Practice software

Practice software

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Hi there

I am in desperately need of ‘time and fee’ functionality and even though I am very happy with Tax Calc in general but I need to move on only because of their poor practice management module.

I am looking for integrated solution, Capium (new cloud based solution) ticks all the boxes but bit risky option by default, first impression is very positive. However its not a finish product, lots of work still needs to be done but if we don’t join them how they will get feedback to get better!!!

Capium is very competitive with their price structure as well so seems a good value for money. Anyone who is using Capium??

BTC have very good reviews but I feel they are stuck in the past, software looks ‘old’ and felt not very intuitive but I am sure once I  get the hang of it, it will do a good job, sadly they only provide ‘time recording’ function, which is half what I need however something I can work around…!!

Any one moved to Tax Calc to BTC????

Lastly there is Digita with £3,600 price tag for our firm, Digita is perfect however its bit out of my budget, but it’s the safest bet, any once moved from tax Calc to Digita?

Digita will also punish with price hikes when I  add more clients and users, price policy is also bit confusing, the wont tell me exact price which i will pay for adding more clients. 

As you can see I am well confused, so your comments will be appreciated. It’s a shame that Tax Calc is failing to strength their practice management module.   

Best wishes and thank you in advance 

Replies (21)

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
25th Aug 2015 21:53

Digita for me
Digita is a great product and you have to look at price of product over the time it will save you doing tasks and managing the business

Look at the £3600 against your total revenues and it will be worth it.

You will need to consider the price of upgrades I don't have huge numbers of clients as not wanting to build up a high number of compliance based jobs so I will maybe move up to next bracket but probably not much higher speak to the client manager they are good people to deal with.

Digita support is also spot on when you need it.

BTC seems a fair price for a complete system but I couldn't comment on it as not seen it working.

I spent about 6 months looking before deciding on Digita there are some good developments coming with it soon also.

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By marks
25th Aug 2015 22:39

I moved to IRIS back in May

Like you I was with Taxcalc.

I was very happy with the accounts and tax package of Taxcalc and only moved to IRIS due the following reasons

1. Looking for proper practice management function

2. Looking for time and fees.

3. Looking for automail function.

I looked at all the options eg Absolute, BTC, Digita and IRIS before choosing IRIS.

Have still to get it fully up and running but already it is saving us time keeping a track of the jobs 

I have about 180 clients and expect it to save about an hour or so per client per year so the extra cost will more than pay for itself.

In my opinion if £3,600 is out of your budget then your business isnt really big enough to merit moving.  You only really need a fully integrated system if you have at least 100 clients.  At an average of say £1k per client they your turnover should be at least £100k.  If you cant justify £3,600  of this then you are either spending money unnecesary on other things or taking too much money out of your business for yourself.  After staff, your biggest expenditure should be your software as it is critical to how your business runs.

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Replying to Elgin:
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By qadri23
26th Aug 2015 16:42

Thanks you

 

Hi Mark

I have 112 clients but Digita sounds pricy when compared to tax clac or BTC!!

I really appreciate your thoughts. Thanks

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By Maslins
26th Aug 2015 09:20

I'm kinda with the OP on this.  It's not about whether you can physically afford the software or not, it's about whether it adds enough value to justify the price tag.

For us, Iris (which we started with), didn't.  Key thing is we have a fairly large number of simple clients, so the fancier bits of Iris were completely wasted on us.  Far better for us (again, I accept other firms will differ) to have cheap and cheerful VT and Taxcalc, where we can do unlimited clients for a modest fee.  Some extra fees for additional users, but not per client.

However, we also aren't interested in time keeping, billing, or whatever else you might get from some "practice software".

We use FreeAgent for invoicing, and don't bother with time tracking at all.  Our clients are on fixed fees, and whilst sure, we will be making a big profit on some and a loss on others, that's the way it goes.  The really time consuming ones we know anyway.

Never heard of Capium, though that in no way means they're no good.

