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An accountant’s guide to cloud bookkeeping tools

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20th Jul 2016
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AccountingWEB member Glenn Martin has spent much of the past year assessing the merits of different cloud accounting engines and wanted to share his findings with the wider community.

After putting in all that effort, he did not want his work to go to waste and thought other accountants might benefit from his conclusions. Feel free to add your observations and thoughts about the marketplace below.

AccountingWEB would like to thank Glennzy for his generosity in sharing this report and look forward to further contributions from our accounting citizen software reviewer.

Xero     

Xero Screenshot 2016

Prices*: £10 Starter (5 invoices/bills, 20 bank transactions), £22 Standard, £27.50 Premium (*introductory offer currently in place for £5-£13.50 rates in first three months)
Standard package includes: Unlimited users, automatic bank feeds, budgets, smartphone apps
Optional extras: Payroll - £1/month per employee
Add-ons:  400+ listed in Xero.com UK add-on marketplace

Pros      

  • Ease of use - clients take to it very well
  • Massive add on community to tailor software to your needs
  • Now No 1 with 133,000 users in the UK
  • Huge marketing hype behind it
  • Loved by the "Apple crowd"
  • Now links with Digita
  • Has more functionality than rivals
  • Well developed bank feeds with most major banks.

Cons

  • Doesn’t do CIS
  • Changed tack on delivering final accounts; we're still waiting for iXBRL solution
  • Pricing is of concern
  • Can be costly when add-ons are used
  • Concerns over KPMG deal
  • Support not ideal to some if they like to speak to telephone
  • Currently spends 70% of revenue on marketing; had expected this to be self supporting by now [Xero UK MD Gary Turner has challenged this assumption - see comment below, Ed]
  • Data entry is slow if not using Receipt Bank
  • Marketing not so good in the North
  • Seem to be more interested in bigger firms with Gold status and above

General Comments

Xero is a very good bit of software. It is often used by ambitious clients who are going places, and they genuinely love and gush about the product.

Xero has a big UK user base, but I don’t personally get all the marketing hype. It is currently claiming to be the market leader, but its dominance has waned over last 12 months.

Verdict: It’s better to be in the Xero camp as opposed to be outside looking in. I intend to use it for more active clients who will make use of add-on features and look to buy additional value added services

QuickBooks Online (QBO)

Quickbooks Screenshot 2016

Prices*: £6 Self Employed (1 user), £7 Simple Start (1 user), £15 Essentials (3 users), £25 Plus (5 users) - *introductory offer currently in place for £1.80-£10 rates in first six months
Standard package includes: Bank data imports, quotes/estimates, smartphone apps, budgets (Plus version only); free membership of ProAdvisor Programme gives accountants access to enhanced QBO Accountant edition and other benefits
Optional extras: Payroll - £1/month per employee
Add-ons:  144 listed in intuitapps.com UK directory

Pros

  • Intuit sees the accountant as the customer and aims to support them to sell their products.
  • Priced well with big discounts for accountants
  • Has most of the key add ons you need
  • Looking for market share so keen to help accountants grow.
  • Big following in Birmingham area after sponsorship of local football teams
  • Supposed to be biggest worldwide provider, with 1m+ users
  • Quite a good marketing pack built into accounts  dashboard, with funds available to promote QBO to clients

Cons

  • Doesn’t do CIS
  • Now the software of choice for Tax Assist, which could lure users away with the cheap fees they offer
  • Data entry is slow unless Receipt Bank is added
  • Not quite as easy to use as Xero

General comments

QBO is the main rival to Xero, so I’ll be keen to see what its UK user numbers are in 12 months’ time.

But if you take away the marketing horsepower being put behind the product, there’s not much to set it apart in terms of operational use. Nevertheless, I could see QBO becoming main my main software if Xero pricing keeps heading north.

Verdict: I will be using QBO for clients who don’t want the frills available with Xero and those looking for more a basic compliance service.

