdoc.
● Online approval workflow apps, such as ApprovalMax. This should establish the multi-tiered and fully automated approval workflow, based on the approval criteria pulled from Xero - for example: Supplier, GL code, Amount, Tracking Category, etc.
Results of introducing financial controls for accounting and bookkeeping practices
There are a number of benefits to introducing financial controls, such as:
● A streamlined client communication and strong authorisation process for all financial documents, including POs, Bills, Credit notes, etc.
● A fully automated and notifications-driven authorisation process for multiple remote budget holders and decision makers on the client side.
● Positive profitability by ensuring data quality through timely review and approval of all financial documents.
● Higher client satisfaction due to better transparency and process agility.
● A reduction in time and costs, and improvement in audit quality using automated audit reports attached to every Bill and PO.
● Improved cash flow analysis by taking into account pending POs and Bills which require approval and that are not yet reflected in Xero.
ApprovalMax will be at Accountex on Stand 471.
Accountants must embrace change today to shape tomorrow's business
Accountancy is a venerable old profession. Since mankind first worked out how to exchange goods and services for small metal discs, the job of bookkeeping has been a central part of every economy – not to mention a source of professional pride. When Roman generals were defeated by their enemies, their accounting scrolls were among the first things they saved as they beat their retreat. Accountants have long been the unseen cement keeping the edifice of business together.
Fast forward two millennia and the picture has changed in style but not substance. Accounting still occupies an essential role in the success of businesses of all sizes, helping them to keep control of their finances and ensure that they’re focusing their energies in the right places and for the right reasons. Business leaders of all stripes rely on their accountants to act as a counterweight of good sense and sound practice.
But the old ways are changing. At Accountex this year, I’m going to be sharing findings from Sage’s global research study, The Practice of Now, which lifts the lid on an industry in flux. We already know that technology is changing not just how accountants do their age-old job, but the job itself. Where a few decades ago the role was primarily focused on bookkeeping, balancing incomings and outgoings and making sure the taxman got his fair share, those strict lines are beginning to blur.
In a world where data flows more freely than ever before and accountants have access to information from across the business, accountancy is undergoing a shift of purpose, moving closer to strategic advice and business insight.
The silos are coming down
The silos are coming down. The numbers with which accountants work are no longer bound to the pages on which they’re written – they’re linked in to a holistic picture of the business as a whole, which gives accountants the chance to widen their scope and increase the value they provide to their clients.
In our ‘experience economy’, where data-driven value-add services based on customer needs are the key to a successful strategy, accountants must be able to keep pace. Their clients are becoming increasingly used to being provided intelligent, personalised services by their professional partners. Everything from supply chain to HR is becoming data-driven, using insights generated by increasingly digitised systems to tailor services to the specific users and customers in question.
The good news is that this is a truly exciting time to be an accountant. Many practices are already making the shift from transactional relationships to strategic partnerships with their clients. There are boundless opportunities for accountants to maximise the value they provide and so increase their market share – and The Practice of Now research will help shape that. Technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning matched with cloud-based accounting software are providing not just a sleeker way to manage the books, but a whole raft of high-value insights that can help drive clients’ businesses to the next level.
The old skills aren’t defunct. Every accountancy should be based on a solid foundation of financial expertise. But that foundation is now ready to be built on. Accountants can use their unique insights into the business’s financial health to provide sound, actionable advice for business leaders on where to invest, when to double down and when to watch and wait. Aided by the advanced technologies now becoming widespread in the industry, there’s a real chance for accountants to push into the next level of partnership with their clients and secure their position as value-add strategic consultants.
Now is the time to embrace the change and get ahead of the curve. Equip yourself with the right tools to provide the strategic service your clients demand, and turn your bookkeeping expertise into board-level business insights.
I’ll be sharing the results of the research at the Keynote A Theatre at 10:15am on Day 1 of Accountex, and will also be taking part in a fireside chat discussing the findings further in the Sage Theatre at 4pm – why not come along and find out more?
Why should accounting firms invest in a powerful BI solution?
Time is usually considered to be one of the most valuable assets for accountants.
A good BI solution will reduce manual work tasks so that you can free up time to become your customer's best financial adviser.
With a good BI solution, you should be able to present reports and key figures to your customers at any time, so customers always have access to fresh data. A complete online solution makes this possible.
The digital transformation results in that business services are to a greater extent expected to be offered on digital platforms. This also applies to accounting services, it has become more and more common to order accounting services directly online.
There are many digital marketplaces that customers can visit to retrieve information about accounting services, and quickly compare reviews and competencies for accounting firms.
In addition, today's customers often need more than "just numbers" - they want business advice based on their financial data. Therefore, it is important to ask the following question: “can we offer a complete digital BI solution for our customers?”
We want to highlight how accounting firms can grow their businesses by investing in a powerful Business Intelligence (BI) solution.