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By Siany
26th Aug 2015 17:08

Tax Calc

I am considering Tax Calc after the announcement from HMRC that agents will no longer be able to use their online free software.  Trialed it, looked ok to me, but have concerns after reading this.  Where did it fall down for you?

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Replying to Not Anonymous:
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By qadri23
26th Aug 2015 17:23

Hi Siany

Tax Calc is a fantastic for tax (both SA & CT) and I would give them 5 stars, accounts production I would give 8 out 10, but does a fantastic job.

However it’s very poor on the Practice Management (client hub), its just a database of your clients, I think it’s a ‘work in progress’.

If you are on a fixed fee , or don’t need to keep track of ‘ spent time’ or  few clients to manage deadlines then don’t look anywhere else, Tax Clac will do amazing job.

If you are new start-up then you can’t go wrong with them, however you will face the same problem what I am facing now with only 112 clients.

I am really sad that I am leaving them due to practice management tool, other than this they have pretty slick product.

Have you looked at Capium?

Good luck

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By marks
26th Aug 2015 22:27

where taxcalc falls down

As qudri23 says taxcalc is great if you are just looking for an integrated accounts and tax return piece of software at a great price.

But where it fails is in practice management.

I have 180 clients so need to keep a track on the following

1. When Ltd company accounts are due

2. When CT payments are due.

3. When VAT returns are due.

4. What payrolls have still to be done.

5. What management accounts are due.

6. What is the status of all personal tax return clients.

7. What is the costs on each job.

8. Where the books for a client are stored.

9. Able to do cover letter for an accounts or tax job at the click of a button with it all populated with the relevant address, payments due etc.

10. What information still to be received for newly set up clients.

I was able to do the above on various excel spreadsheets and word documents but it took time updating them and double checking them. 

Running everything now on IRIS avoids having to do this.

I actually prefer Taxcalc accounts and tax modules to IRIS so if taxcalc could do everything else that IRIS does even at the same price I would go with taxcalc.

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By lildanfen1
27th Aug 2015 02:28

Practice software

I have been using Capium since its inception, I used the Sage Suite before that, CCH before that and when I first started out on my own IRIS.

Capium for a small practice ticks all the boxes, it is cost efficient maximum cost is either £187.50 pcm or if you purchase a full year £1800.00 this is aimed at large practices and has unlimited clients. I think you will find for all other pieces of software with those capabilities you will be paying £1800 a month.

I currently pay £62.50 p/m. The staff are at your beck and call as a new kid on the block we as accountants have the ability to mould this cloud application to how we want, they as a company want to give us as end users the best experience and make our life easier.

Practice Management Suite is simple to use, ties nicely into companies house, updating AR deadlines and account submission dates without the constant pushing of buttons and requests.  Can be synced with your emails so paperless options are attainable, client folders can be set up, so clients can on a read only access their accounts, tax comps and returns without contacting you(perfect for fixed fee compliance) Engagement letter templates can be uploaded, email marketing campaigns can be mail merged from there.

Just because they are at the starting gate in my opinion they are the only company that offers a full cloud based system.

Digita uses many components that do not interact with each other, Sage cloud based and IRIS Cloud software is still only half of what they offer and still requires disks or downloads which require down time from your staff an IT person to install across the network. Capium does this for you behind the scenes.

Taking back ups from your office to clients, your client asking important payroll queries or other pertinent questions while you are on the train, travelling files, as long as you have an internet connection its a the push of a button and at a fraction of the cost.

I have also heard some fantastic developments that will appear in the next couple of releases.

Watch this space.....

 

The downside to Capium is pre 2013-14 tax work which we all come across from time to time. this will need to be developed.

Partnerships returns are being released September October.

 

Would love to hear from other Capium users

 

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Replying to Tey:
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By qadri23
27th Aug 2015 11:07

WOW

 

 

Finally I found someone who is using Capium.

Yesterday I spent good few hours and couldn’t upload a simple Excel file with client details, funny thing was that each time I was getting different error message, even though I was trying to upload same file, of course those error were not ‘accurate’, for example system was advising me to enter date in ‘VAT reg’ column!!