Sage One

Sage One

Prices: £5 Start (1 user), £20 Accounting (unlimited users)
Standard package includes: Quotes, bank feeds, cash flow forecasting, smartphone apps
Optional extras: £20/month per additional company; Payroll - £5-15/month (for 5-15 employees); Partner Edition for accountants at £10/month integrates with accounts production, CT and other Sage Impact tools
Add-ons:  23 listed in uk.sageone.com/add-ons/ directory

Pros

  • Popular with users of older desktop versions of Sage 50 and Sage Instant
  • Actively making a comeback to the market after a shaky start a few years back
  • Sage One Cashbook great alternative to spreadsheet users at £1
  • Priced reasonably well, great deal for accountants
  • Big following in the North
  • Has sufficient functionality for most users.
  • Very active in the marketplace and closing gap on competition rapidly
  • End to end capabilities if used with Sage One Final Accounts and Corporation Tax modules

Cons

  • Became unpopular with users over pricing once you became long term user.
  • Early versions of the cloud application were very poor
  • Not quite as polished as Xero or QBO
  • Slow data entry

General comments

Sage One continues to be the most likely option for desktop Sage users who want to convert to a cloud system. The Cashbook version is great for small jobs.

Sage One has the resources of a big software developer behind it, but still has a way to go to catch up with more mature products from Xero and Intuit.

Verdict - I am already using cheap Sage One Cashbook licences to convert spreadsheet users in preparation for the MTD quarterly reporting regime.

KashFlow

KashFlow

Prices: £5 Starter, £10 Business, £15 Business+ Payroll
Standard package includes: Bank feeds, quotes, departmental accounting, CIS, integration with IRIS Open tax and practice tools
Optional extras: Payroll available as system upgrade
Add-ons:  50+ apps available in online catalogue

Pros

  • Does CIS very well, so good for construction clients
  • Priced very well at £10 for main version
  • Can appear as a white label version with your branding

Cons

  • Bank Feeds can be problematic
  • Very clunky to use
  • Limited reports
  • Clients struggle with bank reconciliation
  • Doesn’t have the range of add-ons that other cloud accounting engines do
  • Uncertainty about its future direction now that KashFlow is owned by IRIS

General comments

Clients stuggle to use KashFlow without a lot of help from me and bank rec problems present a major hurdle. With the exception of those in the construction section, it’s not an ideal system for my clients.

Verdict - Will not be actively supporting KashFlow going forward and will look to migrate clients onto other products.

ClearBooks        

Clearbooks Screenshot 2016

Prices: £7.40 Together, £16.50 Together+, £POA Enterprise
Standard package includes: Unlimited users, bank data imports , quotes, budgets, cash flow forecasts, P11Ds, stock, CIS, smartphone app
Optional extras: Payroll available as system upgrade to Together+ or £5.20/month, also HR for £5.50
Add-ons:  12+ app integrations listed in online catalogue

Pros

  • Priced at reasonable level
  • Has functions such as CIS and other that are not available with main players

Cons

  • Very clunky to use - has not proved popular with clients who trialled it
  • ClearBooks comes across as a small outfit, which makes me wonder about the level of support and whether it may end up being acquired by alarger group
  • Limited marketing activity - they seem very quiet of late
  • With few clients using it, is it worth offering to them?

General comments

Basically, I just don’t like ClearBooks and neither do my clients. Suspect it will be absorbed by a bigger player soon.

Verdict - Have dropped this software from my portfolio and moved clients onto other products some time ago

FreeAgent

Freeagent Screenshot 2016

Prices: £19 Sole Trader, £24 Partnership, £29 Limited Company
Standard package includes: Self assessment filing, tax timeline and P&L view showing tax liabilities, estimates, time tracking, project reporting
Optional extras: Dividend vouchers & CT tools available in Ltd Co edition
Add-ons:  36 listed on integrations and add-ons page

Pros

  • Excellent software for freelancer market - does what it says on the tin.
  • Great people to deal with

Cons

  • Does not work so well for non freelancer businesses
  • Don’t like the pricing model with Sole Trader, Partnership and Limited Company versions. Since all my clients are limited companies, they have to go on to the most expensive version. Cashbook, VAT trader and full versions would be better
  • Small discounts available to accountants. I notice they’ve been hooking up with some big firms like Crunch - presumably with some hefty discounts included. If they offered more favourable pricing to accountants they might get more take-up with smaller firms too.

General comments

  • Great software, but doesn’t seem to have a following in the North East.
  • Would certainly use FreeAgent if my firm managed to get into serving higher-level freelance sectors like oil & gas or IT, but at present it’s too expensive for lower value jobs.
  • Suspect FreeAgent clients will be the most likely and able to do quarterly reporting themselves under MTD.

