Cloud accounting in the next generation of record keeping technology, which has proven to be a more efficient and innovative way to monitor and follow the financial performance of a business. It is simply using the Internet to access accounting software rather than physically installing it on a computer. Depending on your software, you might install it on your computer but it runs on servers and you can access it using your Internet connection. In other cases, you won’t need to install the software on your computer and you can simply access it via web browsers. It can be accessed via your computer or any smart device (tablets, iPads, iPhones etc.) at any time.
There are a number of benefits relating to cloud based accounting software:
- The most impressive being the ability of cloud services to pull data directly from financial institutions. This eliminates the time spent on data entry and makes reconciling a breeze. Not only can the data entry time be reduced, but transactions with a similar reference can be memorised to be automatically coded.
- Businesses no longer need expensive computer hardware to store and manage their data;
- Information can be updated and accessed from any computer anywhere in the world;
- Eliminates the need for backing up files and using CD’s/USB’s to give data to your Accountant. As there is only one ledger kept and that is the file in the cloud, it improves the accuracy of the information which minimises errors at BAS and tax time;
- A monthly fee is paid instead of purchasing the software upfront and no annual subscriptions are required;
- The software is automatically updated by the provider which makes it easier for the business, especially when tax or payroll changes occur.
Some of the more popular service providers include:
(old Quickbooks)
(new QuickBooks)
