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Holiday Gadget Wishlist 2011
Wouldn’t it be nice to have a few extra hundred hours in a year that you could create to bill clients? We can’t promise that Santa Claus will grant you that wish, but we do have some gadget suggestions that can make the upcoming tax season more comfortable.
Here are a few gadgets to consider:
DisplayLink Field Monitors – These portable USB displays will soon be a standard accessory outside the office. Not only is setup a breeze, they also give you additional digital workspace to view documents without adding additional bulk.
iPad2/Facetime – Simple isn’t always easy and Apple has made video conferencing accessible to everyone- and their grandparents, too! Even though Facetime is not the only game in town, the ability to quickly wave goodnight to your kids at 8pm on April 15th will be well worth the investment. Not to mention that any technical questions can be answered at the Apple genius bar.
Ergonomic Keyboard – 
An ergonomic keyboard can potentially save you years of pain in the future. Depending on your area of practice, an accountant can spend just as much time typing on a keyboard as they spend in bed. The Microsoft Natural keyboard is inexpensive and only takes a short time to get comfortable with. Continue reading »
CPE Discount through Western CPE
Xcentric now offers a 20% discount through Western CPE, a registered continuing professional education provider. By using the Xcentric discount code (R88J), you will receive 20% off all Western CPE programs through October 15, 2012.
Instructions:
To browse Western CPE’s inventory of CPE products, go to www.westerncpe.com and select a link in the navigation bar on the left side of the screen. To purchase a product, click “Add to Cart”. When you are ready to purchase CPE products, click “View Cart” in the row of tabs along the top of the screen. Click on the grey “Enter Promotion Code” button at the bottom of the screen. Type the given promo code, R88J, in the box and click “Apply”. A 20% discount will be applied to all purchases based on prevailing rates. Please note: Shipping is not eligible for the discount. Continue reading »
Xcentric Store Blowout
Missed the Black Friday sales for your firm?
No problem. Xcentric has extended its sale with reduced prices in conjunction with the best practice specifications for your CPA computer needs. We have made these deals available to you for year-end planning and are here to help make your computer purchasing easier.
Four Computer Fits for Administrative, Bookkeepers, Auditors and Partners:
For administrative staff we recommend the OptiPlex 790 desktop:
Sale Price: $879.00 (originally $899.00) *
• Windows 7 Professional, 4GB RAM
• Video card supports 4 monitors
• 8X DVD+/-RW
For bookkeepers and staff accountants we recommend the Latitude E6420 laptop:
Sale Price: $1,239.00 (originally $1,299.00) *
• Intel Core i5 Processor
• ExpressCharge™ battery charges 80% in one hour
• Docking station compatible Continue reading »
Ready, Set, Go! – - – Not Ready, Set, Procrastinate!
For many years, CPA firm consultants have jokingly described the decision-making style of CPA firm leaders as “Ready, Aim…Aim…..Aim…. Aim…” It seems like they rarely get to “Fire!”
True story. One practitioner told me, when I inquired about his partner group’s decision-making style, “Oh, we don’t make any. Honest, we just let things happen. That’s why I am talking to you!”
Here is how the story often goes inside many firms. You have a great idea or you hear one at a MAP meeting or conference. Perhaps you read about something you want to try in a newsletter . At the next partner meeting, you introduce the idea to your partners. Everyone seems to like it and you discuss it at great length. The decision is to do more research and put it on next month’s agenda. This is usually repeated for several months (even years). Continue reading »
Digital Administrative Capture
Most firms have done a good job of using paperless tools to streamline audit and tax production, and integrated workflow tools are doing an amazing job of managing our clients’ digital files once they are in the firm’s systems. But is your firm taking advantage of all of today’s digital capture technology? Regardless of what format information takes when it enters your firm, there are tools that can capture it in an electronic format so it can be fast-tracked into your paperless workflows, particularly in your administrative department, which is often behind when it comes to paperless technology. This article will look at a number of tools and processes to optimize your firm’s digital capture.
Business Cards- Often the first contact with a prospective client ends with the exchange of business cards with scribbled notes for follow up. If you have a stack of these cards, CardScan Executive scanners will capture all of this information quickly into Outlook or into many of the popular customer relationship programs with optical character recognition (OCR). If you carry a smart phone you can also take a picture of that business card and send it to administration for immediate processing. There are even smart phone applications (Android and Apple devices, for example) that will take that photograph and run OCR to capture the data much the way the card scanner does. Continue reading »
Hot Potato- Who has it? QuickBooks file transfer between accountant and client
We have come a long way in the “humanization of technology,” from the scientific management stages at the turn of 20th century with the assembly line to now where technologies like Siri talk to us. This peaks the question: is your firm future ready? How is your firm streamlining processes by implementing innovative technologies? The best firms in the world are always tweaking their processes and making them better.
