Believe me, I've read more than a few excellent books on real estate investing and real estate law, But I am a better Gregory Yates lawyer and dirt guy as I was ten years ago, in practice, practice and more practice. Don't just replace experience. In The Period. If there was a quick and simple solution to how to do it, we all do it. You live, you learn, you move on to the next deal and (hopefully) better for you every time.Gregory Yates lawyer
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Sunday, October 20, 2013
How to win an election
How to win an election
Do know whether the decisions in the vicinity, you know that coconut shell moved. The streets are lined with flags and improvised mini political party offices, although the Parliament is not dissolved. Ang pow packets, free food, gifts, money, and keep, distributed almost daily. You have a cell phone has a few questions WINS, votes, or get you a text message (SMS). Not only a local politician (which I don't know) has a generic to me, I have even a birthday greetings for mother's day, though I do not come into consideration. Definitely similarities in ancient Roman letters suggest this tactic "How to win an election"?
Thursday, October 3, 2013
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Getting a Rein on Organizational Functions With The Expertise of a Virtual Controller
By
Shoni Priyanka
Staying on top of one's finances and working the way through
budgetary restraints and defined deadlines can be one of the most
daunting challenges for startup companies and other organizations. While
taking care of all the issues concerned with the nature of the
business, owners and management officials often find themselves at their
wits end as they go about controlling all the documentations connected
with financial transactions, banking formalities, accounting and
taxation procedures, budget planning and other conciliatory activities
which require time, energy and knowledge resources.
Under the circumstances, it certainly helps to have an external controller who takes over the responsibilities of managing the basic as well as advanced functions and processes and helping the organization work in smoother fashion.
Who exactly is a virtual controller and what is the periphery of his services and scope of work?
Well, if you do not want to employ a full time controller in house for reasons connected to finance restraints or work culture prevailing in the organization, you would consider going in for the services of a virtual controller- who works online and guides you by providing valuable management insight, customized and well prepared financial reports and value added services in the field of business decision making.
Some of the common ways in which an external expert can assist in controlling the different aspects and functionalities of your business organization are as follows:
• He is an experienced agent who can hold your hand and guide you through all the formalities of setting up your accounting system and package and set up the same as per your customized needs and requirements.
• As your business accounting procedures may go through certain changes after the employment of an external controlling firm or agent, they help the existing in house staff get used to the changes in the processes and also train them to use the same.
• If you already have a bookkeeper in house, then the controller co-ordinates the various processes of recoding and reporting financial transactions and makes sure that the work is done accurately and in a timely fashion. He also helps the bookkeeper in the event of any unprecedented problems or issues arising in the course of account management.
• They give adequate time to discuss the various ongoing and other pipelined projects and share their knowledge ad ideas on the department's profitability as well as the feasibility of the various activities going on in the organization.
• Apart from fixing the asset depreciation schedules for equipments, taking stock of all the assets and liabilities and keeping a close eye on the current purchases, accounts receivable and payable, a controller also helps in tax preparation and filing of returns.
• They go a long way in planning out the strategies, helping in the documentation of procedures and policies, assisting with mergers and acquisitions and planning solutions for various issues connected with any unprecedented events which may arise in the course of the business.
The services of a virtual controller are exhaustive and cover a wide gamut ranging from the basic to most advanced functions. Cost effective and highly experienced, they help businesses get a controller function without locking up any infrastructural and other in house resources.
Under the circumstances, it certainly helps to have an external controller who takes over the responsibilities of managing the basic as well as advanced functions and processes and helping the organization work in smoother fashion.
Who exactly is a virtual controller and what is the periphery of his services and scope of work?
Well, if you do not want to employ a full time controller in house for reasons connected to finance restraints or work culture prevailing in the organization, you would consider going in for the services of a virtual controller- who works online and guides you by providing valuable management insight, customized and well prepared financial reports and value added services in the field of business decision making.
Some of the common ways in which an external expert can assist in controlling the different aspects and functionalities of your business organization are as follows:
• He is an experienced agent who can hold your hand and guide you through all the formalities of setting up your accounting system and package and set up the same as per your customized needs and requirements.
• As your business accounting procedures may go through certain changes after the employment of an external controlling firm or agent, they help the existing in house staff get used to the changes in the processes and also train them to use the same.
