two different approaches.
by hitendra patil
the definitive success guide to client accounting services
client accounting services essentially requires an ability for your firm to be able to best serve the needs of all your clients. in other words, your firm’s technology stack, services, processes and pricing packages need to cater to businesses of different sizes, turnovers, as well as various levels of tech-savviness of the business owners and their employees. in yet other words, your firm should have the ability to do part of the accounting work or all the work your clients offload to your firm.
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when clients do part of the work
in such cases, you want the technology stack to be as standardized as possible to avoid costly, error-prone and time-consuming need to deal with a variety of software. at the same time, when clients do part of the work, you must seek to implement collaborative technology on the cloud to eliminate duplication of data entry and mailing/emailing information back and forth between your firm and clients.
this will, most likely, require you to convince your clients of the benefits of a common, collaborative, cloud technology platform, and more likely than not, train the clients onto newer technologies. but the experience of hundreds of firms shows that the payoff far outweighs the cost of such efforts.
when clients offload all of the accounting work to your firm
such clients are your ideal cas clients. they will pay comparatively more fees. you can deliver excellent advice to such clients (as you have control over all accounting processes). even though such clients will not “process” any accounting work, they still need real-time access to and insights from the accounting information. for this purpose, you absolutely need collaborative cloud technologies. if you can implement technologies/solutions that enable clients to interact with you online, when possible from right within your accounting solutions, it will give your firm a significant competitive advantage.
for the purpose of this post, we will talk about 100 percent cloud solutions. yet, the same principles will somewhat apply to “hosted” solutions as your firm and clients can access those at the same time.
core software
your accounting, payroll and tax software, as well as any industry/niche specific software you may have/need, must be cloud-based and collaborative or integrated, as the need may be. many good-sized businesses need access to the core accounting and payroll software to be able to perform routine, regular business functions. they need to write checks, issue invoices, enter bills, enter/upload payroll time and attendance data, etc. as long as such work by your clients is in the same software that you have access to and there is no need to re-create/re-enter the data created by your clients, your cas tech foundation will be solid.
client service software
each cas component requires your firm to “deliver” client communications, reports and insights. as the first and the topmost preference, your firm must implement core software that has client service capabilities built in.
for example, when you finalize monthly financial statements, the software should automatically notify and deliver those to your clients, without the need for you to download pdfs to your computer and then email them separately using your email software. similarly, your core software should include the ability to set up meaningful alerts and notifications that the system automatically emails/texts to the clients – for example, if receivables from the customers of your client exceed, say, 30 days. ideally, your core software should also have a corresponding mobile/tablet app that the client can use on the go to consume important information or process some work.
technology also should enable your clients to deliver work-related information/date right into your core software, avoiding the need to mail/email/hand-deliver it to your firm. for example, the monthly bank and credit card transactions data should be directly fetchable from your core accounting software.
the fundamental requirement
the fundamental requirement to select and implement software solutions is simple – “as much as possible, data and information once created should not be required to be re-created” in any other software. in addition, you must strive to minimize, if not eliminate, the manual effort of “moving the information” between different software, and between your firm and clients. it not only enhances efficiency, avoids delays and errors but helps significantly reduce your firm’s operating costs – all of which means each of your employees can process work for more number of clients, thereby improving your firm’s profitability in multiple ways.
ancillary software
other than your core cas software, your firm may need other ancillary software, e.g., workflow software, email software, internet telephony software, crm software and so on. it is important for your firm to research and find such ancillary software that integrates with your core and other software. even for such ancillary software, the underlying requirement is the same “as much as possible, data and information once created should not be required to be re-created” as in any other software.
all of the above make your clients’ lives easier. it provides them real-time information and insights that helps them make better business decisions. it helps your firm optimize your staff time and process costs. and more importantly, it keeps you, the accountant, on the top of their mind and memory recall, which in turn helps build and enhance great relationships with your clients.
but what about clients who are not technology-savvy?
hopefully, you should have, if at all, a minimal number of such clients. they should be encouraged and convinced to offload all their accounting work to your firm. make arrangements with their vendors and customers to directly, electronically deliver to your firm the accounting-related documents and information. explain to the clients that you need a secure, minimal, read-only access set up with their bank(s) to deliver bank account(s) and credit card(s) statements to your firm electronically.
bring to their attention the benefit of doing so – it will reduce the effort required on their part, and/or the cost of mailing, to periodically send such information to your firm. as these clients will find it challenging to consume electronic information, identify their top concerns that accounting insights can address – and then standardize the monthly/quarterly summary to deliver such insights in a narrative format.