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AIA

Checkmybooks shoots for the middle ground

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23rd Apr 2015
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A new automated accounts review and checking tool for accountants in practice called Checkmybooks is officially launching on 1 May.

Checkmybooks is the brainchild of Adrian Pearson, a Yorkshire born and raised chartered accountant, now the director of Ledgerscope (who own Checkmybooks). Pearson will also be familiar to many AccountingWEB members.

“I had my own practice which I sold a number of years ago and it struck me that there was a gap in the market, a software gap,” said Pearson. “There’s lots of software at the front end of the process there’s lots of software at the back end of the process for accountants to tax returns and final accounts etc. but there’s a big gap in the middle where accountants are still working, typically, with spreadsheets.”

The product is currently in its review stage and can be used for free until launch, after which a charge will be introduced. The charge is slated to be £60 per job (per client). Customers will buy credits which can be bought in the any quantity that is desired. "Whatever you fancy," said Pearson.  

According to Pearson, compliance work will remain critical and foundational to the profession, but he is acutely aware of the shift to value added services within accountancy.

“There’s an incredible price pressure, year-end accounts has become very much a commodity product,” Pearson said. “What we say to accountants is ‘yes, the future is with value added services’, but to sell added value service to your client base you have to have secured your client base. And you can only secure the client base if you retain their compliance work.”

It is then, in Pearson’s opinion, important that accountants get their compliance processes as efficient and cost effective as possible.

The sheer amounts of data that will be going through Checkmybooks once it becomes established will mean the product will eventually be able to offer other services, too.

“Once we have lots of accountants using Checkmybooks and lots data sets going through, that opens up some real added value services we can provide to accountants in the area of bench marking their clients against each other and bench marking, on an anonymous basis, accountants against their peers,” said Pearson. “Checkmybooks should be able to tell people in a year or two’s time whether you take 20% longer to turn around year end accounts than the average.”

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Man of Kent
By Kent accountant
23rd Apr 2015 12:28

Unconvinced of East Kent

Hmmm, be interesting to see what this software can actually do. At the moment I'm not convinced that a computer can apply the necessary logic to accounts data to determine what should/shouldn't be checked/reviewed/adjusted without having an understanding of what it is that the business does.

As I tend to make the vast majority of year end adjustments in my clients software (Xero, Clearbooks etc) I don't see a benefit in uploading that data into yet more software.

I remain

Unconvinced of East Kent

(I would like to be proved wrong though)

Thanks (0)
Adrian Pearson
By Adrian Pearson
23rd Apr 2015 18:16

Happy to try

Hi Unconvinced,

I will gladly show you what Checkmybooks can do, if you can spare me 30 minutes?

It's not clever enough to replace you, with your years of experience and expertise, but it is clever enough to make your life much easier by doing most of your review work for you. And it will only get better at it and more useful to you over time.

For now think in terms of Partner Review Points: but ones produced automatically and available to you within minutes of you or your client uploading their accounts data.

Please take me up on my offer of a demo. I would really value your feedback.

Regards

Adrian
www.checkmybooks.co.uk

Thanks (1)
Man of Kent
By Kent accountant
27th Apr 2015 15:15

Value

Thanks for your time Adrian.

I can see the value, in particular I like the report back to client, not just to justify fees but to demonstrate the work that goes into preparing their accounts.

I look forward to using it.

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keep calm and have a cuppa
By tbk
28th Apr 2015 13:25

being rather pernickity...

This is not about the product but about the journalism, "the product is 'slated''" is not a UK English term. British use of 'slated' means that something has been criticised strongly. Can we stick with proper English please; this one is a particular bug-bear of mine.

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Adrian Pearson
By Adrian Pearson
01st May 2015 13:05

Update on pricing

Hi all

Just to let you know that Checkmybooks will remain free during an extended review period to the end of May.

We are getting great feedback from the accountants that have used it so far and want to keep that going - especially on the new features we just released.

Also, we will be at Accountex (Stand A500) and want as many people as possible to be able to get a demo and try it for free using their own data.

So, please use Checkmybooks this month on us.

Regards

Adrian
www.checkmybooks.co.uk

Thanks (0)