• If you already have a bookkeeper in house, then the controller co-ordinates the various processes of recoding and reporting financial transactions and makes sure that the work is done accurately and in a timely fashion. He also helps the bookkeeper in the event of any unprecedented problems or issues arising in the course of account management.
• They give adequate time to discuss the various ongoing and other pipelined projects and share their knowledge ad ideas on the department's profitability as well as the feasibility of the various activities going on in the organization.
• Apart from fixing the asset depreciation schedules for equipments, taking stock of all the assets and liabilities and keeping a close eye on the current purchases, accounts receivable and payable, a controller also helps in tax preparation and filing of returns.
• They go a long way in planning out the strategies, helping in the documentation of procedures and policies, assisting with mergers and acquisitions and planning solutions for various issues connected with any unprecedented events which may arise in the course of the business.
The services of a virtual controller are exhaustive and cover a wide gamut ranging from the basic to most advanced functions. Cost effective and highly experienced, they help businesses get a controller function without locking up any infrastructural and other in house resources.
Keeping Your Suppliers Happy
By
Steve AH Lloyd
This article is written for the benefit of finance managers or anybody who has to manage a process of paying suppliers.
Purchase Ledger/Accounts Payable processing
Whatever IT system you use, there should be a mechanism in your company that ensures no invoice is cleared for payment unless the goods or services it covers have been properly ordered, delivered, and are charged at the correct price.
If you are going to keep your suppliers happy, you need to ensure that invoice processing happens as quickly as possible. Discuss with your staff a performance target that all purchase invoices should be cleared for payment within, say, 5 working days of receipt. (Don't just impose the target!)
Your staff will almost certainly tell you that for 85% of invoices this is no problem, but that there are some special cases that will make this impossible to achieve.
You need to review these special cases one at a time and eliminate the reasons for their slow processing. Typical reasons & responses include:
· The invoices need to be signed by a manager who is regularly out of the office.
o Set up a system of emailing scanned copies or summaries of the invoices for remote approval.
· The supplier's invoices rarely match with the orders.
o Talk to the people who raise the orders about amending their process to give more accurate information.
· The supplier's invoices are a mess and very difficult to interpret.
o Talk to the supplier about improving their layout or providing additional information. If this doesn't work, talk to your buyer about finding a different supplier, using the argument that there are high hidden costs with poor invoicing.
You need to adopt a continuous improvement approach, always looking for new ways to streamline your processes.
Supplier chasing and payment runs
Your objective in organising payment runs is to keep to a minimum the chasing calls & letters that you receive from suppliers. These are an annoying distraction, adding nothing to your company's profitability & impairing your department's efficiency.
If your suppliers know with confidence when you will pay them, they won't bother to call. The sort of statement you want to make to them is:
"We clear all purchase invoices within 5 working days of receipt. We make a (weekly/fortnightly/monthly) payment run so that money is in the bank on a Friday for all invoices cleared by the previous Tuesday. We would prefer it if you didn't telephone us unless you feel we are not meeting these commitments.
You could improve the speed of clearance of your invoices by (providing a geographic breakdown, subtotalling by project, or whatever other improvement is required.)"
If you are able to make those statements and stick to them, you should see a reduction in interruptions from phone calls.
Building Relationships
Internally
Quite commonly, the only time you will deal with certain managers in your company is when their suppliers have put them on stop & they are unable to continue with operations. They are frustrated and angry, blame you, and expect you to resolve the problem at once.
Surprisingly often, the problem is caused by the complaining manager who hasn't raised an order or signed off an invoice.
These situations do need to be dealt with urgently, as the company's operations have to continue. But it is far better to prevent them from arising in the first place.
You need to make it clear to everyone involved in ordering goods or services that they must adhere to procedures for raising and signing off documents. If they don't do so, you can't pay the supplier, who will put you on stop. A few examples of this happening can help to re-inforce the point.
Externally
If a supplier has put you on stop, they will probably take a firm line with your buyer. However, if you can get through to someone in their finance department, you can often persuade them to take you off stop if you give some undertakings to pay them soon. However, if you don't keep to your undertakings, then this will only work once.
