Should we trust the cloud? - The Book-keepers Forum (UK)

AlleliA · Newbie

Should we trust the cloud?

VinceH · Expert

I don't personally like the idea of 'the cloud' for a variety of reasons, least of all for this type of work, but my view is that if a client is paying me and wants me to use a particular system, I'll use it.

And to that end, I do have a couple of clients that use a cloud-based accounting system. One thing it does have going for it is that it's very convenient. 8)

To answer the question, though: Is it reliable?

I haven't read of any significant problems with any cloud-based accounting systems, but I know some big cloud service providers and/or services have suffered significant outages - e.g. Microsoft's Azure cloud recently went into "Total Inability To Sustain Usual Performance" mode, and Adobe's cloud-based licensing system went into that mode a few months ago. And these are BIG players - if they can go wrong, so too can smaller cloud providers, such as those offering accounting solutions (or those providing them with the server space).

So I'd say that with reliability, it's a case of if it hasn't gone wrong yet, that doesn't mean it's reliable, it just means it hasn't gone wrong yet. You (to everyone with faith in the cloud) might be lucky. You might not. I hope you are.

Another pitfall with the cloud is the reliability of your own connection to the internet - which, again, may so far have been superb, but could still go down (fault with the ISP, fault with your line somewhere between you and the exchange, or the exchange and the ISP...)

Now look at all the security breaches that have occurred online in recent years. What's the impact if your cloud-based accounting provided suffered such a breach? Someone has accessed your private accounting data, and all the associated data that goes with it, such as your client information. (Although, to be fair, this is also a problem on people's own computers, where they are at risk from malware - and some people's approach to keeping their PCs secure is a joke.)

Next, don't forget the need to maintain the records for a mandatory period after the close of business - I've recently encountered one who had two businesses, and closed one of them, so simply ceased the cloud-accounting subscription without thinking about it. I've suggested they contact the provider to see if the data is retained in some way, but they've not got back to me. (I suspect there's an option to download the data, making the company responsible for retaining it themselves, but they didn't realise).

RobH · Expert

VinceH wrote:

Microsoft's Azure cloud recently went into "Total Inability To Sustain Usual Performance" mode, and Adobe's cloud-based licensing system went into that mode a few months ago.

VinceH · Expert

Credit for that backronym goes to The Register.

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

TITS UP

You crack me up.

As with the general flow here I do not believe that software requiring a constant online mode is a sensible sollution as client do not accept that you cannot access their data as the software / ISP is not available as a reasonable excuse for not being able to give them the information that they need.

Personally I use the cloud to backup my data via dropbox and that keeps a version of the backup on the hard drive of every computer set up to share that dropbox.

Add to the above a flawed business model for cloud offerings.

Think about it. The key component of cloud agreements is to get the client to pay x amount every month on top of your fee's or take the per client hit on the software yourself.

You could argue that's not dissimilar to Sage charging per client but my counter would be that two wrongs don't make a right.

I personally won't be disappearing off down the cloud route, readies in hand looking for someone to relieve me of them anytime soon.

Of course, one cannot just apply logic to the Ipad generation that expects everything on their phones. So there is a big market for this stuff despite its shortfalls over dependability, usability, security, post agreement accessibility, business model, etc.

kind regards,

Shaun.

Sylvia · Veteran Member

I have a couple of cloud clients, which works well as they do all their invoicing and I do the rest from my home/office. But I worry about backups, especially if they ever stopped using the cloud software. Therefore once a month I run a general ledger report and a report showing all the invoice lines, at least this with bank recs this is better than nothing. I am thinking of putting these on a CD at year end and giving them to the client to keep with there paperwork.

Sylvia

Kundan Lal Rana · Veteran Member

AlleliA wrote:
Read a bunch of articles about Accounting going to the Cloud. Is this reliable? Thanks!

Here is your answer - Cloud Accounting

-- Edited by Kundan Lal Rana on Wednesday 20th of August 2014 12:32:39 PM

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Hi Kundan,

for obvious security reasons please do not post blind links but rather post the full link.

For example, your hyperlink was pointing to here : www.youtube.com/watch

Right, define 65% of accounting practices.

