Advantageous for Accountants

Cloud Technology Saves Time

The pressures on a professional accountant are significant and include everything from meeting tax deadlines to the routine frustrations of pursuing invoices. Technology has long been touted as a means of alleviating – or even eliminating – some of these pressures.

Research from Xero (conducted in collaboration with World Wide Worx) confirms this. In a survey of 230 industry professionals, it found that cloud-based software can save accountants up to three hours every day.

Let’s break down these benefits further.

Cloud vs Non-Cloud

When it comes to manual processes, 57% of cloud adopters spend less than an hour a day on tasks such as dataentry, meeting requests and reporting. By comparison, 79% of non-adopters spend up to three hours a day on such tasks.

Take something like chasing emails – an essential and time-consuming consideration that nonetheless occupies a great deal of mental and physical energy for accountants. Those who don’t use cloud technology are twice as likely to spend over an hour replying to and sending these messages every day.

It’s hardly the best use of their experience, qualifications, and skills, but it needs to be done nonetheless.

Cloudy With a Chance of Productivity

Three-quarters of accountants (75%) expressed their intention to migrate to the cloud. But more can be done to boost awareness and encourage adoption – especially as 16% of respondents have never heard of the technology, don’t intend to use it, and are suspicious of its security.

Cloud providers should therefore vigorously advocate for their services, because while the software might automate data entry or invoice chasing, the real benefits are in the time it saves and the resources it frees up. The less time spent in Microsoft Excel, the more time available for business development. The less time an accountant spends emailing, the more time they have for their families, or beachside fun. (20% of professionals said they’d use spare time for the former, while 14% said they’d use it for the latter.)

While cloud software might be about technical process-improvement in theory, in practice, it’s about freedom. Accountants shouldn’t wait around to take advantage of it.

Please visit www.xero.com/za for more information. /