But no doubt they are on the right track, but moving to them sounds bit risky.

Thank you very much for taking time to share your experience. 

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Replying to AnotherPerspective:
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By qadri23
27th Aug 2015 17:37

My IT skills are not bad!!

Hi Lildanfen1, Yes I called them and Mr Sanjay spend  considerable amount of time on Screen share but sadly even he could not fixed the issue or tell me the cause!!!!

All mapping was done correctly on my csv file, so my IT skills are not as bad as one might think.

It appears you are more than happy with them so I wish good luck, not doubt they are the 'future', but for our peace of mind I have decided to go with less riskier option, Digita.

On Accounting web we share our thoughts and experiences which does not mean I am right or wrong, it’s just my experience, it’s possible when you tried to upload system was working fine.

I think Capium has a big potential, its something all of us are waiting for and team there is just fantastic, I  don’t think you even need to wait 3 minutes for the support, their service is very good however I have decided to go with well-established software providers for now and hope to come back to them next year.

Lastly, if I had less number of clients I would give them a shot. 

 

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Replying to AndrewV12:
Morph
By kevinringer
04th Sep 2015 13:19

Well said

qadri23 wrote:

On Accounting web we share our thoughts and experiences which does not mean I am right or wrong, it’s just my experience,

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By Mr_awol
27th Aug 2015 16:43


I've only ever used Digita and IRIS but can tell you that IRIS is much better of the two - albeit more expensive.

Sometimes you really do get what you pay for.

 

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Replying to johndon68:
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By Sheepy306
27th Aug 2015 16:48

How much difference?

Mr_awol - Can you give a rough indication of the price difference and why you think Iris is much better. That would help put things into perspective a little.

Thanks.

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Replying to cathygrimmer:
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By Mr_awol
27th Aug 2015 22:20

Briefly

Sheepy306 wrote:

Mr_awol - Can you give a rough indication of the price difference and why you think Iris is much better. That would help put things into perspective a little.

Thanks.

I don't want to thread hijack as the OP has asked about different systems to these two - my point was more that cheap isn't always cheerful.

In answer though, Digita costs c£15k p.a. for us. It's a LOT cheaper than IRIS but IRIS was a much more genuinely integrated product. Enter assets into fixed asset register and they pop up in the Capital Allowances comp without having to retype. Make a journal in the accounts module and it automatically updates the tax module (Digita needs to be manually reminded to import).

I suppose it's like comparing an ipad (IRIS) to an android tab (Digita). They both do the same generally but the more expensive offering is faster, slicker, and generally nicer to use.

The ixbrl tagging is much easier in Digita though (in that you hardly have to do anything and could get away without understanding, or even caring, what a tuple is!).

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Stephen Quay
By squay
03rd Sep 2015 15:11

Digita to TaxCalc

Moved from Digita to TaxCalc about 3 years ago. I run a small practice and Digita was getting  too expensive. TaxCalc tax and accounts production with client hub works well and in my opinion is more in tune with the small practitioner's needs. Incidentally in Digita the free client hub was similar but to increase functionality and add File Cabinet and Time and Fees would have added yet more costs.

Jobs and deadlines are tracked with spreadsheets which works for me. We do some fixed fee billing but also track time with a very old version of Timeslips (love this as it uses the old model of once purchased that's it, no more costs, so a real no-brainer to keep this going). This produces a nice report of work done and can be used to manually update our sales invoices which are  emailed out direct from Xero. I believe Timeslips is still going if you search for it.

Having downgraded from Digita I would be very wary of having everything integrated with one supplier. Yes, TaxCalc integrates hub, tax and accounts but I consider that is a core function. I wouldn't be happy to integrate the above additional services because you will find it a wrench to leave a supplier should you ever decide to do so. Better to use third party cloud based add-ons which integrate with your software and are portable. These cloud based apps should also work stand alone as well and cater for multiple users.