Verdict - Will still list FreeAgent as supported software as I carry on my quest for a better freelance client base.

Capium

Ccapium Screenshot

Prices: £15 Small (<100 clients), £30 Medium (101-300 clients), £45 Large (301-500 clients)
Standard package includes: Bookkeeping & payroll
Optional extras: Accounts Production £15-45, Corporation Tax £15-45,  Self Assessment £15-45, P11Ds & Auto Enrolment £15-45, Practice Management £25-75
Add-ons:  None listed; Capium has a one-stop shop approach

Pros

  • Looks to be very complete software.
  • Is Free to cleints
  • Now has CIS added
  • For practitioners, it can provide an end-to-end accounting and compliance capability if used with Capium Suite.

Cons

  • Does not have bank feeds
  • No add-ons available as of yet

General comments

This is the young pretender in the chaos that is likely to accompany MTD. Because it’s free for clients it could provide a real alternative for those clients that you have to bring in house because they will not able to tackle the bookkeeping themselves.

Verdict - Planning to use Capium as our practice software and will trial these the bookkeeping application as part of that migration.

Exact

Exact Screenshot 2016

Prices: £5 Starter for Accountants (for sole trader clients), £19 Accounting Standard (3 users), £29 Accounting Advanced (5 users)
Standard package includes: Bank feeds, CRM, document management, receipt scanning (fee incurred per scan), smartphone apps
Optional extras: £7.50 per extra company; £5 Accountancy upgrade includes client portal, budgets, document management, bank feeds for unlimited client numbers; also modules for wholesale/distribution from £109, project management from £139, time & billing from £69, and manufacturing from £189.
Add-ons:  50+ listed in Exact Online Apps Centre

Pros

  • Looks like a very slick and complete online suite with room to grow
  • Exact is priced on modular basis so you can pay for what you use
  • Looks to have Receipt Bank-like functionality built in to capture expense and invoice data, which makes sense.

Cons

  • Exact may be very well established in Europe, but is quite a latecomer to the UK market, so they’ve got a lot of ground to catch up

General comments

Exact’s built-in smartphone data capture facility gives it huge potential. If it works well, that will be a very slick option. I am surprised other accounting engines have not tried to develop something similar.

Verdict - Will watch with interest to see how Exact develops in the UK.

Other cloud accounting systems are available. Can you help fill out Glenn’s review with observations about the applications listed above and others such as Reckon, Liquid, Gbooks, Twinfield and any others you’ve tried? Feel free to comment below…

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Replies (45)

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By Anita Best
21st Jul 2016 11:34

I would like your advice, I am a very small practice and up to now have done all the accounts on Excel and tax returns on TaxCalc.
Now left with just my husbands construction business ( T/o approx. £ 120,000, operates cis, no employees )
Also, joint property business with me.
With MTD I realise we will have to buy new software for all the books, accounts and maybe tax returns have you any idea which may be best

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Replying to Anita Best:
By Tim Vane
21st Jul 2016 12:06

All a bit premature - there is still no real guidance on what MTD will and will not require, and no real certainty that it will even go ahead in the current climate.

The repeated statements that Excel is not going to be acceptable to keep records is also premature - until the reporting requirements are known in more detail, it is difficult to see how HMRC can limit the way that records are kept. It would not be hard for an online system to take excel records and produce a submission file that would be acceptable to HMRC, just as one can currently convert Excel templates to XBRL using cheap online services, or upload spreadsheet data for MOSS or AE purposes.

Your mistaken belief that you will be forced to move away from Excel is a common one, and it is obviously in the interest of cloud bookkeeping vendors (and by extension, Aweb) to keep pushing the MTD agenda and encourage users to move online, but frankly, if it isn't broke, don't rush to fix it. If you have a bookkeeping method that works for your business, keep using it.

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Replying to Tim Vane:
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By Anita Best
21st Jul 2016 13:27

Thanks for your advice, lets hope they decide not to make the smallest businesses change.

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Replying to Tim Vane:
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By Clinton Lee
25th Jul 2016 12:24

I like your "if it isn't broke" advice.

It's an interesting an useful article. I wonder how many of these cloud accounting services allow you to port your data. YOUR data. If you're not happy with them later - say fees go up or quality of service goes down - how easy is it to port your data, to simply pack it up and take it elsewhere?

