Software to Manage Practices Clients Deadlines etc

dewsbury

Hi,

Is there any good software around that assists small and medium practices in managing their clients contact details and in particular financial deadlines etc. (i.e. year end, VAT returns etc).

What price is the software?
What is the good or bad about it?


Thanks

Jim2007

dewsbury wrote: »

Hi,

Is there any good software around that assists small and medium practices in managing their clients contact details and in particular financial deadlines etc. (i.e. year end, VAT returns etc).

What price is the software?
What is the good or bad about it?


Thanks

Have a look at this

Herbalist

Sage Practice Solutions may be a potential option for you. It will allow you to track client's contact details, to record time against client accounts and to track their financial deadlines. You can manage your own diary within the software and set yourself reminders too.

Other options in the marketplace for you could be Relate's Drive software or Viztopia's practice solution.

seco

try "tasks" and "contacts" in MS Office. Works well for tracking all deadlines and contacts over a network but take a while to setup. Against that any programme will require time to populate the information. Sage CRM might be another option. They were doing a deal including database and time & fees up to end of September last where the only cost was the maintenance agreement - ie no up front capital cost for the programme. We took up this option but deferred installation until early next year. Maybe worth a call.

DoMyBooks

I researched the packages above and I believe their overpriced and outdated.

We use Google apps with Zoho CRM and Toggl for time tracking. If a prospect emails me I can set up the lead in Zoho from inside the Google mail screen. The whole thing is online so I can access anywhere and it can be had completely free depending on the size of your business.

Hope this helps

Jim2007

DoMyBooks wrote: »

We use Google apps with Zoho CRM and Toggl for time tracking.

Out of interest how do you ensure that you are in full compliance with the data protection legislation, I'm thinking in particular about data storage and how to ensure that it remains in the jurisdiction...

Jim

DoMyBooks

We resell a cloud accountancy package and in the 100 times I've pitched it no one has ever asked me that. Any SAAS/ Cloud vendor targeting the EU should be well used to the Data protection act.

The data can leave the EEA subject to certain conditions. I have correspondence with the vendors on file here to ensure were were complaint.

Have a read
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2003/en/act/pub/0006/sec0012.html

Jim2007

DoMyBooks wrote: »

We resell a cloud accountancy package and in the 100 times I've pitched it no one has ever asked me that. Any SAAS/ Cloud vendor targeting the EU should be well used to the Data protection act.

The data can leave the EEA subject to certain conditions. I have correspondence with the vendors on file here to ensure were were complaint.

Have a read
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2003/en/act/pub/0006/sec0012.html

Oh, I'm very well aware of the legal issues involved, as I have been involved in this are for some time now on behalf of a major European company. And while there is not doubt that cloud computing offers great advantages to a business, I have yet to read a legal opinion that suggest that it is compatible with EU data protection laws. The key to it all is the fact that you do not have physical control of the data once saved and thus you are not in a position to confirm compliance with the rules, nor to take action when the rules are breached since you will not know about it.

My expectation is that while cloud computing techniques will flourish in the coming years it will be mainly on private networks operated by major corporations, rather than some kind of global public network.


It will be interesting to see what happens next year when the US starts to enforce compliance with EU data protection rules in the US. This is a precondition to being granted access to EU data and the Americans are committed to implementing it, starting next year......

Jim.

DoMyBooks

Hi Jim,

Theres some very large companies based in the EU using full cloud applications particularly Salesforce and Netsuite. (Not just on private networks). I expect they would disagree with you. Salesforce recently showed revenues of $1.6billion.

The Irish government (for what their worth) are supporting a number of SAAS providers. It would be foolhardy in the extreme for semi state bodies to support businesses engaged in an activity which is potentially breaking data protection laws.

IF you were correct in your expectation huge companies like sage would be shouting from the rooftops that SAAS was breaching data protection laws. There not. There developing their own SAAS applications.

The cloud revolution which we will undoubtedly see over the next 5 years offers huge opportunity to Ireland.

Good Luck
Ralph

Jim2007

DoMyBooks wrote: »

Hi Jim,

Theres some very large companies based in the EU using full cloud applications particularly Salesforce and Netsuite. (Not just on private networks). I expect they would disagree with you. Salesforce recently showed revenues of $1.6billion.

The Irish government (for what their worth) are supporting a number of SAAS providers. It would be foolhardy in the extreme for semi state bodies to support businesses engaged in an activity which is potentially breaking data protection laws.

IF you were correct in your expectation huge companies like sage would be shouting from the rooftops that SAAS was breaching data protection laws. There not. There developing their own SAAS applications.

The cloud revolution which we will undoubtedly see over the next 5 years offers huge opportunity to Ireland.

Good Luck
Ralph

Well first of all cloud computing is very new and many of the issues involved have not been addressed as yet.

And I don't see any of the vendors doing anything that could be judged as illegal. After all it is you the business owner that is ensuring compliance with the law and you can be just as irresponsible with non cloud solutions!

In my own case I'm dealing with banking and insurance information at that of course is a very sensitive area and the applicable law is mainly German and French not Irish. At the moment what I'm hearing is that clients want to take advantage of the techniques, but on their own networks.

Jim.