Good evening everyone, and welcome to the latest ASN FREE Q & A session with Jason Blackman from iMentor. Tonights Q & A is on converting to the cloud. If you have any questions, please post as a comment below. Please be aware, if any questions are left unanswered, then they will be answered at a later time. And thank you all for participating…..now over to you, who has the first question?
Jason Blackman Good evening everyone!
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Melissa Compton
Melissa Compton good evening
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … as we wait for our first question, I’ll just explain a bit about the cloud. Basically ‘the cloud’ means ‘online’. So any software in the cloud is accessible wherever you have an internet connection – so it also means you can use pretty much any device – if it’s workable, such as a laptop, iPad or smartphone…
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Carly O’Keeffe
Carly O’Keeffe Hello 🙂
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … obviously it helps to have a good internet connection!
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … for me it’s been a revelation – since I discovered the cloud I haven’t looked back – and my practice is now run virtually 100% online…
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s SUCH an advantage to be able to show the client their figures over a coffee using an iPad… for me it really brings accounting into the 21st century…
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Hello
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Melissa Compton
Melissa Compton hi so my question is this I am looking at converting to cloud but I am really a big fan of sage 50 but not sage one is there a cloud software like sage 50 ? or that simple to use
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … there’s lot of options Melissa. I personally don’t like Sage, and never have done, and if I’m honest the cloud version of Sage is pretty awful, but that’s just my opinion. The big cloud players are Xero, FreeAgent & QuickBooks Online. My software of choice is Xero but FreeAgent is also very good, and very simple to use and understand. If you’re familiar with the desktop version of QuickBooks then the online version is probably the way to go. That’s not to say you can’t use Sage One at all, and if you’re serving clients you really need to look at making the move…
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Melissa Compton
Melissa Compton thank you i actually have the free trial of freeagent at the moment and it is good
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Natasha Everard
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Is it secure? So many hackers nowadays
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … great question Yulia! It’s AT LEAST as safe as online banking, and how many of us use that? To put it into perspective, QuickBooks Online’s servers are guarded 24 hours a day and they employ a team of ‘hackers’ to try and penetrate the data 24/7 – …See more
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Thank you, Jason. It is reassuring
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Lorna Phelps
Lorna Phelps Still a little worry. Look at tesco this week!
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … of course it’s a worry, but it’s all about perspective. I had one guy saying to me the other week he would NEVER use cloud software because of the security factor. But where was he having the argument from? Facebook! Where he had stored all his family pictures!
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … the client is always impressed as well – to be able to show them realtime figures is always a clincher. Plus it’s really handy for prospects too – to show them what they can do without being tied to their office is a real plus for them…
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Ida Bouwhuis Miab
Ida Bouwhuis Miab if one just starts out with only 2 or 3 clients, you still think doing the cloud even if the customers are small fry and would not benefit themselves?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman .. for me Ida yes. I totally believe in ‘starting as you mean to go on’. If you set yourself up on a platform with just a few clients you can easily grow that cloud-based platform. Plus there is a new initiative coming in April 2018 from HMRC called ‘Making Tax Digital’. If we work for the self-employed we will NEED to be cloud-based!
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard My query…..do you have a plan b if your internet connection is poor?
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Join the question
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … great question Natasha – and one that has indeed been put to QuickBooks Online. Their argument is that internet connections will improve the more time goes on – speeds will get faster, and places will get connected that haven’t been before. There’s no real hiding from the answer here, the fact is you need a good internet connection to use the cloud!
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard With so many different options, would you chose one that includes payroll services too…or keep both separate?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … another good question. Unfortunately Xero haven’t quite grasped payroll yet so I wouldn’t recommend that one just yet. FreeAgent’s payroll is good although it’s only monthly and not weekly. So I would say until the cloud providers get their payroll house in order I would stick to a separate package – but in an ideal world you would want them combined!
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard is there one out there you would recommend over others? and why?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … for me it would be Xero. It’s more complicated than say FreeAgent, but I think there’s a good reason for that. I personally think that Xero is designed more for accountants, whereas FreeAgent is designed more for the self-employed users, like our clients. So it’s easier to understand, and there’s nothing wrong with that. QuickBooks Online is very similar to the desktop version in the way it works. There are of course lots more but these are the main ‘players’ as it were…
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Natasha Everard
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest I currently use Sage and excel but need to upgrade. Do any of these cloud based software solutions work in a similar way to Sage 50 as the ones I have looked at assume that the client is going to use the software to send invoices, download bank statements etc and I know that they wouldn’t do it.
