I think that it is a foregone conclusion that you might need to make changes to your current accounting operations in the future if you are still on QBD. When will you need to make these changes though? Will it happen before or after your plans to retire? Sell the business? Will you be caught having to make these decisions during a particularly busy year? These are all factors that might affect you and it is certainly a decision that only you can make.
I have more than a few clients who have outgrown the capabilities of QuickBooks Desktop (QBD) as a business management software. These clients have moved operations and/or accounts receivable, accounts payable and more out of their accounting system into more industry driven applications, all cloud based at this point. Some of these clients are also poised to make the jump to QuickBooks Online (QBO) at some time in the near future.
There are many options out there for operational and/or function focused software. Finding the one that will work for you is critical to your company's health and growth. As an accountant, I am here to assist with the transition of the accounting system and the integration of outside applications to the accounting. But I do not have the knowledge of your day to day operations that is critical to finding the solutions for your individual operations and daily business management.
If there is a guideline that I firmly adhere to and has always been successful in my opinion, finding solutions where information is entered only once is critical to maximum productivity and accuracy in reporting and financial information. It worked for small businesses using QBD stand-alone as their business management tool and all encompassing operations and it's a proven practice.
QBO and AI driven processes certainly improve productivity and reduce the possibility for errors. Manually transferring information in and out of multiple systems including excel worksheets and proprietary systems is a stressful process. It is also time consuming and prone to mistakes and errors. Maintaining internal servers is costly and while it keeps people out of the accounting system who don't need access and shares information with internal employees who need operations information, it creates other problems without the capability for automated integration. Integration is the basis of "app-stacking" and in my opinion, QBO does a better job of this than QBD. Creating an Application Stack or group of software programs that work together to manage your daily operations and produce financial data and reports for your business is efficient and has multiple side benefits.
It is my personal intention to make you aware of what is changing at Intuit, how it might affect you and my personal opinion on all of the subjects presented here. Please know that CLN Consulting Associates won't be around forever and I certainly don't want my clients to feel that I didn't give them enough warning or notice of the possibilities.
Yes . . . . possibilities and maybe even opportunities. Opportunities for improvements to your business, your life and your employees lives. If and or when you are ready for these conversations with the intention to begin the research for changes to your accounting operations, please feel free to reach out to me.