A flexible BI solution that provides great opportunities for creating custom reports is also essential to meeting your customer demands. Custom reports provide your customers presentable data as they want to see it, which contributes to better financial control and decision-making.
Customized reports also help to emphasise factors that are particularly important to your customer's success. Often, a lot of time is spent on daily operational tasks that make it easy to forget the overall goals.
With a personalised dashboard that displays updated key figures, the customer can easily locate, for example, outstanding claims, balance year-to-date, actual to budget, which customers are most profitable, etc. This enables the customer to stay up to date on critical success factors and quickly show trends and challenges.
Expectations of an accountant seem to have changed progressively. Providing advanced advisory that gives the customer a solid ground for decision-making is becoming more and more crucial. The increased digitalisation also means that the accounting firms services are expected to be offered online. A flexible online solution makes it easy for the customer to get access to their reports and keep up to date on their financial situation. A powerful BI solution enables the accounting firm to meet today's customer preferences and create added value for both the customer and the accounting firm.
OneStop Reporting will be on Stand 526 at Accountex on 1-2 May.
The state of blockchain in the accounting industry
Blockchain is certainly being explored, but we are at the tip of the iceberg in terms of its use and adoption. PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Deloitte, Ernst & Young (EY) and KPMG, better known as the ‘Big Four’ auditors, all have established solid long-term blockchain roadmaps to remain relevant in the cryptocurrency and blockchain space.
It is important that the ‘Big Four’ have recognised the growing demand for both blockchain and crypto from an accounting perspective, and have taken different approaches to facilitate the rapidly increasing interest in the blockchain space.
As a starting point, their interest and allocation of resource to the technology further solidifies blockchain’s legitimate and longstanding future within the industry.
Blockchain has the capacity to be directly integrated into existing accounting infrastructures and potentially improve many technical aspects from an audit perspective. Its implementation also opens up new avenues for consultation, in particular creating a new market looking for consultancy on blockchain. There are regulatory and technical risks that come with blockchain, but these have been identified by the big conglomerates which helps companies understand blockchain’s potential in a more realistic manner.
What’s the No.1 1 trend that will shape blockchain in accounting (2019)?
Throughout 2019 we should see a gradual increase in the use of blockchain technology. For example, apps will be released that leverage blockchain technology in order to help accountants as well as business owners. These apps will plug into and build upon the cloud accounting platforms already in existence, which is a natural progression in technology. But if history is a guide the adoption will likely be very slow.
Blockchain is becoming more and more mature, and much like the .com bubble that resulted in the appearance of Google and Amazon, we are going into that space where we’ll start to see the beginnings of major apps emerging who use blockchain.
What’s the #1 challenge to blockchain adoption in the accounting industry?
While cloud technology is now a given in the UK accounting sphere, it has taken roughly 10 years for it to get there. In the same way, blockchain technology is currently at its infancy, and has a long way to go to be at the early majority stage in the accounting profession.
Blockchain is going to have to go through a similar trend and process to be fully accepted by accountants, and potentially one of the biggest challenges to overcome on that journey is converting the more traditional firms to adapt and adopt the latest technological advances.
There is no denying that the accounting industry is seen as a traditional space. According to the FRC’s July 2017 report of Key Facts and Trends in the Accountancy Profession over 60% of members of the ICAEW are 35+ in age. Arguably, these statistics support the reasoning behind why the accountancy profession remains conventional and reluctant to change.
Resistance could stem from disinterest in new innovations or it could also be because there has been so much change recently with auto-enrolment, FRS102 and Maxing Tax Digital (MTD) that it is tedious and hard to keep up.
The challenge for blockchain is not that it isn’t useful - there are many use cases for the technology in financial services and outside of accounting such as ID verification in Estonia - it’s whether accountants are willing to go through another innovation and change in their industry.
What’s the #1 benefit for blockchain in accounting?
Blockchain technology provides transparency, allows for speed and enables automation in the accounting profession. It has the potential to enhance accountancy by reducing the costs of maintaining and reconciling ledgers, and from an audit perspective we are able to see with absolute certainty the ownership and history of assets.
By obliterating menial tasks, the automation that blockchain technology offers in replacement gives accountants the time and resource to better serve our clients, move away from compliance, and focus on consultancy.
The ICAEW agrees in stating that “Blockchain could help accountants gain clarity over the available resources and obligations of their organisations, and also free up resources to concentrate on planning and valuation, rather than record keeping”.
What’s the future of blockchain in accounting?
There is a long road ahead for blockchain. We are a long way off from full scale adoption, but eventually blockchain technology will revolutionise the way we record and exchange value in the digital age.
Blockchain is here to stay and with blockchain technology as the foundation, the potential aftermath could result in further benefits for accounting such as triple entry bookkeeping. In addition, blockchain technology provides the platform for artificial intelligence (AI) to scale and thrive.