There have been five respondants in this thread including yourself, three anti, one on the fence and one for. that does not equate to 65% for the cloud (actually 20% for, 60% against, 20% undecided).

Nobody has actually asked me in a survey whether I want to move to the cloud so I'm assuming that this is a figure based on 65% of the accountants asked. How big was the population of the survey that was taken? In which country? Were certain age groups targeted?

Does the 41% include accountants who are merely trialing cloud offerings?

I have never had a client insist on a cloud offering. Where does the figure of 25% more come from. Also 25% more of what ininitial figure? If there were four and now there are 5 thats a 25% increase but if there were 1,000,000 non cloud and now there are 1,005,000 thats only an increase of 5% so in percentage terms the cloud is doing better but in reality it would just be smoke and mirrors. (for more on that arguement see the difference between residual income and return in investment for basic investment appraisal techniques).

What the heck does using cloud as a competitive difference mean?

No upfront hardware costs.... So how do you access the cloud. Oh yes, on the same machine as if you did not have a cloud offering.

Always up to date... Same as a desktop solution.

The vendor confidence slide does not actually answer the question asked.

The research used is secondary from reports published mainly by those with a vested interest in the findings.

The golden rule is always that statistics without the figures upon which the statistics are based are simply a marketing tool and are worth less than nothing.

Sorry Kundan, the video gave no answers.

RobH · Expert

Kundan I would have to agree with Shaun that that video really tells us nothing, there was no corroboration of data whatsoever. Having said that I think the younger generation of business people will be looking at the Cloud for their bookkeeping needs, it's a generational thing and for that reason I am throwing my lot in with Kashflow. I have clients who are now retiring and I have to replace these with younger guys and I shall be offering them the option of cloud or desk top. The cloud offering will add a few quid to the monthly cost but as Sylvia says the client can enter their invoices on and it should make our job that bit quicker so a tenner a month is not such a problem.

Old fogies like me and Shaun might just have to move with the times (but VT will have to go cloud based for Shaun!)

Kundan Lal Rana · Veteran Member

Hey Shamus,

#1 Thanks for the notification to my link posting.

#2 Since AlleliA was bored with the articles, hence the video. blankstare

#3 This video is based upon the data from the survey conducted by Xero which is a leading cloud accounting software and trusted authority in accounting field. Here is the link to that survey - https://www.xero.com/us/infographic/cloud-accounting-2014/ , 250 accountants age between 18 to 65 yr. were asked. It's Xero to be asked for more. confuse

#4 I don't think why are you disagree on "cloud as a competitive difference mean", Intuit is one, who is using cloud as a competitive difference. smile

RobH · Expert

Thanks for the link Kundan. It makes me wonder whether the 250 accountants asked were already Xero users and hence the positive spin, it's that whole 'lies, damned lies and statistics' thing!

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

I last did accounts work before the cloud was invented, and had systems where my clients did the book-keeping in their office on Sage, sent the data files down the phone line to me (first by dial-up to a bulletin board, later by e-mail). At my end, using software I had written (as a Sage Developer), flags for the bank rec. and other stuff I'd done at my end were extracted from my Sage data file and stored, the clients data files were copied over them, and the flags written back. This was all automated, and worked very reliably. I did journals on a spreadsheet that I could import at my end while working on the accounts, then send them to the client to import at their end. It meant that I could offer a great service that my clients were very happy with.

If we had been able to share data files online, it would have been easier, but I would never trust a third party with the data. They could:
a) Go out of business at any time
b) Change the system in a way that made it unsuitable for the job
c) Make a major change right at a critical time when we needed to work on the accounts
d) The internet could go down
and lots of other reasons

I've tried to find some decent web based accounting software that I could run on my own web space, but there's nothing out there. I'd be happy with this because we would have control of it, and if and when updates are installed. Any problems with the internet, and it could be run on a local web server in my office, or the client's.

I did actually start writing an accounting system for my own use using PHP and mySQL, and got enough of it done to be useful for my own accounts. As it will run on the web, it would be ideal to work with some clients, but would need more work that I can spend the time on, or have the skills for. It's got some features rather similar to VT, which is one of the reasons I've got VT.

-- Edited by EPF_Solutions on Wednesday 20th of August 2014 03:27:19 PM

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

250 accountants... lol.