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Replying to Anita Best:
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By Vaughan Blake1
22nd Jul 2016 13:36

If ever there was a case of "wait and see" this is it. The ideal solution may not even exist yet, as we don't know what is required or when or indeed if the quarterly bit will actually ever happen.

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By Michelle Aldridge
21st Jul 2016 11:59

This has been really useful - thank you so much for sharing! I'm a Sage-girl through and through, although I don't like SageOne (it's not all about me is it!), my clients like it because it's easy to use. Thanks again.

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By 0098087
21st Jul 2016 12:09

I find this fascinating. I do not see how my clients who do manual entries will pay even just £20 a month for bookkeeping software they do not need just to satisfy an ex chancellor who has never lived in the real world. Firstly we had the nonsense of auto enrolment with shocking websites like Now Pensions and now pointlessly forcing everyone to go online for 3 monthly quarterly. I am so angry about this nonsense. If I could I would get out ASAP.

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By Charlie Carne
21st Jul 2016 12:13

Excellent summary, Glennzy. I would add a couple of comments, if I may.

You suggest that data entry in QBO is slower and less easy than Xero. As a user of both systems, I would respectfully disagree. I find QBO extremely easy to use and can usually show my clients how to do basic data entry very quickly. A couple of years ago, QBO lacked some of the features of Xero, but the product now competes on an equal footing. The QBO bank feed and reconciliation process, for example, took a while to catch up to the sophistication of Xero, but it is now extremely quick and easy to use and I can process hundreds of transactions in a fraction of the time that I used to.

Not only is QBO at least as easy to get data into, it is undoubtedly (IMO) very much easier to get data back out again. I have never come across an accounting product with better reporting than QBO. The customisation options make reporting a breeze. In contrast, I find that trying to extract even basic data from Xero (unless you want one of the pre-defined reports) can be tortuous. I can't even get a simple list of payments made to a supplier in Xero, whereas in QBO I can create such a report in seconds.

I agree that Xero is an excellent product, but I can no longer see an advantage in any area over QBO and, in my opinion, the superiority of the reporting engine in QBO makes it the product of choice.

I've not used the other products (as QBO and Xero are so good that I haven't seen a need to look elsewhere) but I was very impressed with the level of granularity allowed for user access in ClearBooks. If you have a need for different users to have very sharply defined areas of access, then it may be worth taking a look at ClearBooks.

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By lexi
21st Jul 2016 12:48

Thank you for sharing! Very interesting.

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By tony.cassons.co.uk
21st Jul 2016 12:55

Fabulous of you to share your research and experience of the various current cloud accounting options. The great revelation that I see with clients adopting these cloud solution, is the access it gives them to wider business solutions. They can build a platform of solutions through various add ons with the accounting as the hub. They can create relatively cheaply, a whole business solution including scanning documents, stock handling, expenses handling, time recording, payroll CRM, forecasting etc. Its all about the client.

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Replying to tony.cassons.co.uk:
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By 0098087
21st Jul 2016 13:02

May be okay for the bigger clients but hey, what about the taxi driver or plumber who gives us a bag of receipts or uses an excel spreadsheet.

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Replying to 0098087:
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By brenbrady
22nd Jul 2016 13:18

0098087 wrote:

May be okay for the bigger clients but hey, what about the taxi driver or plumber who gives us a bag of receipts or uses an excel spreadsheet.

Receipt bank staring into excel.

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Replying to brenbrady:
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By 0098087
22nd Jul 2016 13:31

A. Who's going to pay for it
B. How does that recognise turnover?
C. How does that recognise cash payment for his expenses?

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Replying to 0098087:
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By brenbrady
22nd Jul 2016 15:07

0098087 wrote:

A. Who's going to pay for it
B. How does that recognise turnover?
C. How does that recognise cash payment for his expenses?

A. You pay for it, it's cheaper than paying staff to write up receipts for a day.
B. Expenses only
C. It doesn't. It just gets the data into excel much faster than what it takes to enter it manually.

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Replying to brenbrady:
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By 0098087
22nd Jul 2016 15:16

Okay but how does it help if he writes up a manual book once a year. How are we going to get him to provide the info quarterly.