If you have a particular supplier who represents a high proportion of your purchases or whose invoices cause you severe difficulties, a face-to-face meeting with your opposite number is a good idea. This person will have exactly the same problems as you do and will appreciate a common approach to improvements. You may also be able to make a deal whereby you delay payments at your year end, while advancing payments at their year end, if they are at different dates.
Not enough cash?
The process of paying all cleared invoices on a regular basis works well if you have money in the bank. But not every company has the means to do this.
As a professional person, you will always behave ethically. If your company has entered into a contract with a supplier to pay on certain terms, this should be honoured. You will never make a dishonest statement to a supplier that they will be paid on a certain date when you know this is not true. Far better to be open and say to the supplier that you won't be able to pay them until a given date. You may be able to negotiate longer payment terms with some suppliers.
On the other hand, it is commonly understood, if not accepted, that payment periods sometimes slip. You also have a responsibility to your company to ensure that it maximises its cash flow and stays within its banking facilities.
How do you resolve this dilemma? Only you can decide what is the right action to take in any given circumstance. Ultimately if your company is under-capitalised or unprofitable the Board needs to tackle this issue rather than expecting you to finesse it by juggling payments to suppliers.
Conclusion
For many finance departments, purchase ledger and supplier payment represents the biggest single use of manpower. By using the ideas in this guide, you can minimise this use of resources, improve your cash flow & cut down on interruptions from discontented suppliers or buyers.
Key Points
Steve Lloyd qualified as a Chartered Accountant. He has
experience as a Finance Director of running the finances of a wide
variety of organisations. He believes that the discipline of financial
management is essential to any business but is insufficiently
understood.Purchase Ledger/Accounts Payable processing
Whatever IT system you use, there should be a mechanism in your company that ensures no invoice is cleared for payment unless the goods or services it covers have been properly ordered, delivered, and are charged at the correct price.
If you are going to keep your suppliers happy, you need to ensure that invoice processing happens as quickly as possible. Discuss with your staff a performance target that all purchase invoices should be cleared for payment within, say, 5 working days of receipt. (Don't just impose the target!)
Your staff will almost certainly tell you that for 85% of invoices this is no problem, but that there are some special cases that will make this impossible to achieve.
You need to review these special cases one at a time and eliminate the reasons for their slow processing. Typical reasons & responses include:
· The invoices need to be signed by a manager who is regularly out of the office.
o Set up a system of emailing scanned copies or summaries of the invoices for remote approval.
· The supplier's invoices rarely match with the orders.
o Talk to the people who raise the orders about amending their process to give more accurate information.
· The supplier's invoices are a mess and very difficult to interpret.
o Talk to the supplier about improving their layout or providing additional information. If this doesn't work, talk to your buyer about finding a different supplier, using the argument that there are high hidden costs with poor invoicing.
You need to adopt a continuous improvement approach, always looking for new ways to streamline your processes.
Supplier chasing and payment runs
Your objective in organising payment runs is to keep to a minimum the chasing calls & letters that you receive from suppliers. These are an annoying distraction, adding nothing to your company's profitability & impairing your department's efficiency.
If your suppliers know with confidence when you will pay them, they won't bother to call. The sort of statement you want to make to them is:
"We clear all purchase invoices within 5 working days of receipt. We make a (weekly/fortnightly/monthly) payment run so that money is in the bank on a Friday for all invoices cleared by the previous Tuesday. We would prefer it if you didn't telephone us unless you feel we are not meeting these commitments.
You could improve the speed of clearance of your invoices by (providing a geographic breakdown, subtotalling by project, or whatever other improvement is required.)"
If you are able to make those statements and stick to them, you should see a reduction in interruptions from phone calls.
Building Relationships
Internally
Quite commonly, the only time you will deal with certain managers in your company is when their suppliers have put them on stop & they are unable to continue with operations. They are frustrated and angry, blame you, and expect you to resolve the problem at once.
Surprisingly often, the problem is caused by the complaining manager who hasn't raised an order or signed off an invoice.
These situations do need to be dealt with urgently, as the company's operations have to continue. But it is far better to prevent them from arising in the first place.
You need to make it clear to everyone involved in ordering goods or services that they must adhere to procedures for raising and signing off documents. If they don't do so, you can't pay the supplier, who will put you on stop. A few examples of this happening can help to re-inforce the point.