There are over 600,000 ACCA members and students alone (and every student can be a bookkeeper so that figure is relevant). Also are there not over 1.7million qualified accountants in the states.

The statistic does not say out of the 0.00000000001% of accountants, 65% of them (made up number as I have no idea how many accountants there actually are worldwide (but we're talking millions)). It made out that 65% refered to the total of all accountants without actually talking to well above 99.9% of them.

As Rob (and Mark Twain) says "Lie, Damned Lies and statistics".

Actually, I've just considered another flaw in this marketing approach. It depends on the people that it is selling to being financially, logically and numerically illiterate but the target market are bookkeepers and accountants.

Thats not saying the product is wrong, its saying that the way that it is being marketed is.

Shaun.

VinceH · Expert

Well, as we all know, "there are lies, damned lies, and statistics".

Look underneath that YouTube video, and you'll see:

"According to Xero, around 41% of accountants are using cloud accounting and 65% are planning to use cloud accounting software such as Xero, QuickBooks Online, Wave, FreshBooks, Netsuite, Kashoo etc."

So once that 65% start using Cloud-based accounting software, that'll be 106% of accountants doing so. How does that work?

Those are clearly figures from two distinct questions, that don't link in the way they are linked in that sentence. The answer is from Kundan's subsequent link, where we see that (according to Xero):

"65% of accounting practices are using or planning to use cloud accounting" (my emphasis)

And:

"41% Nearly half are using cloud accounting to reduce their overheads".

So, yes, two completely different things linked together as though they relate, resulting in a nonsensical statistic.

Furthermore, that second question doesn't reveal all: Is that 41% of all surveyed using cloud accounting to reduce their overheads, or 41% of those who use cloud accounting using it to reduce their overheads?

Hint: the wording - that they're using it to reduce overheads - suggests the latter, so there is nothing to indicate the actual percentage of those asked who do actually use it.

Consider that we know it must be less than 65%, because that is the percentage using or planning to use it. Now consider the wording on the 41% - specifically, that it's pointing out that 41% is nearly half. My inference (cynical old git that I am) is that is that this is a deliberate attempt to inflate the numbers in the readers' mind - to suggest that nearly half of all accountants (surveyed) use cloud accounting. And that leads me to the conclusion that the percentage of those surveyed who do use cloud accounting is lower still.

I'd love to see the raw data (and the full questions), rather than a selectively designed infographic designed to big up the service.

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

This could be good business for non cloud using book-keepers and accountants at some time in the future, when businesses are desperate to have their accounts recreated, when they lose them and the tax man is on their back!

Casaroza · Member

I haven't read every post on this thread, but the ones I have read seem to be spreading doom and gloom. Before the cloud we worried about the backups not working, and I assure you I had had some very long nights because the backups were not tested until needed after a crash or power surge. Whilst we can't do backups with cloud data and we are reliant on the provider to be vigilant - and if the contract is properly set up they will suffer greatly if they are not, but that's another matter - we can regularly download the data via csv file or other db. format that you may be more comfortable with. If you do this after each burst of input activity, any problems with loss of data etc., etc., should be minimal. Or am I being too simplistic?

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Too simplistic.

The issue for me at least is not with loss of data. I use dropbox, a backup computer and CD's for that.

The issue as I see it is the availability of the software, not the data. Any system requiring a constant internet connection to use the software has a built in issue.

I can see the argument for an offline sollution that backs up to the cloud so that your data is available wherever you are without worrying about versioning. But thats just described using dropbox.

The bulk of the above is actually about the lies of statistics in marketing rather than cloud offerings so if you covered the first five replies you've basically covered the original subject matter.

You'll get used to that with this site. Threads seldom end up where they start off.

RobH · Expert

Grape nuts or granola?

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

Back in the olden days I did nightly backups onto a tape streamer. I used three tapes alternately and one was always kept off the premises. It seems to me that it's harder to have a decent backup routine nowadays.

Presumably there isn't a viewer program available to access cloud data offline, so what use is a download in a CSV file, or even in a database? You may have the data, but what do you have to do to use it?

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

If we're talking about the bad old days John.