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Donald MacKenzie
By Donald MacKenzie
21st Jul 2016 13:01

Hello
I do not see much advantage on going to the cloud unless clients are constantly needing to pass files to you. I use VT Transaction+ for some, and the FREE cash book version for others. I use Dropbox cloud storage so can allow people to share the file with me. It works, and no one can complain about cost when it is free. Or £125 for the paid for version with sales ledger etc.
VT lacks bank entry update software but many cannot cope with the complexity of doing that. Entry is very fast and simple.

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Replying to Donald MacKenzie:
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By 0098087
21st Jul 2016 13:14

Well it seems all clients are going to have to. apparently

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Morph
By kevinringer
21st Jul 2016 13:07

This is really useful - best thing I've read on AW for some time. Thanks Glennzy for sharing it with us.

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
21st Jul 2016 13:25

@Charlie

Thanks for your comments and remember this was my just my opinion and i am aware all accountants have strong views with regards what they use is the best product.

I think you have miss read the article around data entry as I did not state that QBO was slower than Xero I said they are both slower unless used with Receipt Bank.

I am comparing that to data entry in a product like desk top Line 50 where you can enter 100's of invoices quite quickly without saving each one. This is the hardest thing for clients to grasp when switching from desk top to cloud. For me this is a trade off with cloud where you lose speed of entry but gain ease of access to your data, this fact has allowed Receipt to flourish.

I agree with your comments though that QBO is the closest rival to Xero if you stripped the branding away and blind tested them with clients there would not be much in it. I feel what edges Xero ahead is the add on products although I appreciate most of the key ones now work with QBO. The reporting pack available in QBO is very good and presentable to clients.

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Replying to Glennzy:
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By Rocky WCB
21st Jul 2016 14:12

There are other cloud solutions available in a more traditional style - check out www.cloudsis.com which provides an optimised cloud platform specifically designed to run traditional server/workstation products for a fixed monthly fee. As standard it comes pre loaded with Pegasus Opera 3 but could utilise any accounting database.

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Replying to Rocky WCB:
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By Rocky WCB
21st Jul 2016 14:13

I also meant to say great article too!

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By DKB-Sheffield
21st Jul 2016 16:09

QuickFile

I started using QuickFile a couple of years ago. I found, to my amazement, that it was simple enough for clients to use and is feature rich.

Admittedly, it's not one for all BUT for clients who are stuck in the rut of Excel entry, it prevents some of the balancing issues and complex calculations required of a "for all" spreadsheet solution.

Sales, purchases and general entries are similar to the key players. Reporting is limited to standard TB, P&L, Aged Debtors/ Creditors etc. but, as a lifelong Sage user I do realise that I use a mere handful of their many "standard" reports.

Sales invoices can be emailed in a straight forward and automated manner. However, for no additional cost (aside from normal merchant fees), invoices can be paid online through Paypal, Stripe, GoCardless and many other online payment gateways.

As for cost... a standalone client can use QuickFile for free (up to a transaction limit) whereas, to access using Affinity (their accountant's system), there are fees payable (from around £1-£3 per client per month). Larger clients are charged £45 per annum (up front) for the standalone system BUT, the same package works out to a little over £36 per annum (billed monthly in arrears and based on usage) when purchased through Affinity. I tend to bill my clients the £3 per month.

Clearly, there are some limitations and there is definitely a requirement in the market for some of the "bigger players". However, for the smaller client with a smaller budget, QuickFile is well worth a review. After-all, the client could easily save £3 per month in the processing fees associated with transactions which are simply "too complex" for a "simple bookkeeping spreadsheet".

Check QuickFile out at quickfile.co.uk where you can also see further information in relation to Affinity.

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Replying to DKB-Sheffield:
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By DKB-Sheffield
21st Jul 2016 16:15

Oh... and one other bonus...

The client dashboard and system may be adapted using your Affinity account. Through simple logo uploads and modifications of simple css features (i.e. colours) you can have a dashboard which is personalised to your practice.

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By Dave Oakley
21st Jul 2016 17:07

I agree with Glennzy there is a trade off between speed of entry and ease of access. It should also be remembered however any accounting package whether just the simple cash book or full accounting is always going to be more structured than a spread sheet.

My biggest beefs are the lack of standards and the visuals.