Externally
If a supplier has put you on stop, they will probably take a firm line with your buyer. However, if you can get through to someone in their finance department, you can often persuade them to take you off stop if you give some undertakings to pay them soon. However, if you don't keep to your undertakings, then this will only work once.
If you have a particular supplier who represents a high proportion of your purchases or whose invoices cause you severe difficulties, a face-to-face meeting with your opposite number is a good idea. This person will have exactly the same problems as you do and will appreciate a common approach to improvements. You may also be able to make a deal whereby you delay payments at your year end, while advancing payments at their year end, if they are at different dates.
Not enough cash?
The process of paying all cleared invoices on a regular basis works well if you have money in the bank. But not every company has the means to do this.
As a professional person, you will always behave ethically. If your company has entered into a contract with a supplier to pay on certain terms, this should be honoured. You will never make a dishonest statement to a supplier that they will be paid on a certain date when you know this is not true. Far better to be open and say to the supplier that you won't be able to pay them until a given date. You may be able to negotiate longer payment terms with some suppliers.
On the other hand, it is commonly understood, if not accepted, that payment periods sometimes slip. You also have a responsibility to your company to ensure that it maximises its cash flow and stays within its banking facilities.
How do you resolve this dilemma? Only you can decide what is the right action to take in any given circumstance. Ultimately if your company is under-capitalised or unprofitable the Board needs to tackle this issue rather than expecting you to finesse it by juggling payments to suppliers.
Conclusion
For many finance departments, purchase ledger and supplier payment represents the biggest single use of manpower. By using the ideas in this guide, you can minimise this use of resources, improve your cash flow & cut down on interruptions from discontented suppliers or buyers.
Key Points
- Work on your systems to ensure they are as efficient as possible
- Target a reduction in phone calls received from suppliers chasing money
- Build relationships internally and externally
- You may still have to delay payments, but don't compromise your ethical standards
Steve leads the Prospero network of Finance Directors, supporting businesses on an on-demand basis. The part time finance director service is a brilliant solution for businesses that need expert financial management, but don't need a full time person.
He is based in Solihull in the UK.
Best Ways of Managing Your Accounts
By
Victor Abrahan
With the increasing number of entrepreneurs setting up businesses
in each sector, the need to manage your income and expenses plays an
important role towards ensuring business financial stability as well as
payment of taxes. It's a requirement that each person must provide
proper information linked to their income and expenses so taxes can be
applied accordingly to calculate profits and taxes. To help you ensure
financial accounting goes smoothly, it's important to follow these tips:Plan as many expenses as possible
As a business establishes itself you will notice you are able to predict certain recurring expenses such as electricity and water bills, employee wages, fuel expenses and raw material costs. All these expenses require to be planned ahead to determine your average monthly expenses. By having these expenses in mind, you are able to keep proper track of expenses as well as be more accountable of the expenses each month.
Track each and every expense
Bookkeeping companies will always instruct you to open a small account book to note down your daily expenses and income. The expenses are usually tracked using official receipts which must be acquired on payment of bills and other expenses. These will act as proof of expenses and will also be used to weigh the amount of income verses the expenses to determine the amount of profit being generated, thus helping establish the amount of tax that requires to be paid.
Pay your due in taxes
Taxes can result in cutting down your profits but the fact of the matter is that the taxes are very important to help the government maintenance the country. It's only fair you pay your tax dues to ensure the government is capable of providing the required utilities to the public. Avoid money laundering schemes since they are bound to be tracked over time resulting in additional losses. Many small business accounting firms today will avoid running these scams as they only lead to further complications and could result in the accountant firm's license being cancelled if proven guilty.
Loan can be borrowed based on bookkeeping and tax return payment
Today when you visit a bank to borrow a loan, you will be asked for your tax return as these tax returns are a proof that you are a registered tax payer who is liable to borrow loans. The amount you save or pay tax doesn't matter but having the Bookkeeping service file your tax returns definitely helps improve your chances of securing loans.
Excel Spreadsheets - Do They Still Have a Place in The Finance Department?
By
Sadie Hawkins
From Excel to excellence for the month-end close reconciliation process.
As a financial accounting professional, it is almost certain you will have been using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets during the month end close process. It is also extremely likely you will have experienced problems with them too!
