Finance & Business Guides

Small businesses should get their books in order. Long gone are the days where notepads, sticky notes and backs of envelopes worked suitably for accounting purposes. With more accounts to manage and more tax rules to observe, a company that does not use business financial software is one that leaves money on the table and in the government’s pocket.

Past Problems with Business Software

In the past, business software had obvious limitations. Unless companies bought enterprise editions of their software, they could only run their software on one computer. That computer was always carefully guarded to keep the prying eyes of employees at bay. The lessons of computer backups unlearned, hardware failure could put an end to even the most diligent record keeping, often forcing a company to painstakingly re-enter data starting from the beginning of the year.

Software upgrades for business software were also a routine chore. Businesses without IT expertise would often find installing new versions of software difficult and time consuming, often resulting in lost access to data created in the previous version. Similarly, frequently-changing tax rules would require even more updates that only sometimes worked. Fortunately, with the advent of cloud-based technologies, most of that has changed. Businesses now have the flexibility they need to use their financial software almost anywhere without the administrative overhead of legacy software models.

Hosted Accounting Software

Thanks to high-speed data connexions and an evolving technology landscape, companies can now purchase bookkeeping software hosted in the cloud. Rather than paying a lot of money for shrink wrapped solutions that rapidly become obsolete, businesses can rely on a service provider to make sure their software is always up-to-date with the latest features and tax rules. As a result, authorised individuals can log into the software from almost anywhere to check the status of the business, enter new transactions or produce reports.

The flexibility of hosted financial applications means that companies can use part-time bookkeepers working from home to keep their records updated. It also means that busy business owners can log on from the beach, golf course or cruise to check on their financial reports. It also means that employees can work from any computer in the company that has Internet access.

Security for hosted software solutions is often better than most in-house settings. After all, no one can surreptitiously copy accounting data from the network or a local machine because the data is in the cloud. SSL connexions encrypt data as it streams between the business and the hosting provider meaning that no one can intercept information while en route. Data lost to computer crashes are a thing of the past, since business accounting information is all stored on redundant servers at the software provider’s location.

When businesses go to the cloud to shop for their financial software, they often find the biggest names in the software industry are already there. This gives business owners and executives the choice to either import their existing data into their new cloud-based solution or start over with an entirely new software brand.