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … the good thing about a lot of the cloud solutions Tracey is that you as a bookkeeper or an accountant can ‘control’ what the client does. So if the client just wants to raise sales invoices that’s fine, it doesn’t mean they can touch the rest. In fact a lot of my clients do that – they raise the invoices themselves but I do the rest – it’s a system that can work really well!
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Natasha Everard
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Lorna Phelps
Lorna Phelps Do you worry it could make a bookkeepers job redundant?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … not at all. I think the future is great for bookkeepers. I think the cloud software, and the way it works, makes our job EASIER that’s for sure, but no less valuable. I still believe clients need us for bookkeeping. Yes the software available makes it easier but does that mean clients will want to do it themselves still?
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest Most of mine haven’t got a clue and don’t want to have a clue either. 🙂
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … so from that point of view I don’t think it’s a threat, I think actually it’s a huge opportunity. Things like bank rec are now a breeze to do and make things so much easier for us, but from the client’s point of view we’re still reconciling their bank account so it’s still a highly valuable service!
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard is there any areas of the cloud based software that let themselves down slightly? Obviously the SAGE cost is very expenses .. how does the cost of Cloud based software compare with the likes of SAGE?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … admittedly I don’t know how much Sage costs BUT the costs from the other providers do vary as to how many licences you sign up for. At the moment I know QuickBooks online are selling their software at £1 (yes a pound!) per licence per month, and you will never get it cheaper than that. My version of Xero costs me £9 per month per client, but bear in mind that includes all updates and backups. So one cost you never have with the cloud providers is updates – you’re always using the current version!
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest How do you get Xero for £9? When I go onto their website the pricing options are £7.50, £16.50 and £20.42. Do you have to become a “partner”?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … yes you do Tracey but bear in mind becoming a partner is free of charge! The £9 per month is called a ‘bureau’ deal and the downside is you do have to sign up for a certain amount of licences. But if you have lots of clients to move over it’s well worth it to get such a discount…
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Natasha Everard
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Can you do online HMRC filingS with cloud based software?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … yes you can Yulia – so for example you can file RTI returns to HMRC, plus in FreeAgent you can file tax returns as well. Bear in mind that in April 2018 Making Tax Digital will become the norm, so all filing will be done quarterly online, so the cloud software providers will have to introduce that too!
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Thank yiu
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Natasha Everard
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Which product has the best after sales support? Could you recommend, pleAse
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … great question Yulia. FreeAgent are great to speak too and really helpful, as are QBO. Xero’s help is brilliant but bear in mind there’s NO telephone support, it’s purely done on email. Having said that, I emailed them one Sunday morning with a query and it was answered within the hour so, although you don’t get to speak to anyone, their support is excellent…
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Thank you for recommendation, Jason
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … another MASSIVE thing to talk about is receipt processing – software like Receipt Bank is changing the way we work. Using this the client can simply scan their receipts/invoices using their smartphone and hey presto they’ll all appear on a dashboard ready for us to code – it’s stunning software and well worth a look at www.receipt-bank.com
Receipt Bank – Effortless Bookkeeping
Receipt Bank is an award-winning bookkeeping automation software that saves accountants, bookkeepers and small businesses time and money. Get started today!
RECEIPT-BANK.COM
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard is it easy to convert the data over to cloud from say something like VT Transaction or Sage
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … there are a few companies that offer this service now. One such provider is www.movemybooks.com which specialises in bringing data across from other packages. So yes, it can be done and I think as more cloud software evolves this sort of process will become commonplace…
Home
Following an easy, step-by-step process it will collect your desktop data, walk you through…
MOVEMYBOOKS.CO.UK
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … combining something like Receipt Bank & Xero changes everything as far as bookkeeping is concerned!
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard what online payroll programme would you suggest?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … sadly Natasha online payroll is one of the areas that is quite disappointing at the moment. FreeAgent’s is good but it’s only available as monthly, Xero’s is ‘OK’ at best but it does offer any time periods. There’s a free online package called Payroo which again is OK but not really the finished article. Software like Moneysoft is still streets ahead of the cloud offerings. It’s one area that WILL improve but it’s a slow process…
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … next Monday I’ll be giving a live demonstration of Xero and showing you some of the amazing features of this software. It’s very much not a ‘you have to use this’ type of demo, it’s really to show you the power of the cloud and the really cool things you can do now with software like Xero for example…
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Should we register to participate or it will be regular Q&A?
