Glen Stagg, Duesburys Gippsland
“Cashflow Manager is a Time Saver for Clients and for Us!”
Duesburys Gippland is a regional based accounting firm located in Sale, central Gippsland, Victoria.
Partner Glenn Stagg says, “We have a reasonable exposure in terms of business clients both in retail and in particular the farming community. We also have a sizeable client base of a salary and wage nature because the area has large employers”.
Within the practice there are a sizeable number of clients who use Cashflow Manager for their bookkeeping needs. Glenn reports that “the majority reconcile their own records”, and that “the remaining clients who don’t reconcile still present information in a reasonable format that is well compiled” which saves the firm a lot of time and unnecessary work.
Glenn is very happy with what the program achieves for both himself and his clients and states, “Most of the bookkeeping within it is very good. That’s why we promote the program”.
Glenn believes initially profiling the client and evaluating what their needs are is critical for success when recommending accounting software. “We qualify the client’s needs and abilities, and try to find a solution for their needs and our assessment of them”, says Glen.
Cashflow Manager has proven to be a successful teaching tool for Duesbury Gippsland’s clients as well as
Glenn used the program to demonstrate how the GST worked in 42 pre-GST seminars that the firm held back in 2000:
“Cashflow Manager gave us the solution when GST was introduced, as it was very easy for us to deal with as well as our clients.”
The firm has a number of staff who can train clients to use the software. “We generally give them a 30 minute tutorial to start off with and we have some regular contact people that they can talk to during the initial stages of using the program”.
Glenn says that Cashflow Manager has benefited his practice and his clients through the program’s sheer simplicity: “It has enabled us to deal with the GST implementation a lot more efficiently and educate our clients. It has also streamlined the process of getting the information across into our general ledger program for their annual compliance program as well.”
Glenn states, “It’s important to have a suite of software that suits your client’s needs”.
In response to those accounting firms who do not currently recommend Cashflow Manager, Glenn urges “You need to have a serious look at how your clients are dealing with the alternatives they are using. You need to have a look at whether you are just trying to provide the client with a solution that YOU feel comfortable dealing with, or one that the CLIENT feels comfortable dealing with”.
“’One size fits all’, in my opinion, is not the approach to dealing with computerized clients”, he says.
Glenn believes for his regional small business clients “Cashflow Manager is an ideal solution. It’s simple, understandable and efficient”.