How to choose small business software: the latest offerings

SAGE

This year sees Sage Accountants’ Division continue to put much effort and investment into the Sage Practice Suite, focusing on compliance, usability and integration.

Compliance is a focal point at present for both tax and accounts production. Sage has introduced the new Taxation Suite for 2009 and is actively working on compliance changes in accounts production including requirements for IFRS and XBRL.

Sage continues to work closely with HMRC and Companies House to ensure that their software solutions provide validated and compliant outputs.

Additionally, as more practitioners move to online filing for the first time, Sage has launched Sage Instant Taxation, which aims to enable practices with up to 100 clients to complete and electronically file all SA100 tax returns – dramatically reducing errors and ensuring consistent filing.

Later in the year, Sage will launch an updated practice solution, which will include new features in response to customer demand for improved reporting functionality. Also responding to changes in the market, Sage will be introducing a highly functional and user friendly group consolidation module as part of Sage Accounts Production Advanced. This module will use up to date technologies which will become more prevalent in future iterations of all of Practice Suite modules. Furthermore, Sage will continue to enhance integration between all of the Practice Suite modules and also the Sage 50 Suite, enabling accountants to work closely with their clients and their data.

sage.co.uk/accountants_in_practice.aspx

IRIS

As part of the continuous enhancement programme, Iris has recently launched a staff planning system that is designed to maximise resources through the automation of the management and planning of practice workloads, a search facility for due diligence compliance with the Money Laundering Regulations and outsourced services for bookkeeping, final accounts, payroll and VAT.

Iris also offers a professional tax advisory service from UK renowned tax experts.

A deep understanding of customer’ needs gained over a thirty year period is at the heart of the Iris business along with a passion to deliver the highest standards of software and service directly to the accountant. Top ratings secured in surveys conducted by the ICAEW and numerous industry awards bear testament to this commitment.

Iris is committed to providing solutions that help achieve best practice and improve efficiency for all sizes and types of practice.

Our award-winning range includes standalone products as well as a fully integrated suite under the PTP, Drummohr and IRIS brands.

The latest statistics show that a massive 1.75m tax returns were filed online
using Iris tax solutions in the run up to 31 January 2008 compared with just 1.98m across all other software houses.

iris.co.uk/practice ;
ptpsoftware.co.uk ;
drummohr.com

DIGITA

‘With over 60% of our staff working in software development, which is unprecedented in this industry, we have been able to introduced 180 new features into our range of tax and accounting software in 2008,’ says Digita MD Jerry Rihll.

On average, seven firms joined Digita each week in 2008, a 30% increase on 2007, and we retained over 98% of our existing customers.

We introduced support for LLPs in our accounts production and will support charities and pensions this year. Our practice management suite continues to grow with the addition of time and fees and dashboards.

In corporation tax we introduced support for group relief and this year will see the introduction of support for chargeable gains calculations and the implementation of the ‘Active View’ technology, which will provide a richer user interface with quicker access to dialogs and useful additional features.

Our personal tax software extended the support for partnerships and support for clients whose affairs involve overseas aspects. This year we will improve tax return workflow for compliance and support the filing of prior year’s returns, multiple submissions where amendments are required, and implementing support for the 2009 ‘specials and exclusions’ published by HMRC and extended calculation functionality to allow the vast majority of capital gains calculations to be performed without the need for any external calculations.

‘When you’re not number one, you try harder. You work more hours. You worry more. So at Digita, we’ve have been working incredibly hard because when you’re not number one you have to. By developing great software. By providing the best customer service. By providing the best value.’

www.digita.com/pro

CCH

CCH software was strengthened by the acquisition in 2008 of MYOB UK Accountants Division, bringing together the expertise of the two businesses.

CCH now provides enhanced software and services, covering tax, audit, accounts production, insolvency, practice management and document management.

Its practice management and compliance software is available through the CCH ProSystem suite of products.

This is a range of business efficiency tools that helps accountants improve their workflow and offer enhanced services to their clients, providing alerts, exception management and workflow, including help with marketing their services via campaign management.

CCH is investing in CCH Central, which allows users to simplify the way they extract the information they want from the ProSystem suite, combining it and formatting it in the way they need. CCH Central integrates accounting software tools with up-to-the-minute data, using the latest .NET technology platforms, delivered in a personalised screen format.

As well as providing innovative tools on the latest .NET technology platforms, the most important thing for CCH is to deliver resilient and timely releases that are fit for purpose.

CCH provides software and services to more than 3,000 professional firms. A full range of compliance and practice management software is offered to smaller entrepreneurial firms as well as larger practices.

cch.co.uk/software