Practice management

Practice management

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Hi Everyone

I have concerns surrounding our general practice management and I am hoping that some one can point me in the right direction.

My partner and I started our practice a couple years ago simply as a life style business supporting family,friends and a few local businesses that we was recommended to. We wanted something small just to help out with the bills, school fees... as my partner had recently sold his business.

We have always offered a full range of services to clients i.e. self assessment, VAT, accounts, statutory returns, payroll etc. which was fine when we had a few dozen clients, however we started expanding 18 months ago and now have well up to 180 clients.

I am sure you can imaging it is becoming a nightmare managing deadlines for VAT, payroll, year end and so-forth. We have done our best with Microsoft Outlook using the calender and tasks but it is time to invest in something more bespoke. Any ideas please.

Also we have a couple staff now so time spent on clients files is of concern when it comes to billing... practice software with a time billing system would be great.

Many Thanks

Replies (10)

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By marks
30th Jan 2015 00:02

I am in the same position as yourself.

Got about 180 clients covered by just myself and one full time staff member.

I currently use taxcalc which i think is great for accounts and tax but practice management and timesheets is managed at the moment on a few excel sheets; timesheet, work in progress sheet, client data sheet, monthly deadlines sheet, where the books are stored sheet.

Going to trial MBPracticeManager and Logical Office in February which are practice management software packages.  Might just get a time and fees packages such as TBookman.

Other option is to go for a fully integrated system such as IRIS which would do everything I need but is pricey.  But if can save even an hour a job that is 15 hours a month which more than pays for itself in scope to do more work or freedom not to work 7 days a week.

Other thing I need to do is look to take on a new member of staff but as well as the salary cost would have other cost of either moving to a bigger or getting another office as current office only suitable for 2.

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By Howard Marks
30th Jan 2015 01:10

PM software

First i'd say hit the search function, this is literally a daily thread.  Lots of options, won't know till you try.  Feb would seem to be the perfect time to do that!  I know I will, my current tax software just doesn't cut it when it comes to practice management.  Here's an example thread from the other day https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/anyanswers/question/practice-management-1

 

Second, @marks - i'm sure Iris PM is great (cost aside) but do you REALLY believe it could save a two man practice 15 hrs a month?  Seems like wishful thinking.  I know all the non-integrated stuff causes extra work but i'm not so sure it creates as much as you'd hope to save.

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By marks
30th Jan 2015 08:40

I think it could save at least a hour on each job a year on average.  Some will be less than an hour some a lot more than an hour.

Then got the time saving from cutting and pasting timesheets which takes about 3 hours each quarter plus it would be better when raising an invoice to see at the click of a button what time time on the job is.

As said I might just go with Taxcalc and one of MBPracticeManager/Logical Office/TBookman. The additional cost from one of these will be about £50 per month which together with taxcalc gives a total cost of £1500+VAT a year.

Lot more attractive than £5722+VAT which is what have been quoted for a 2 licence IRIS package up to 200 clients.

 

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By BroadheadAccountants
30th Jan 2015 11:08

Specifications

I’m going through a growth phase too.

 

I wonder what aspects are you looking at?

 

Client liaison (deadline management/ reminders/ templates for correspondence);

Debtors management (Xero integration);

Time and cost tracking;

Workflow (allocation/ tracking).

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By peter.wood100
30th Jan 2015 14:44

Us too - we're in the same boat

We've been looking at this for some time too.

Currently, we use various low cost 'best of breed' software, together with spreadsheets to monitor time (no, we don't bill per hour but we need to track employee time)

Like @Marks, we recognise we're loosing valuable time cutting and pasting spreadsheets, and entering the same information several times over.

But our biggest time waste is retrieving email and documents.

We've shortlisted Digita linked with Virtual Cabinet, and CCH with their Document Management software.

I'd be very interested to hear from any users with experience of either.

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By hectorshouse
30th Jan 2015 15:13

Get yourself a Joanne

I have 240 clients and 1 full time member of staff and a part time, 27.5 hours a week, office manager. I have also invested in several white boards. Joanne keeps all the company deadlines up to date on the whiteboards (1 for account filing deadlines, 1 for corporation tax deadlines and 1 for annual returns). At the start of every month I get a handwritten list of all things that have to be done that month and my other employee gets hers. She manages us totally. She is cheaper than a software package as she also does the payroll for some 50 clients. The only problem with this system is that if she is away it all goes to pot. Luckily in 14 years of working with me this has never happened.

Sometimes pen and paper take some beating. 

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By peter.wood100
30th Jan 2015 17:59

Minimum wage?

@Hectorshouse   Joanne sounds wonderful, but somehow I don't think she could possibly cost less than software unless she is paid far below minimum wage rates.

And.....   can she retrieve an email or document in just a few seconds.....   and do all the other things a good PM package can do?

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By BroadheadAccountants
31st Jan 2015 14:55

Joanne sounds brilliant.....

@Hectorshouse is this code for some software just as George is the name of an aeroplane's autopilot?

 

Handwriting, what does that look like?

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By Lutondata
05th Feb 2015 12:33

Glide Practice Management

Good to hear of accounting practices growing.  Yes its a real headache to manage deadlines and work in progress, plus what is coming up for filing etc.

We have a large number of clients and having missed a few year-end filing dates where the client got the inevitable company house fine, I decided to look into a solution.

There are high end solutions, but cost thousands.  We use and like VT along with taxcalc so don`t really want to change that side of things.

Almost by accident I came across the perfect solution.  Its online so can be shared around the office and the relevant users.  The most important function is allocating jobs to the relevant user, and the job is tracked from thereafter.

You can see at a glance the jobs due to be filed at company house with a cut off point such as 28th Feb etc.  Lots of other features for sole trader job tracking etc.

I must emphasize I have no interest in this outfit, just a very satisfied user.  I do know that they are a small firm and its great to help someone along, particularly when they are good at what they do.

https://www.whatsglide.com/

 

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By pauljohnston
05th Feb 2015 17:58

We have been this route too

as I took on staff I decided it had to be a system that is easy to learn.  The best of breed has been my bread and butter up til now.  We are trying out practice manager by Digita we have tried Glide (brillant) but I am aware that as we continue to grow we need to have software that speaks to each other.  But whether we have gone done the correct path it is difficult to say at this moment.  Time will tell

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