Over the last thirty-odd years, spreadsheets have become a mainstay in finance departments, used for all sorts of tasks, from reconciliation to reporting and everything in between. Despite their popularity with finance staff, they still pose a massive margin for error. The expected error rate when reconciling with spreadsheets is 0.8-1.8% and though this may seem small, for a company with a $1m turnover this represents a risk of $80,000-$180,000.
What's more, the damage done can also affect public perception and trust in your brand, leading to less tangible but just as dangerous losses.
Is it possible to move away from spreadsheets?
For smaller businesses, the number of accounts needing to be reconciled is relatively small, so it makes sense for smaller businesses to continue using a combination of spreadsheets and QuickBooks. In turn, the team that manages the financial close process will also be relatively small, perhaps just one or two finance staff, so there is also less room for data handling errors.
However, as the number of accounts to reconcile grows and the team managing your monthly close process is expanded, errors can easily worm their way in to the reconciliation process. Once a business has grown, it makes sense to move away from Excel spreadsheets and QuickBooks, particularly for tasks like reconciling. At its capacity, the finance department of a large organisation can generate up to five hundred spreadsheets a month - so it's easy to see how errors and duplications can creep in.
Will the finance department ever rid themselves of Excel spreadsheets completely?
It seems unlikely that Excel spreadsheets will disappear from the finance department completely; admittedly, they are still a really useful tool for auditing, even for very large businesses (of 1,000+ headcounts) and they will probably remain the go-to program of choice for creating graphs and charts.
However, businesses that are managing to grow and are serious about both productivity and regulatory compliance will likely move their reconciliation and monthly close process to specialist programs, as opposed to makeshift spreadsheets. Especially as the need for advanced reporting and intuitive financial analysis expands beyond the capabilities of Excel.
As a financial accounting professional, it is almost certain you will have been using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets during the month end close process. It is also extremely likely you will have experienced problems with them too!
Over the last thirty-odd years, spreadsheets have become a mainstay in finance departments, used for all sorts of tasks, from reconciliation to reporting and everything in between. Despite their popularity with finance staff, they still pose a massive margin for error. The expected error rate when reconciling with spreadsheets is 0.8-1.8% and though this may seem small, for a company with a $1m turnover this represents a risk of $80,000-$180,000.
What's more, the damage done can also affect public perception and trust in your brand, leading to less tangible but just as dangerous losses.
Is it possible to move away from spreadsheets?
For smaller businesses, the number of accounts needing to be reconciled is relatively small, so it makes sense for smaller businesses to continue using a combination of spreadsheets and QuickBooks. In turn, the team that manages the financial close process will also be relatively small, perhaps just one or two finance staff, so there is also less room for data handling errors.
However, as the number of accounts to reconcile grows and the team managing your monthly close process is expanded, errors can easily worm their way in to the reconciliation process. Once a business has grown, it makes sense to move away from Excel spreadsheets and QuickBooks, particularly for tasks like reconciling. At its capacity, the finance department of a large organisation can generate up to five hundred spreadsheets a month - so it's easy to see how errors and duplications can creep in.
Will the finance department ever rid themselves of Excel spreadsheets completely?
It seems unlikely that Excel spreadsheets will disappear from the finance department completely; admittedly, they are still a really useful tool for auditing, even for very large businesses (of 1,000+ headcounts) and they will probably remain the go-to program of choice for creating graphs and charts.
However, businesses that are managing to grow and are serious about both productivity and regulatory compliance will likely move their reconciliation and monthly close process to specialist programs, as opposed to makeshift spreadsheets. Especially as the need for advanced reporting and intuitive financial analysis expands beyond the capabilities of Excel.
What Is Ostendo for MYOB, Quickbooks and Xero?
By
Cameron Gill
MYOB, Quickbooks and Xero are great accounting tools as in they
provide the necessary transactional processing and taxation reporting -
however they typically only address the financial requirements of a
business where on the other hand the operational requirements of a
business are often handled in separate applications such as spreadsheets
and other databases.