I used to work for a company with 350,000 employee's and we had a weekly payroll.

Intermitent backups were taken duing processing and at the end of the nights batch run 8 fulls backups were taken.

The flaw was that whilst they took the backup and checked that the jobs worked nobody ever checked the validity of the backup.

One night there was a catastrophic failure in the payroll run. The previous runs backups were duly rolled out and loads attempted...

seven backup tapes failed... By the time that the final tape load was attempted the directors of the company were out of bed and in the operations room praying.

Number 8 loaded.

Apparently the problem was that operations cycled the same tapes on an 8*8 basis (8 tapes per run and on the 9th run the same tapes were reused) and they had been doing this for years.

The tapes were basically buggered.

Peasie · Expert

Shamus wrote:
The tapes were basically buggered.

Do you have to use such technical jargon? Can't you put it in layman's terms?

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

A single tape was fine for my nightly backups of all my client's data, and I'm pretty sure they were automatically verified. If I needed to backup anything part way through a job, one floppy disk was plenty big enough!

When I feel stressed by technical problems, the use of technical jargon, usually a word beginning with f rather than b, brings immediate comfort in the form of my dog putting her feet up on my chair for a hug. Unfortunately, being a German Shepherd rather than a St Bernard, she doesn't also bring alcohol!

AlleliA · Newbie

I guess I should huh?

<< Link removed by moderator >>

-- Edited by Shamus on Tuesday 26th of August 2014 11:05:41 AM

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Ah, I understand now.

You haven't actually taken part in the discussion and from your reply I doubt if you have actually even read it as the general flow was very far from positive about blind trust of cloud offerings.

joining the site was just SEO for the attached outsourcing site wasn't it and the real reason for wanting people to move to cloud based options is that it makes offshoring work far easier.

... not really considered it from that angle before but bookkeepers adopting cloud based solutions are then the equivalent of Turkeys voting for Christmas so I would hope thaty even those UK bookkeepers and accountants who have flirted with the cloud as an option will now reconsider it.

Your link has been removed.

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

Surely cloud cuckoo land, rather than Christmas turkeys!

111 Bookkeeping and Payroll · Senior Member

Shamus wrote:

... not really considered it from that angle before but bookkeepers adopting cloud based solutions are then the equivalent of Turkeys voting for Christmas so I would hope thaty even those UK bookkeepers and accountants who have flirted with the cloud as an option will now reconsider it.

I looked at one of the main ones when my then sole client got a bit bigger than the taxi accounts software I was using at the time could manage. I couldn't justify the extra £200 odd a year PER CLIENT so looked at something other than sage. I discovered VT Tranaction+ and it's still my software of choice. A one off fee and unlimited companies can't be beaten in my opinion.

That said I have used xero for a client and found it relatively straight forward

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

A version of VT that could be run from a web server would be brilliant!

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Why?

You need a computer to access the software so why not just have the software on your computer.

Your data can exist in dropbox so accessible anywhere you are, backed up up to the web and correct versioning from whereever you are.

I can see absolutely no justificatioon for software (as opposed to data) in the cloud at all... Well, unless I was a cloud software vendor and then its more than justified as they can screw far more out of punters with pay as you go than they can with a straight purchase.

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

Multi user software running on a web server could be accessed by us and a client, but as I commented earlier, I would want control over it rather than trusting a third party.

I'm writing a CRM system to do just that for the social enterprise I'm setting up, so multiple users can access it from anywhere.

Maxholt · Veteran Member

I feel much the same as Shamus!

Personally, I do not trust software that is only available online - right now I am having issues with my internet connection, but this does not stop me from working as all my software is on my computer - and I have three portable hard drives for back up (this may be the 'old' way of doing things, but it has served me well for many years!). More recently I have become concerned that moving forward we may not be able to purchase software outright and may be forced to rely on the online versions with the never ending monthly fees!

As for 'statistics' - they can be manipulated to such an extent that the end data can only ever be considered to be misleading.

EPF_Solutions · Senior Member

The advantage of running it on your own web space is that you can also run it on a web server running on your local computer if the internet goes down.

To avoid all this software renting lark (or even just buying it), I was in the process of moving to Linux and entirely open source software. That was until I decided to go back to doing accounts work, as there isn't any decent open source accounting software, and none at all that runs on Linux that is fit for this work.