This move to the cloud is excellent and will solve a multitude of issues for us. However it reminds me of the days before Windows when there were even a multitude of operating systems and just being able to print a pound sign could be an achievement. At that time we also had to cope with dozens of different accounting systems and it wasn't until Sage and QB became dominant that things settled down and efficiency levels rose. A three pin plug is a standard and think how difficult life would be if we didn't have that. Add up the number of packages Glennzy has listed and then add on the others from some of the excellent responses. Are we moving back to those bad old days? The client only has to cope with one but in our practice we are dealing with 7 or 8 and rising.

In term of the software none of the developers has taken account of the need to be able to see it. Call me old fashioned but I think it's quite important and it goes a long way to speed things up when things can be clearly seen. Is there something technical to stop cloud products using clearly contrasting colours? The developers seem to think it very clever to design their products with all manner of light pastel shades imposed on shaded backgrounds. None of the desktop versions do this so why have we now got to put up with it.

Finally, a plea to the developers. Can you give the poor old accountant a bit more priority. Most of the packages have pretty front ends (does anybody use the graphs?), data entry routines of varying quality but mostly pretty good. But for those of us who have to extract the information and make sure everything is ok to produce accounts I get the feeling it was a bit of an afterthought.

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Gary Turner
By garyturner
22nd Jul 2016 13:19

@Glennzy - If I may correct a couple of points or factual errors regarding Xero.

- The prices shown for Xero omit to state the Non-VAT Cashbook and VAT Cashbook prices available to accountants at £5 and £9 per month respectively.

- "Failed promises on delivering final accounts"

It may be a little later than we anticipated but Practice Templates for sole trader accounts is launching next week.

- "Concerns over sustainability of Xero as VC owned"

Xero is not VC owned and has been a publicly listed company since 2007.

- "Currently spends 70% of revenue on marketing"

We don't spend 70% of revenue on marketing. What you're referring to is our reported Customer Acquisition Cost which accounts for all expenditure and headcount costs across sales, marketing, design, training and consulting involved in growing our customer base. As a subscription business, while we're obligated to report the cost of acquisition in the year a customer is acquired, the model offsets this acquisition cost against the long term value obtained from the lifetime revenues we subsequently receive from the customers acquired. Set in this context, an investment of 70% of current year revenue in growing customers returns a significant multiple of LTV. So, looking at this aspect of Xero's financial performance in the context of the current year's P&L is a legitimate but incomplete view, whereas the full LTV is the correct way to interpret this cost.

I'll leave the opinion points as they stand for now, but would note that the Xero screenshot shown is about 6 years out-of-date. :)

Gary Turner
Managing Director, Xero
@garyturner

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By neilrobinson5
22nd Jul 2016 16:08

Thanks for your article.

A couple of comments:

1. The accounting world, including this website, seems obsessed with cloud accounting. I can appreciate the advantages associated with cloud software (primarily easy access and easy backup). However, in my mind, these are far outweighed by the old-fashioned concept of functionality. I happen to like QuickBooks (I know some people don't). The QuickBooks cloud offering is totally different from the desktop version, and, in my opinion, is not half as good.

2. I have used a few cloud accounting packages, and have one major hangup - they are sloooow. You click the mouse and nothing happens. You then ask yourself if you should click it again, and then suddenly the screen changes. I appreciate that the delays are fairly small, but I am used to desktop software which is instantaneous. (By the way, my broadband is pretty quick).

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Replying to neilrobinson5:
Steve Edwards
By stevo5678
23rd Jul 2016 11:30

@neilrobinson5

You must have a slow internet connection as I don't get these problems you report.

One of the main benefits of cloud software is the bank feed and bank rules. Desktop software to my knowledge is still lacking here features by and large?

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Teignmouth
By Paul Scholes
22nd Jul 2016 17:26

Ditto on thanks to Glennzy for this. It's also the longest I've spent on Accweb for weeks, there's hope yet!

I have clients of FreeAgent, Kashflow & Xero but, as many know I'm also consultant accountant to ClearBooks and have several clients on it as well as keeping my own books on it.

So just to tweak the summary above, as far as I know CB and Capium are the only two to have full CIS functionality, that is electronic subbie verification and monthly report submission.

For me the real pros are:

(As mentioned by Charlie) Tailoring to your clients and users' needs. There are 50 features you can turn on/off per business and then 70 access permissions you can turn on/off per user. This makes training clients so much easier than even FreeAgent (which I like alot) in that you can start them seeing only a couple of features and build it as they get used to the system.