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard i will posting a link in the week as this will be a live video link 🙂
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it will be available via a link Yulia but have no doubt Natasha will be providing more details very soon…
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s going to be great as I will be demonstrating it LIVE via screen share!
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest I think this is my problem at the minute. I am so used to Sage and do it the tradition way, that I don’t have a clue how the cloud software works so keep putting it off.
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Wonderful. Thank you Jason and Natasha
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … so many are used to Sage I know Tracey mainly because that’s the AAT route I guess? But most of the cloud software is SO easy to pick up I promise – hopefully next Monday I’ll convince you just how easy it really is…
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … if you hate bank rec then the cloud offerings make it a breeze – importing bank data is now SO easy and reconciling it all is really straightforward. Next Monday one of the areas I’ll be showing you is bank rec – it’s so good you’ll actually be wanting to do it!
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard on a non cloud based software you back up often, and can go back and restore if you need to reverse or fix something…..can this be done on cloud software?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … not as such I suppose as everything is ‘live’ and by the same token everything is backed up live – but on most of the software the audit trails are great and it’s usually very easy to correct things – sometimes even by doing something simple like just reversing the transaction!
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Yes, it is important. We all can make mistakes
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … to me one of the massive benefits of cloud is the freedom – no longer do you have to be tied to the office. I have a friend that travels the world but still keeps up-to-date via cloud. It really does change everything!
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor This is a good one 😊
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard So how do you convince someone to convert…..i currently do bookkeeping for a company then the accounts go to the accountants at year end….do most accountants think cloud based software gives them enough info?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … sometimes the accountant PREFERS it! No longer do you have to send backup USB sticks to the accountant, then restoring them when they’ve made their changes. That’s always been a recipe for disaster as far as I can see. Now you can give the accountant access to the software too. Simply invite them to the client in the software and they’ve got instant access – of course you can choose if you allow them to play with the data or not. It makes working with the accountant so much easier!
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … as I said Xero is certainly not the only offering, but one thing with them is the education, training and tools on their website – it’s really great. They’ve also got some great information too, including a little bit on how the security works – https://www.xero.com/uk/about/security/
Cloud Security | Xero Accounting Software
We’re committed to the security of our customers’ data. Learn how we provide multiple layers of protection for…
XERO.COM
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard And i suppose the main benefit…..software works on a mac!!!
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Oh yes. We need it
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … that’s a huge benefit – it works on any browser!
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Natasha Everard
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s my personal opinion that desktop software will eventually be phased out, and will certainly cease to be supported. The change in April 2018 to online accounting will be huge, and will almost force accountants and bookkeepers to get online, so it’s my feeling that we should act now – the sooner we make the change, the sooner we’ll be ready to service our clients…
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … of course, there’s also now cloud-based accounts production/tax return software – one such package is Taxfiler – an absolutely brilliant bit of kit, incredibly cheap but incredibly powerful – accounts can be produced and then transferred to the tax return – great stuff. It’s well worth a look at www.taxfiler.co.uk
Taxfiler – tax and accounting software
Cloud-based tax and accounts software for accountants in practice – powerful, reliable and fast. The future of tax…
TAXFILER.CO.UK
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Amanda Essen
Amanda Essen Good evening Jason Blackman . I have heard of people having various issues with bugs re various updates and websites going down are these common? How can you work around them? If a client wanted to change providers are their files held to randsom? Would it be worth running a desktop version temporarily until the hmrc transfers services online? And how would you encourage older less tech savvy clients to convert? Just a few questions 😀 (just moved as accidentally hijaked someone elses post )
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … the cloud software websites going down is a very, very rare occurrence and in the years I’ve used cloud it’s happened perhaps twice, and only temporarily. The files aren’t held to ransom as such and it’s very, very easy to extract data. I personally wouldn’t feel the need to run a desktop version parallel to the cloud version, but each to their own of course. Converting clients is harder if they’re involved in the bookkeeping, if they’re not it is slightly easier. But showing them how easy the packages are to use, and the feature they offer, has always won it for me!