With that said, Xcentric is trying hard to find ways to improve how you interact with your clients’ needs. Currently, we’ve found there is no standardization of the process of exchanging QuickBooks files between accountant and client. Few have provided a solution to the industry’s need for a scalable, branded, intuitive technology. So, we took the process of small business accounting and asked, “How do CPAs interact with their clients as it relates to QuickBooks?” After a series of interviews with Xcentric Cloud clients here is what we found… Continue reading »
Hard Drive Shortage – Should Your Firm Worry?
Should your firm worry about the recent hard drive shortage? The answer, in short, is yes and no. Yes, you should be concerned and, no, you do not need to start hoarding hard drives as if the world will end tomorrow. Here are a few things you should keep in mind as you answer this question:
1. We are in a global economy – yes, even small firms! The way you do business has changed drastically, particularly in the last decade. Computers and the internet have become synonymous with business. Reliance on computers, particularly in the accounting industry, has increased ten fold. Your firm needs computers to conduct any kind of transaction, which means that without computers your firm cannot operate. Most large computer manufacturing companies that operate in the US receive portions of their computers from various worldwide distributors. Your computer is an example of a global economy.
2. 90% of hard drives are made in Thailand. Currently, Thailand ranks as the world’s second largest producer of Hard Disk Drives (HDD) . 4 out of 5 of the world’s largest manufacturers of HDD produce and export from their Thailand operations. So what does this mean for your firm? It means that if Thailand is unable to meet the demands for hard drives, the computers sitting in your office might become obsolete. Continue reading »
Replacing Your Computer: Where and How? Part 2
Recently, one of our firm’s partners, Howard Loomis, reached out to us with a series of questions concerning upgrading their desktops, laptops, and software. He identified 7 key goals: 1. Upgrade hardware 2. Upgrade operating system and productivity software 3. Incorporate ability to use 3+ monitors 4. Keep impact of change to all employees at a bare minimum 5. Train in advance to minimize disruption 6. Spend money wisely 7. Complete implementation by October 31, 2011. Xcentric understands that your time is valuable and we strive to meet these goals. We found this dialogue to be enlightening and wanted to make the Q&A session available to you as well.
Question: What desktops is Xcentric currently recommending and how should they be configured? (processor, processing speed, RAM, disk drives, CD/DVD/Blue Ray, graphics card, etc.)
Answer: The Dell 790 Small Form Factor with the Intel Core i3 processor, Windows 7 Professional 64-bit operating system, 4GB RAM, 8X DVD+/-RW, 2 x 512MB AMD Radeon HD 6350 video card (4 additional monitors), and 3-year Pro Support. Continue reading »
7 Must Do’s for Disaster Recovery Planning
When I began research on Disaster Recovery, I quickly found out that the topic is gigantic and that there are many paths that one could go down. This is one of those business areas that you can have a great depth of knowledge in, yet do nothing about due to its overwhelming nature. Few firms actually take the resources, time and money necessary to develop a requisite plan. Further, we know of a 40-person firm that incurred a disaster that cost them 5 days of downtime and $250k. Which is all to say that it’s important to try and understand the areas where your firm is most vulnerable and how to remedy them proactively. For this reason, I propose 7 Must Do’s for Disaster Recovery Planning to help you get started:
Set up phone redirect. Your telephone system is often your chief communication tool and crucial to the livelihood of your business. We recommend that you have your phone system set up to re-route calls via your Telco provider so that, in the event that your telephone system goes down, your phone lines can be redirected. In some cases, the phone service provider will have a web-based interface that allows temporary forwarding of your line(s). In other cases, you may have to call the provider to have them change it for you. Configuring a failover option ensures that your firm always has an operational line to make calls. Google Voice is another great web based option to ensure that your phone line is always accessible. Google Voice is essentially a call routing system that allows you to either forward the call to a cell phone or send the caller directly to voicemail. Google Voice messages are then transcribed and sent via SMS or email to your device of choice. Continue reading »
How can I best reduce my mailbox size?
Maintaining a small organized mailbox helps not only keep data storage costs down, but makes finding and referencing email messages more efficient.
In this article we’ll look at a few places that email piles up that you might not think about right away. We’ll also suggest a few ways to locate potentially unneeded email and email that is taking up the most space.
Checking the Size of Your Mailbox
- In Outlook 2003 or 2007, click on the Tools menu and select Mailbox Cleanup.
- Click the View Mailbox Size button.
- Locate the size to the right of the text that reads Total size (including subfolders).
- In Outlook 2010, click the File tab at the top of the window.
- Locate the size of your mailbox in Mailbox Cleanup section under the bar graph.
Where should I look first to clean out mail?
- The obvious first choice is the Deleted Items folder. Make sure that your Deleted Items folder is emptied regularly. As a business best practice, don’t get in the habit of using the Deleted Items folder as a holding pen for “just in case”. Continue reading »