Is anyone using IRIS Starter Pack 250 able to tell me roughly what they are paying?
Since we joined IRIS several years ago, we have experienced a year on year above inflation hike to our annual fees under the guise of "iXBRL development".
This is one of our larger outgoings and I just wanted to check that we are paying the same as everyone else.
Many thanks.
Replies (15)
Please login or register to join the discussion.
Best place to start
Why are you asking others to state their fees but you haven't stated your fees?
250 clients?
Is that for 250 clients?
I have Digita and I pay about half that for single user with 200 clients. The advantage with Digita is that you pay per program so some clients may need Accounts Production but not Corporation Tax (eg. property management companies). There can also be a lag before you need to use a client in some of the programs.
Iris fees
Ok - I'll start the ball rolling with figures- I was using Iris 150 personal/75 business up to March this year and were paying in the region of £4.5K p.a for accounts production, business tax, personal tax and trust tax. We did not use practice management as we could not justify it's cost. We were facing another huge hike this year for moving on to the next client numbers banding.
In April I moved away from Iris and now use VT and BTC which are just a fraction of the cost of Iris for unlimited client numbers. It took very little time to move everything across, we now have a practice management database with BTC, which is brilliant. Both products are exceptional value for money. We have come across a few things that we had to do a little differently to Iris, but nothing we have not overcome. As for ease of use - both of them are top notch on that score.
How much????????????????????????????????
Switch to VT/BTC and if you want a more powerfull PM option then have a look at MB Practice manager. The whole lot could be yours for under £2k!
Integrated?
Are these cheaper software packages integrated?
If you are linking accounts, tax and practice management you can do work a lot quicker without mistakes.
I think some of the cheaper packages don't have as comprehensive a set of features as Iris and Digita.
My experience
I've mentioned this before on other threads. I thought what you say was true when I used Iris. I went from Iris to a combination of VT & BTC. The integration you speak of saves minutes. The time saving from using more efficient software is hours.
VT and BTC have an upload link faclility and it certainly doesnt cost me £4k+ a year in additional time to copy and past the info into MB PM!
does make me question whether i should move
away from IRIS.....i feel like i am paying my share of the country's debts sometimes...(ok lets not exaggerate....just the loose change Bob Diamond carries around with him...)
Upload link facility?
Does that integrate the invoices and time recording, too?
What's the relevance of the £4k+ amount? From the figures I have seen I can't arrive at a relevant cost of £4k+.
If you divide the price by the number of clients you use a particular program for it usually only costs about £5-£7 each.
Integration
Before I moved to Iris I used to think that it didn't take long to cut and paste.
When I moved to Iris, I just LOVED it. It was so joined up and wonderful to use. Everything was where it should be. I stayed for about 8 years, but finally the cost drove me away (over £5,000 for 600 tax returns or 300 clients).
Now I'm saving about £4,500 a year. But I REALLY miss Iris.
If you can afford it, you'll never regret Iris. But I couldn't.
Horses for courses
Having been involved in selling the Digita products previously for 5 years I can pretty much tell you the costs of all the packages available. They vary hugely - some parts can be ten-fold the cost of an "equivalent" package elsewhere.
Peter's methodology is a good one - work out the cost per client and use this as a benchmark.
Unfortunately you may still find that the packs or "bundles" are not always cost effective because they follow a very prescriptive model where it is assumed you will have twice as many personal returns to do as sets of accounts, for example.
What would be useful is a public list of prices so firms can check they are paying the same as everyone else on a package. The ICAEW technology supplement did used to give a run-down of costs for each supplier but this was often quoted as "prices from...."
Dan