VinceH · Expert

The advantage of running it on your own web space is that you can also run it on a web server running on your local computer if the internet goes down.

Indeed, there is that. You can be a little less limited, as well - just because your internet connection goes down (or there is a problem further up your line, perhaps with the ISP's DNS or whatever), doesn't mean your LAN will be down.

Therefore, rather than a web server on your local computer, it can be a web server on your local network - so anyone in the office can carry on using it. (If you're just one person, though, and have nobody else in the office working for you, a web server on your local computer is fine, though!)

One of my clients is going down this route - not for accounting, but for the back-end to their business, and the invoicing. (Currently, the back-end is all done on paper multi-part dockets, and the invoicing is done by one person on Sage Instant.) They're paying £lots to have a web-based system set up, which will be run on a server in the office.

kris1985 · Newbie

Cloud bookkeeping was launched by Mandy Bagot, a chartered certified accountant, to revolutionise outsourced bookkeeping, using the latest cloud technology with online Sage Line 50 software, so that the most up to date data information can be accessed by the business owner, the bookkeeper and the accountant, all at the same time if needed!

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Doesn't actually answer the question though does it as to whether anyone should have any confidence in cloud based offerings... Probably not the best thread to advertise a cloud based franchise in really.

Shaun.

VinceH · Expert

Resurrecting an old thread... This particular post might also be given the title of "Cloud rant".

First of all, though, and looking at the titular question: "Should we trust the cloud?" - although it's a thread/subject title, rather than a headline, I think people should look up "Betteridge's law of headlines" which basically states that when a headline asks a question, it can usually be answered with the word "no".

Now, to cloud, and trust and shizzle like that. My first post in this thread covered security, and reliability in terms of access to data. In other posts on other threads, I've mentioned the possibility of the software changing - that can also relate to trust, because you have to trust that changes to the software don't fluff your figures.

A week or two back, a cloud-using client contacted me to ask if I'd been working on their stuff, because their accountants were preparing their year end accounts and had commented that "things were updating". I replied to say no (and even if I had been, it would have been current stuff). Nobody else, apparently, was logged in.

I had noticed a couple of changes to the system, though, when I'd last used it.

One was a minor annoyance: When inputting an invoice, the first screen includes an "Invoice number" field - but when the invoice was being saved, that invoice number was becoming a purchase order number, and the invoice number was an internally generated one.

The second was in the VAT handling. When inputting "expenses" (i.e. bank, cash, card payments that don't go to the purchase ledger, instead straight to the P&L) there is a field to input the VAT amount if you don't want the software to calculate it - and when you do, if it's wrong, you can use that field to override the VAT amount. This is handy where the software and the receipt disagrees by small amounts, or where you have a mixed item receipt where some of the items carry no VAT, but it can all be posted to the same expense account.

The change was that field not being honoured; it's the software's calculation if you want any VAT at all.

There could be other changes that I hadn't noticed, but I wondered if *that* change (which I think is a screw up rather than a deliberate decision) may have been retrospectively applied - this would affect things historically, buggering up the VAT and so on. However, I haven't heard back from the client to say what specifically had changed.

Unfortunately, I forgot to contact the provider to point out this error - but I encountered it again today when dealing with another client on the same system, so I *have* now raised it with them.

Another recent change is that there is now an EC reverse charges VAT code for services - something I asked for a *considerable* amount of time ago.

And I spotted today that it gets it wrong.

Figures for reverse charge services go in boxes 1 & 4 (calculated UK VAT amount) and 6 and 7 (amount actually paid). The software is putting the VAT amount in box 2 and the net amount in box 9 - which is for reverse charge *goods*. On the bright side, it doesn't handle submission - that's manual - so I can manually adjust the figures.

So another reason *not* to trust the cloud is that changes to the way the software works can affect your figures - they shouldn't, but the people writing the software are humans and can introduce bugs. And unlike desktop software, that can happen under your very noses.

VinceH · Expert

And another quick addition to this thread, and going back to a comment I made on 20th August, 2014:

"So I'd say that with reliability, it's a case of if it hasn't gone wrong yet, that doesn't mean it's reliable, it just means it hasn't gone wrong yet. You (to everyone with faith in the cloud) might be lucky. You might not. I hope you are."