According to the Xero add on page other time a fees suppliers are Harvest, Timely, Geo-op, Deputy, MinuteDock and others.

As I said above my comments are that of a small practice. Medium to larger practices have different requirements and budgets.

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By Howard Marks
03rd Sep 2015 15:26

Capium (and Sanjay)

I've said it time and time again - great idea and definitely on the right track but not REALLY fit for market yet.

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FT
By FirstTab
03rd Sep 2015 23:45

So annoying!

Digita and IRIS have failed to come up with clear pricing as client number increase. They can only be one reason for this, mugs like me accept it, so they can make super profits.

Fair point by squay, once you are tied in they have got you! They will squeeze as much as they can out of you.

At the same time, I had take the integrated route. It was getting difficult using different software. I am looking forward to fully blown integrated software from TaxCalc. We miss the ease and the look of TaxCalc.  It is well thought through.   

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By mabzden
04th Sep 2015 10:10

Gbooks worth a look

I use gbooks, which is a cloud-based integrated system and more established and road-tested than Capium. They have a Time and Fees module that does the job for me.

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By User deleted
04th Sep 2015 16:22

IRIS have clear pricing ...

... you have two things, number of clients and concurrent users.

Once you get a reasonable number of clients you just have the full monty, unlimited clients, then it is only number of concurrent users that affect price.

If you speak to IRIS the will give you the prices happily enough. The only reason they don't put prices on the website is there are so many variable it is better to talk through your needs and they will quote for that.

The good thing with IRIS is you can put the clients on database but not register fro any module so you don't use your allocation.

In theory you could have the smallest starter pack and switch clients on and off as you used them. the only thing that won't work for is CoSec, it could be done but restoring involves calling support!

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Replying to johnt27:
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By Cath Walker
10th Sep 2015 15:34

Iris allocations. Iris v Digita costs

Old Greying Accountant wrote:

In theory you could have the smallest starter pack and switch clients on and off as you used them. the only thing that won't work for is CoSec, it could be done but restoring involves calling support!

 

That wouldn't work in Accounts Production in Iris (which I guess is the one that most people hit the limit in).  Once you allocate a client to an accounts chart, it uses a licence allocation - the only way (as far as I know) to free up that licence again is to delete the client.  I suppose you could extract the client data, delete them and then add them back on the next year, but you'd have to enter the background data again because that doesn't get saved in the extract file.

On the subject of cost - I am on Iris 75 and paid £3,391 last year for one user, not networked (interested to hear if that is similar to others, or whether I am suffering from having been with Iris for too long!!).  Digita are just doing me a quote, but I think he said that it would be £1,860 for the equivalent package, so quite a lot cheaper.

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By Howard Marks
10th Sep 2015 15:46

Iris pricing 0-49

Option One

Accounts production 0-9

Business Tax 0-9

Personal Tax 0-18

Practice Management 0-9

 

Annual Fee: £1016.47 + VAT

Monthly option: £92.33 + VAT per month

 

To add in Company Secretarial it would take the price to:

Annual Fee: £1137.41 + VAT

Monthly Fee: £103.31 + VAT per month

 

Option Two

Accounts production 0-24

Business Tax 0-24

Personal Tax 0-48

Practice Management 0-24

 

Annual Fee: £1596.42+ VAT

Monthly option: £145 + VAT per month

 

To add in Company Secretarial it would take the price to:

Annual Fee: £1786.36 + VAT

Monthly Fee: £162.26 + VAT per month

 

Option Three

Accounts production 0-49

Business Tax 0-49

Personal Tax 0-98

Practice Management 0-49

 

Annual Fee: £2183.77 + VAT

Monthly option: £198.36 + VAT per month

 

To add in Company Secretarial it would take the price to:

Annual Fee: £2443.59 + VAT

Monthly Fee: £221.96 + VAT per month

 

Also included as part of your package are the following:

All support as standardAll updates as standardIRIS OpenPortal1 Free Kashflow Licence worth £120 + VAT Annually1G Free OpenSpace

2  Free Company Formations Credits

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