Increase in fuel prices, will it affect your drive to success?

What effect has the increase in fuel duty had on businesses, bookkeepers and accountants?

Fuel duty was meant to rise by 3p a litre on the 1st April 2010, but Chancellor Alistair Darling decided to phase in the rise instead with a further 1p rise in October and then again in January. A year ago, fuel at the pumps was about 30p a litre cheaper. But it has risen steadily since then and has now reached a record high.

So how has this affected business?

As we know many businesses outsource their bookkeeping and accounting tasks to professionals within the industry. So what are the consequences of this fuel increase to those that provide a bookkeeping service to businesses?

In most cases businesses that have purchased off the shelf (desktop) accounting software will have installed this accounting software to a computer within their office. For the bookkeeper to have access to the clients data they will usually have to work onsite at the clients premises. In some cases the client may only be a 5 min drive from the bookkeeper however in some cases it may be closer to a one hour journey. If we calculate the cost of the fuel for each of these journeys not to mention the time lost in travelling which could be spent more productively doing other things, how much do we reckon it would cost and more importantly who is paying for this cost.

If a bookkeeper was able to access a client’s data anytime and from any location without having to travel would this not be great. Well as it turns out they can. Fusion Accounts is a web-based bookkeeping and accounting system that enables a business and their trusted advisors to access their data real-time via the internet. This means the bookkeeper can work remotely from their own business premises yet still providing real-time support to their clients. In reducing the cost of travelling this should in turn mean that the bookkeeper can offer their clients more competitive pricing.

As Fusion also provides multi-user access it means that more than one user can access the data simultaneously. So rather than the business having to post invoices or receipts to the bookkeeper, the business can go online and generate invoices and do the simple tasks leaving the bookkeeper to the more complex tasks such as VAT, etc. Online accounting is a win win situation for all.

For more information visit http://www.fusionaccounts.com