Today, I have two cloudy jobs that need to be done, both using the same (local, as it happens) cloudy accounts provider.

But I can't do either because the site is down. It's not just me, or my internet connection - I've checked it via downforeveryoneorjustme.com, and found a status update on Twitter to say they're looking into it. The site is down.

Welcome to the future of accounts - the cloud.

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Think that my new Avatar says it all Vince!

VinceH · Expert

Hah, yes. :)

If I possessed time displacement technology, I'd copy that, get it put on a T-shirt, and send it back to myself to wear on the day I met the guy behind the stuff my clients use.

apps4rent vikram · Newbie

Cloud hosting is the future now everything has its Pro's and con's however with cloud solutions there are more pro's then cons. Few things where the cloud hosting surpasses others are:

-Cloud computing cuts out the high cost of hardware. You simply pay as you go and enjoy a subscription-based model thats kind to your cash flow.

-The costs of cloud computing are much more flexible than traditional methods.

-Most cloud providers are extremely reliable in providing their services, with many maintaining 99.99% uptime.

-Improved mobility. One can access the applications from anywhere via smart phones, tablets or laptops.

-Document control and collabaration is also easy. -The most important point is security. Lost laptops are a billion dollar business problem.

Cheshire · Master Book-keeper

Vikram - stop spamming old bloody posts!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

apps4rent vikram wrote:
-Most cloud providers are extremely reliable in providing their services, with many maintaining 99.99% uptime.

VinceH · Expert

I shouldn't, but...

"Cloud hosting is the future now everything has its Pro's and con's however with cloud solutions there are more pro's then cons."

More pro's then cons? So customers get told about the alleged benefits, and then they are conned?

"Few things where the cloud hosting surpasses others are:

-Cloud computing cuts out the high cost of hardware. You simply pay as you go and enjoy a subscription-based model thats kind to your cash flow."

Translation: It's kind to the provider's cash flow, because they can charge month after month after month for the service, instead of getting a one-off payment (possibly with subsequent payments for upgrades) for a piece of desktop software.

Also: Unless people can just poke and prod at thin air, they still need hardware to access cloudy crud. And in all likelihood, they'll need that hardware for other stuff as well.

"-The costs of cloud computing are much more flexible than traditional methods."

Translation: Once they have you using their system, and your data is on their servers, price rises can be expected. i.e. like most 'services' you're unlikely to see flexibility that results in price decreases - prices are, generally, only flexible in one direction: Upwards. Especially in these days of "screw the customer, we just want their ££££s" mentality.

"-Most cloud providers are extremely reliable in providing their services, with many maintaining 99.99% uptime."

Well, if you ignore that there have been some notable outages in the past few years with big players.

In fact, I think... yes... my first post mentioned a couple. Not specifically accounting providers, but still!

Then there's the issue of security, something I keep harping on about for a damned good reason. I don't think a single week of 2017 has gone by yet when there hasn't been some data breach or other reported in the tech news. While I can't predict which, or what type, of sites will be compromised, I won't be in the slightest bit surprised if at some point in the future a cloudy accounts site is ripped wide open.

"-Improved mobility. One can access the applications from anywhere via smart phones, tablets or laptops."

Translation: Improved mobility. Businesses can mess up their accounts from anywhere via smart phones, tablets or laptops.

It's something I've pointed out before that I've seen examples of clients messing up stuff in cloudy accounts software, and I commented in the 'FFS' thread the other day that I'd put something in this thread, because I had a new example of the same thing again - which is now expanded slightly.

I have a client who uses a well known cloudy accounts package, which I'd class as a semi-irregular job - I might go a couple of months without receiving anything, then have a couple of months to do to bring things up to date. They emailed me last week to query why I was posting a particular regular payment twice, once with and once without VAT.

When I looked, I wasn't - I was posting it once correctly, without VAT, but the client was also posting it, with VAT. (The software makes it easy to see who posted the erroneous entry - as it should.)

And since then I spotted another, similar cock up. I'd posted two invoices from a supplier, and the client had input the payment for both - except they only matched the payment against one of the invoices, and then input an invoice to cover the balance. With the VAT incorrect.

