Thursday April 11, 2013 at 9:00am
For a long time I have felt that the accounting industry is ridiculous. We, as accountants, ask business owners to maintain their own accounting records. This is something they are not trained to do, generally don’t have any inclination for and indeed adds no value to their business. Then the accountant comes along some time after the year end, takes the accounts away and produces the statutory accounts thus making it possible to calculate the profits and tax liability. Problems with old s....
Thursday February 7, 2013 at 9:00am
Businesses slow to embrace new technology could see an impact on their growth and profits according to a recent survey.
Out of 4,000 small businesses questioned, one-in-five lacked basic IT skills and 40 per cent of those identified this as a key factor holding back their growth. Those businesses with poor IT skills were most likely to record no annual profit compared with more technically able businesses.
Being slow to keep up with IT developments could be for a number of reasons. Busy sma....
Thursday January 10, 2013 at 8:00am
Those in the Midlands service sector might well be starting the year with a smile. The Birmingham Chamber of Commerce Group’s last quarterly economic survey for 2012 issued last week showed the region’s service sector export sales had risen to 40 per cent, compared with 30 per cent in the previous quarter. This is quite an achievement when media reports elsewhere suggest that UK service sector activity as a whole fell for the first time in two years in December.
It wasn’t such....
Thursday November 8, 2012 at 9:00am
Are you entirely confident that your financial record keeping is robust? If not, then now is the time to urgently get things in order as HMRC rolls out an enhanced record checking process for SMEs. I wrote with some scepticism in my blog last year about Business Record Checks brought into play by HMRC after they felt research by OECD suggested poor business record keeping is responsible for a loss of tax in up to 2 million SME cases annually. Over the last year, HMRC has consulted over the best ....
Thursday September 27, 2012 at 9:00am
SMEs are able to access greater IT power than ever before due to cloud computing systems, like Xero online accounting. Not only does it make life easier but there’s an impact on the bottom line, with research this month revealing SME cloud users are much more likely to see financial success through increased productivity.
Cloud computing - provided remotely by a third party, usually over the internet using a web browser, and often without a contract – was once the preserve of the ....
Thursday May 24, 2012 at 9:00am
Were you as incensed as I was a few weeks ago when reading the headlines that ‘Hague Tells Bosses to Work harder’? At the time I thought, you idiot, I’m not sure most business owners feel they can work any harder. I don’t know any who are sitting back and resting on their laurels.
Having had some time to calm down and reflect, and trying to give Hague the benefit of the doubt I wonder whether what he was trying to get at is the need to work smarter. Cliché....
Thursday May 10, 2012 at 9:00am
The media loves a bad news story. You could practically hear the cries of delight as they reported the news. It was all doom and gloom, concentrating on the Government’s failure to lift us out of the economic slump. Typical media stuff.
And while we can’t pretend the outlook’s completely positive, perhaps it’s not as bad as some in the media make out. Two new surveys show confidence from UK businesses. Optimism among smaller manufacturers rose for the first time since ....
Thursday March 8, 2012 at 4:18pm
At first, the idea of outsourcing your accountancy software may seem a little strange. You may worry about the prospect of not owning the software installed on your own computer or server. But the benefits of Xero’s online accounting software are considerable. The process is secure, and will revolutionise the way you deal with your financial management.
Benefits of Xero cloud accounting
More than 200,000 businesses in over 100 countries use Xero cloud accounting. Xero allows you to run y....
Wednesday November 9, 2011 at 5:16pm
Xero, the company that develops our online accounting software, is calling upon the UK Government to abandon proposals to simplify statutory reporting for the smallest businesses. Xero believe that there are other ways to address any reporting concerns that the UK’s smallest businesses – 60% of UK businesses registered at Companies House - may have, without requiring yet more legislation. And our response is ‘here, here’.
This follows the Department for Business Innovat....
Thursday September 1, 2011 at 9:00am
It may sound futuristic but in fact web based accounting, in the cloud, is now a reality for many small and medium sized businesses around the world. For many it allows them to delegate a non-core activity and reap the full benefits of outsourcing. Yet, I’ve been surprised how few local businesses in Birmingham have embraced the major advantages offered by ‘the cloud’.
Over my twenty odd years in the accountancy profession I’ve been searching for a solution to an age ol....
Thursday July 28, 2011 at 9:00am
Just like buses not a lot new seems to happen and then all the innovations seem to come along at once. You might be interested in some of the new things that have come across my desk that we have either adopted or are looking more closely at:
Online accounting software: Nothing so special about that you may be thinking, however Xero Accounts seems to have taken a big slice of market share for two reasons. Firstly it is web based and fast, secondly it downloads company bank statements automa....