VAT comparison report to compare standard VAT with FRS VAT and visa versa, it also keeps track of the anniversary FRS turnover.

A full system backup file per client that can be held internally or downloaded. This has saved disasters with some clients where they do huge data imports from external systems only to find that the settings were not quite right, so you just hit restore to the last backup point.

I had to have a chuckle over the comments that they have been quiet on the Marketing front recently. I have made the point many times to Xero, and I know users & partners regularly make the same point to other Cloud providers, that, rather than spend so much of our money on marketing hype, they should direct it to improving the system, fixing defects and improving speed. So, for 6 months that's what CB has been doing.

As far as a buy out is concerned, I haven't the foggiest, but seeing as they are the only one I know of who offered shares to all their users it wouldn't all be gloom & doom :)

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By pae59
22nd Jul 2016 22:31

Have you tried quickfile? I am not an accountant, but recently taken over managing accounts of a small charity ( with no accounting experience). Found quickfile is free, really easy to use, downloads information straight from the bank. Sends invoices by e-mail or post and has more features than I will ever use.
Didn't know accounting would be so straightforward. For a complete novice it is very good and very user friendly. However sometimes it can be slow.

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By coolmanwithbeard
23rd Jul 2016 00:35

Hi

Great article thanks

As a long term supporter/supplier of QB I have gone with QBO. I can get a good deal from them and pass this onto clients

One huge advantage is data migration - I can migrate a client from desktop QB in little time and they get all their lists and history. The software works on the same basis as desktop so migration is easy from a use point of view too.

I would love to see an spreadsheet entry system like on qb accountant desktop but actyally have found I can use the bank import routine to import spreadsheets and apps are available to help too.

Receipt bank works well and there is transaction pro importer too for other imports

Regardless of mtd the idea of giving clients access to their data is sound regardless of who puts it in and a mix of who does what is possible.

Mike

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Steve Edwards
By stevo5678
23rd Jul 2016 11:27

This is along the lines of my thoughts, Xero is the easiest to use (for accountants and non accountants) but they have a bit too much power and support is slow.

QB is my alternative as it is the one I find to have a bank rec function any where near as intuitive as Xero and offers great pricing.

Will keep with Xero for non invoicing clients as it's just so easy to keep a nice up to date reconciled bank :)

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By ohgoodgodno
28th Jul 2016 08:30

I've never really been sure what the fuss is about when it comes to Xero

I've always found it to be flimsy and wouldnt really describe it as a robust bit of kit.

one thing we look for in software to recommend is ease of use and automation, taking client errors out of the equation.

Xero has always seemed to need manual manipulation, it doesnt even do flat rate VAT properly, which just leads to client errors

likewise I dont see why so many are down on Clear books, it doesn pretty much everything ....well, support could be better at times, but isnt that true for everyone?

another vote for quickfile too

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By cbp99
19th Aug 2016 16:39

One problem with Xero, and I daresay other cloud packages have similar problems, although I have not tried others, is with the Vat coding. The defaults are not all correct, for example Donations is set to xero-rated.
Clients are likely to trust these settings, especially when HMRC are telling them how simple and flawless this cloud malarkey is.

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SiWoodhams
By Si_Woodhams
23rd Sep 2016 15:25

A few good points made in the article:

With Gary in saying that the screenshots are well out of date for both Xero/QBO - in fact i've never seen a QBO screen look like that ever!

For the people complaning about them not being built for accountants - that is the point - you are thinking about yourselves again and not about the end user that have to use the software day in day out.

The fact that all of these peices of software saves you and your clients time should be the very reason to go and spend the money - I'm pretty sure if you spend £20 a month on one them you will easily make it back in other areas in a week

I could go on - but thats all for now!

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By adam.arca
26th Sep 2016 13:44

I'm not a big believer in "the Cloud as panacea" which the likes of Gary @ Xero would have us all buy into, so (other than a couple of clients on Sage One) I've no experience of it.

I therefore approached my first taste of Xero (for a client who has decided to go that way after years on TAS) the other day with interest as this is supposedly the big brother of the cloud accounting experience.

Frankly, not that impressed. Obviously, it's not designed with accountants in mind and it does have the odd nice feature but, fundamentally, it's so ****ing slow!!!! I think I'll need to learn to multi task better so that I can be painting the wall or something whilst I wait for it to process.