What businesses really want is the centralised management of business data, both financial and operational - for example, most businesses with multiple sales staff find that each sales resource has a different quoting method and they store their quotes as emails or text documents and then once a week may put these into a CRM for the sales meeting. From here a sale may not come off, however that contact or lead remains the 'property' of the sales person for following up. The issue here is that management find it very hard to forecast sales accurately and more importantly measure performance of sales staff and marketing campaigns. With Ostendo, the sales person can maintain their quoting format (and bring in into Ostendo as a reporting output) however they enter the client and quote details into the system once only and then should the sale proceed there is no double/triple handling of data as it simply flows through the sales workflow to invoice/picking and follow-up tasks created.
Ostendo is an application that bolts onto MYOB, Quickbooks and Xero that offers the following inbuilt components;
JOB COSTING (projects)
- job quotes
- job templates
- work in progress reporting
- job profitability reporting
- timesheets to jobs
- job calendar / schedule
MANUFACTURING
- kits, bill of materials
- production orders
- capacity planning
- custom products
CRM
- lead tracking
- Outlook integration
- Operations Centre for account management
- workflow
- timeline
- next action / tasks
Advanced Stock Control
- serialisation, batches
- multiple stock locations & warehouses
- consignment stock
- colour / size / style
- importing & landed cost management
- multi-currency
- pricing rules (quantity, promotional, contract, discounts)
- rentals & hirings
Call Centre & Servicing
- service jobs
- customer asset tracking
- service level agreements
- service history
- call logging, task tracking, knowledge base
Reporting & Technical Utilities
- web services for Ipad access (timesheets, quotes, lookups, meter readings... )
- script scheduling
- graphical process workflows
- inbuilt report writer
- SQL query tool
Point of Sale
- postcode tracking
- sale parking
- barcode scanning
- laybys
- vouchers
- till drawer commands, end of day...
As Ostendo is an add-on, you keep paying creditors, producing BAS statements, paying wages and managing your general ledger through your accounting system, however all else is handled within Ostendo.
About The Admin Manager: The Admin Manager is a team of Ostendo
implementers, bookkeepers and accountants that know Ostendo, MYOB,
Quickbooks & Xero inside-out and specialise in administrative
solutions for Australian small to medium sized businesses. Feel free to
call the team on 1300 1ADMIN to discuss your requirements and to see if
we can help you ease the burden of your business administration and
accounting software systems.
What businesses really want is the centralised management of business data, both financial and operational - for example, most businesses with multiple sales staff find that each sales resource has a different quoting method and they store their quotes as emails or text documents and then once a week may put these into a CRM for the sales meeting. From here a sale may not come off, however that contact or lead remains the 'property' of the sales person for following up. The issue here is that management find it very hard to forecast sales accurately and more importantly measure performance of sales staff and marketing campaigns. With Ostendo, the sales person can maintain their quoting format (and bring in into Ostendo as a reporting output) however they enter the client and quote details into the system once only and then should the sale proceed there is no double/triple handling of data as it simply flows through the sales workflow to invoice/picking and follow-up tasks created.
Ostendo is an application that bolts onto MYOB, Quickbooks and Xero that offers the following inbuilt components;
JOB COSTING (projects)
- job quotes
- job templates
- work in progress reporting
- job profitability reporting
- timesheets to jobs
- job calendar / schedule
MANUFACTURING
- kits, bill of materials
- production orders
- capacity planning
- custom products
CRM
- lead tracking
- Outlook integration
- Operations Centre for account management
- workflow
- timeline
- next action / tasks
Advanced Stock Control
- serialisation, batches
- multiple stock locations & warehouses
- consignment stock
- colour / size / style
- importing & landed cost management
- multi-currency
- pricing rules (quantity, promotional, contract, discounts)
- rentals & hirings
Call Centre & Servicing
- service jobs
- customer asset tracking
- service level agreements
- service history
- call logging, task tracking, knowledge base
Reporting & Technical Utilities
- web services for Ipad access (timesheets, quotes, lookups, meter readings... )
- script scheduling
- graphical process workflows
- inbuilt report writer
- SQL query tool
Point of Sale
- postcode tracking
- sale parking
- barcode scanning
- laybys
- vouchers
- till drawer commands, end of day...
As Ostendo is an add-on, you keep paying creditors, producing BAS statements, paying wages and managing your general ledger through your accounting system, however all else is handled within Ostendo.
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