As we venture into 2015, independent shops, restaurants and other small businesses are flocking to the cloud as a cost-effective means of leveraging enterprise-grade business capabilities. There’s now no need for small companies to be dedicating hours each day to data entry.

You can now swipe sales transactions into an iPad that doubles up as a mobile point-of sales terminal. Instantly approved credit cards, updated stock and revenue logged into the bookkeeping system can all happen thanks to the cloud. This allows small business owners to focus on their customers instead of spending several hours digging tediously through business data.

Small Business Accountants

However, we recognise that between the business owner and their bookkeeping software, there is a missing link. This missing link is the accountant. People want real-time advice, quarterly or once-a-year check-ins don’t cut it anymore. Today’s thriving and competitive small business scene demands that their sales, marketing and even accounting work in an agile, responsive and efficient manner to ensure success.

By avoiding cloud-enabled technology it causes several other productivity-draining effects on the client-accountant relationship.

One of the biggest problems that occurs between the client and accountant is collecting the required documents on time. It is clear that small business owners would rather spend time running their small business and not gathering paperwork. Cloud and online services make it a relatively trivial task to get these transactions through technology. However, some accountants are still stuck in the past.

Accounting for Change

With more businesses making use of online software solutions every day, it is now down to the accountants themselves to utilise the many benefits it has to offer. Cloud accounting is now the go-to service provision for business and accountancy firms alike and the demand for it is unlikely to falter any time soon.

Manual administration tasks and travelling to meet clients for regular meetings can be a drain on the bank account and hugely time-inefficient. By its very nature, the any-time and anywhere access of cloud-based accounting allows accountancy firms to reduce and in some cases negate these unnecessary outgoings.

The recent surge in small businesses using cloud technology should act as a wake-up call to many British accountancy firms to adopt cloud technology, offer new services and work more productively with their clients.

The future is online and it is essential that accountancy firms adapt to stay competitive to retain their clients.