So, I'm still no nearer making a decision about which bookkeeping package I might try to push with the advent of MTD. Frankly, I think I'm going to wait and see what the fightback from the desktop packages produces.

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
29th Sep 2016 16:05

Thank you to all who found my comments useful and for giving there own views on a subject that will be discussed a lot more I am sure over the coming 18 months.

What I did not expect from the article was the contact that followed from those at a fairly high level within the software companies.

Capium, Freeagent, QBO, Clearbooks & Exact all took the time to contact me personally to extend on my comments made and they are clearly very interested in how people at the sharp end see things. It just goes to show that some companies do value what the small business people think.

I must say the new developments in Clearbooks look very interesting and what a thoroughly nice fella Marcel the CEO of Exact is.

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Replying to Glennzy:
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By ohgoodgodno
29th Sep 2016 09:09

Glennzy wrote:

I must say the new developments in Clearbooks look very interesting and what a thoroughly nice fella Marcel the CEO of Exact is.

it would be nice if these companies actually took the time to contact the accountants that use and promote them once in a while to advise of whats coming up and whats changing, interesting developments are all well and good, but not if no-one knows about them

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Replying to ohgoodgodno:
Teignmouth
By Paul Scholes
29th Sep 2016 13:33

Hi oggn - I can only speak for Clear Books (I use & consult for), FreeAgent & Kashflow that I use and in my experience, they all keep me up to date with what's going on, and also ask users for their views on future developments.

In case your comment was directly in response to Glennzy's comment above about new developments at CB, he had not, I think, used it for some time and so was responding to being brought up to date with new stuff since he last looked at it.

In general CB email when anything important happens including new developments and these are also put on their blog, where, you'll see their product roadmap published in May https://www.clearbooks.co.uk/blog/.

New or changed features & functions are also put on their "Preview"option for people to try out, and feedback on, for a month or two, until they go live.

There are about 30 cloud accounting systems out there, they are not, thankfully, all the same.

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Replying to Paul Scholes:
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By ohgoodgodno
29th Sep 2016 14:03

no my response wasn't aimed at any particular provider specifically, we have felt that all providers could be a lot better at providing information.

we have tried most offerings and found that info from all about product changes or development to be limited

it seems like its up to us to go and dig out info from their websites (and to a large degree that goes for all providers), that's fine if you have the time, but that's not always the case.

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Chris M
By mr. mischief
17th Oct 2016 21:19

Glenzy, many thanks for your report. However, when it comes to Xero no report is complete without including that its payroll module is truly awful.

See my other posts on the weaknesses I have found in Xero in the client of mine who uses it.

Also, I have concerns over the finances of Xero, amongst others. It seems to me to be the sort of investment I avoid - looks like it is overtrading to me - and if it ever gets a UK quote I will add it to my spread bet favourites as a short selling target.

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
17th Oct 2016 14:56

@Mischief

I agree, for me most of the tagged on payroll that comes attached to cloud bookkeeping software is both pretty expensive and quite poor, I would not like to try and run AE with one of them.

For me you cannot go beyond the ease of us of moneysoft or brightpay and just post them into the software.

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
17th Oct 2016 15:55

.

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Glenn Martin
By Glenn Martin
19th Oct 2016 13:12

.

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By Kevin Hussey
26th Apr 2017 08:54

Cloud accounting software is almost similar to self install accounting software. Here the accounting software is hosted on the remote servers. Well, data is sent into the cloud, where it is processed and also returned to the server. Here, all functions are performed off site rather on the desktops. In cloud computing, an user accesses the information remotely with the help of internet using the application of cloud service provider. As it allows remote access, here the whole data is secure and safe. It also minimizes the level of fraud. Your blog is provided with the information regarding cloud bookkeeping and also gives some knowledge regarding various software available for remote access. But in this context if someone will take my opinion then I can say that I am using
bookkeeping services which has been giving the best services till now. Thank you so much

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Akounto
By Akounto
27th Dec 2021 08:39

Thanks for sharing informative information about accountant’s guide to cloud bookkeeping tools, and how it helps manage your financial operations. Cloud accounting software or services are great for small businesses because they allow you to store all your data in one place. But if the service goes down or gets too expensive, how easy will it be to just port that information elsewhere?

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