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Amanda Essen
Amanda Essen Cloud is definitely the way forward there are no two ways about it. Do you think it will eliminate the need for bookkeepers i the future completely?
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Natasha Everard
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Rosie Murphy
Rosie Murphy Sorry if this has been asked already, I havnt had time to read through everything. We use keytime accounts production at work to do the financial reports for clients (we dont really do book keeping). Do these cloud softwares enable the user to produce full sets of accounts with all the notes etc included? Or do they just produce basic reports from which you then do the final accounts?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it all depends on the package Rosie but obviously the final TB can be extracted then imported into something like Taxfiler mentioned above – this produces full and complete accounts!
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Rosie Murphy
Rosie Murphy Thans
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Natasha Everard
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard Does anyone have any further questions this evening? Can i just say this is another great Q & A this evening!!! Lots of great information. Can i just thank Jason Blackman for his valuable time and knowledge again!! What a great Q & A 🙂
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s been a pleasure! If anyone has any more questions I’ll be here for a while. But I hope you can join us next week for our live Xero demonstration!
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Natasha Everard
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor It was interesting and helpful.
Thank you Jason and Natasha. Look forward to Monday session.
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy Thank you, that was another informative session, looking forward to the live demo.
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s been a pleasure – the websites if you want to check them out are www.xero.com, www.freeagent.com and www.quickbooks.co.uk – they’re all worth a look!
Online Accounting Software – Free Trial, Free Support | Xero
XERO.COM
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Carly O’Keeffe
Carly O’Keeffe If you have more than one client, do you have to buy more than one package, say of xero?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … not at all Carly – if for example you choose Xero as your software to use, then you can sign up for free as a partner and add as many clients as you like!
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Natasha Everard
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Amanda Essen
Amanda Essen Yes thanks again Jason Blackman and Natasha Everard for a very informative Q & A session.
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest Sorry, for being dumb but can cloud software still be used if the client doesn’t do any of their own book keeping but provides you with a nice dustbin bag full of receipts?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … absolutely Tracey – any combination could be used – if for example you wanted to set a client up on Receipt Bank so they could scan their own receipts you could do that, or you could scan them yourself! Either way cloud could still be used…
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest Cool.
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy Thats really impressive and would save lots of work!
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Natasha Everard
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy Jason Blackman can I just ask about the licences? Do you purchase a licence per device ? Not sure how it works and can you back up to a portable hard drive? thanks in advance.
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … no it’s literally per client Michelle – it’s available on unlimited devices and you just pay for every client you add. Unfortunately you can’t back up but rest assured that the providers are backing up your data every few minutes. It’s difficult to ‘let go’ of the thought of manually backing up but that’s what you have to do!
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy haha it certainly is hard to think of a world where we dont back up!
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … as I say the backups happen of course – it’s just you can’t see them happening!
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy couldn’t it become quite costly then as you grow and introduce more clients? or are there deals to be had?
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman …. absolutely – in general the more clients you add the more of a deal you’ll get. As I say I get £9 a month per client for Xero – considering what you get that is a very good price, and as I say QBO are at the moment offering £1 per licence – you won’t get desktop software cheaper than that!
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy wow, that does sound good, thank you for your time, it’s much appreciated. Thank you Natasha Everard for organising these Q and A’s they really are invaluable! You never know, I just might get the confidence to set up on my own!!!!
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Natasha Everard
Natasha Everard go for it 🙂
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Michelle Bellamy
Michelle Bellamy Need to find some workbase experience first!
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Natasha Everard
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Tracey Priest
Tracey Priest Thanks Jason Blackman and Natasha Everard for organising. Can’t wait for next weeks demo.
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Jason Blackman
Jason Blackman … it’s been a pleasure once again – hope you all found it valuable!
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Yulia Taylor
Yulia Taylor Very. Thanks again
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Natasha Everard
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Iddy Amjad
Iddy Amjad I was studying AAT LEVEL 2 for a while and was flying through it, I put the course on pause while I looked for a finance job. I got the job and now trying to get my head back into the course. I am really struggling with the ledger side of things, knowing which side to post what 😣 I’m going to read the book again but wondered if you have any tips
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Rosalyn Carrington
Rosalyn Carrington What laptop would you recommend
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Caroline Clarke
Caroline Clarke I missed this session again but just read back through all the comments. So useful, thanks so much – I love these Q & A sessions and look forward to the Xero demo
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