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Technological change stops for no one

October 5, 2016
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Technological change stops for no one


As the Party Conference Season passes (again) I wonder what the future will hold for us all.  The level of uncertainty seems to be higher that before.  The Labour Party seem in turmoil, the Lib Dems (who they? Ed) seem invisible and the Conservatives have a difficult time ahead to please everyone (and probably satisfy no-one) with the Brexit negotiations.

The new Chancellor will make his Autumn Statement soon.  A change in emphasis has been signalled, less focussed on Austerity, possibly more focused on flexibility.  No doubt tax will get more complicated under the banner of “simplification”.  Nice piece of double-speak there methinks.

We also face technological changes.  HMRC’s “Making Tax Digital” will push huge changes on the compliance of individuals, changing a lot of what we do.  This follows on from the payroll Real Time Information filings, the online P11D filings, the iXBRL corporation tax filings, etc……

Our role as accountants will change to be IT specialists, supporting our clients not only on the complex tax rules, but the change process for compliance.  At Barnes Roffe LLP we invest a lot of time in looking into such matters.  We have in-house experts on online accounting and automated invoice processing systems.  We help clients integrate their banking into their software.  We seek to assist clients talk about process improvement.  In some cases, the work done by our clients will qualify for additional Research & Development tax relief, so often our role can be twice as effective!

I will spend a day next month at the Wolters Kluwer “Tomorrow’s World Today” conference, exploring the new possibilities.  We have already introduced secure document exchange via online portal, we have large file send and receive for emails with large data files attached, we have Dropbox an OneDrive capabilities and remote control support can be offered.  Please do let me have any thoughts about what could serve you, our clients, best.

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