If it was practical, I could go over the stuff with a fine tooth comb to spot stuff like this - because I'll bet there are plenty more mistakes. But it's not practical, because one of the so-called "benefits" for the client is that they can be more hands on and therefore pay me less - they don't want me to increase my bill by double checking their work.

THIS is what cloud software makes possible from anywhere via smart phones, tablets or laptops.

"-Document control and collabaration is also easy. -The most important point is security. Lost laptops are a billion dollar business problem."

Lost laptops will still be a problem, along with lost tablets and lost mobile phones. Cloud isn't going to change that. As for security, if a user allows their browser to keep active cookies, as well as their log-ins - which many do - then there is no benefit whatsoever.

Plus, what I said above about breaches.

Cheshire · Master Book-keeper

Well said Vince!

Dont you also just love the way clients play the blame game....without getting their bloody facts straight.

Princess · Senior Member

i have resisted the cloud for some time but have decided to embrace it. More and more clients have been requesting Xero and QuickBooks Online in recent months and it seems inevitable once Making Tax Digital comes in so I've started using QuickBooks Online and Xero. I have to say QuickBooks Online has improved quite a bit in the last few years. I'm not as much of a fan of Xero, but it's usable. They say they use the same security as online banking so hopefully it's as secure as it can be. Even with fibre broadband neither are particularly quick though.

It does concern me a bit that clients have to have a certain amount of access in order to view reports but as already mentioned there are reports to see what each user has done and I've asked mine not to do anything except set up invoices.

QuickBooks does a nice management reports thing which can be emailed out monthly. Xero does some nice sole trader annual accounts. I guess there are positives and negatives to all of these things.

I did ask QB what happens when a client stops paying. They said the client has reports only access for a year and if there is an investigation HMRC can have access for up to 6 years after the subscription is stopped.

Leger · Master Book-keeper

Princess wrote:
I did ask QB what happens when a client stops paying. They said the client has reports only access for a year and if there is an investigation HMRC can have access for up to 6 years after the subscription is stopped.

That's a definite positive. I haven't got any cloud clients but I'm not averse to taking it on should I be asked. I do the bookkeeping for all my clients bar two, so I will continue to use VT + until such time that I can't.

Your point is noted re slowness, that's a big downside imo, although I guess it would be the client doing the bookkeeping on the cloud.

Do you do submissions Princess? With Taxfiler there is an import facility for QB online, and wonder how good that is.

VinceH · Expert

"it seems inevitable once Making Tax Digital comes in"

And that my friends is how FUD works.

When MTD was first talked about the cloud-centric companies jumped on it and started suggesting their offerings would be necessary. Say it enough and it becomes a firm thought in the backs of people's minds, believed as though it were true, and then repeated by them to help cement the idea in other people's beliefs.

(No offence to you Princess - you are the victim here.)

teresa · Newbie

You can trust on Cloud because the second party who are the provider of this type hosting services they are very responsible and caring companies they never want to give any chance to a customer for feel unsatisfaction from their.
The << advertising removed >> is a company who provide best and more reliable Cloud hosting services for SMBs, you can trust this company for Cloud hosting.

-- Edited by Shamus on Wednesday 6th of December 2017 07:22:02 PM

Leger · Master Book-keeper

***Spammer Alert***

Shaun, I thought you had banned this shower of ****

Shamus · Forum Moderator & Expert

Hi Joanne,

soooo many bannings!!!!

Hope that you are well hun and thanks as always for drawing iot to my attention.

I'm actually adverse to deleting this one as the line " they are very responsible and caring companies" should be up for a comedy award!

Just got rid of all advertising links though. Don't want anyone accidentally believing any of the cloudy twaddle.

Laters
:)

Cheshire · Master Book-keeper

Hi Shaun
Well thanks, are you?

Missing you!!

Have to say - it was John who drew it to your attention on here (thats his big white beard on his avatar, mine's the cake, typically), but what John will not know is that I bounced you a PM early doors (whilst nursing a slight hangover!)

lol on your piccie by the way!

Agree about the comedy award - it gave me a giggle. Along with the unfinished sentence!