The past 18 months have changed how we live and work. But they have also brought words into everyday use – words such as ‘lockdown’, ‘tier’ and of course, ‘pandemic’. Now as Covid-19 is contained more by vaccines, another phrase is being heard more and more – the ‘new normal’.
When the pandemic hit the UK, many office employees moved to home working, many for a long period. While some people who live in cities, house shares or who are at the start of their career may not welcome this, many employees have greeted this change as a chance to boost their work-life balance.
The Times reported in February 2021 that a survey found that half of employees say that they would look for a new job if their bosses do not allow flexible working. Many companies have now adopted flexible working, even in more traditional sectors such as financial services. The media has reported on each of the Big 4 audit firms moving to a hybrid model with a split between office and home working.
Covid-19 has also led to changes in how we do business with technology. The obvious is clear – the use of videoconferencing tools such as Teams and Zoom has boomed. But it is also an opportunity for cloud accounting too, and that is where FoxKash can support businesses to work more effectively than before in the ‘new normal’.
How can cloud accounting support the new normal?
Cloud accounting can support flexible working by ensuring that wherever your team is based, you can all access the information you need quickly and effectively. By making data accessible to everyone, a company can have a quick overview of its financial position.
With the economic uncertainty and the ever-evolving Government fiscal response, real-time data has become more critical. Cloud accounting can deliver this with a live scoreboard on a company’s financial position – for example, a running total on forecast VAT payments. This can aid cashflow management.
It is also a chance to introduce new processes. With cloud accounting, some processes, such as debt management, can be automated. Rather than rely on manually sending emails or time-consuming phone calls to manage debt, cloud accounting can automate emails to do this. It is, therefore, a chance to boost your company’s efficiency.
As part of this efficiency drive, it can allocate tasks to various people to ensure that the system does not rely on any one single person to authorise payments, for example. It can spread the workload across a team intelligently and reduce the burden on a person.
How can cloud accounting support business as usual changes?
The pandemic has accelerated existing trends in areas such as online food shopping and the decline of the high street. The same is true of cloud accounting.
Over the past few years, people have wanted to focus on their business’s strategy and operations to boost profitability rather than spend time on back-office tasks. Cloud accounting can facilitate this by automating processes to give you more time to focus on building your business.
As software has developed in many areas – such as phones and computers, its interfaces have become easier to use, and its data more secure. This is also the case for cloud accounting. Similarly, the training that supports this enables users to take advantage of its functionalities more effectively. FoxKash can support this.
How can we help?
FoxKash offers cloud accounting and bookkeeping support for busy business owners – FoxKash is an independent service from Foxley Kingham designed to give our clients expert online bookkeeping support. Sitting alongside our established offering, FoxKash is a standalone business with its own fee structure that offers expert online accounting at an affordable price.
Get in touch today to speak to our experts.