How the accounting firms react to the pandemic would vary, but it is certainly possible to prosper during and after the crisis.
The adoption of cloud technology is growing exponentially across different sectors. Once considered revolutionary technology, cloud accounting has now become the core of firms that want to be competitive, ingenious, and efficient.
The effects of the pandemic have been many throughout the world. In the accounting sector, COVID-19 has accelerated many transformations that were considered the future of work until recently. It has allowed businesses to put together organizational processes with cloud technology to provide greater scalability and flexibility during such uncertain times. Hosting QuickBooks on the cloud has become an indispensable part of continuing business and is crucial to unlocking organizational growth.
Is QuickBooks on the cloud inevitable? Yes, and the pandemic shows why.
Since the world entered the pandemic, most accounting firms are now planning to move their QuickBooks to the cloud. There are numerous reasons why this technology is essentially irresistible. Cloud has become a crucial catalyst for businesses that want overall business growth.
Remote working is a common phenomenon now across accounting firms to make their services available to clients all the time. The pandemic has made hosting QuickBooks on the cloud an immediate priority instead of a steadily approached future transformation.
A confluence of existing factors is driving businesses to move their operations to the cloud is being further accelerated by the pandemic. According to research by Synergy Research Group, cloud spending has gone up by 37% during the first quarter of 2020.
The COVID-19 crisis and an economic downturn have prompted accounting firms to accelerate their move to the cloud. Hosted QuickBooks enables the scalability and flexibility needed to help businesses meet the challenges of the downturn.
Main advantages of QuickBooks cloud hosting – and how to get them right away
Putting aside the pandemic, hosting QuickBooks on the cloud is just more efficient than the traditional way of using QuickBooks. Here are some other benefits of QuickBooks hosting:
1. Collaboration efficiency
Collaboration should be any business’s top priority if they have more than two employees. After all, there isn’t much point in having a team if users can’t work as a team. QuickBooks hosting makes collaboration a simple process. All the users can check and track all modifications made on a file as cloud technology works in real-time.
While collaboration may be possible without the cloud, but would never be as effective or easy as on the cloud platform.
2. Less administration
With QuickBooks on the cloud, CPAs, accountants, or business owners don’t need to contend with time-consuming installation, maintenance, regular back-ups, and other administrative tasks as the application is being accessed over the internet. The cloud providers would take care of these requests.
They also don’t need to purchase or manage servers or other IT infrastructure to run QuickBooks with the cloud. As the QuickBooks provider performs regular data backups, companies need not worry about their data getting lost. With less time spent on administrative tasks, the employees have enough time for productive activities that help grow the business.
3. Mobile access at any time
Hosting QuickBooks on the cloud allows users to access their key files or data at any time, from anywhere.
With QuickBooks Desktop, users are effectively tied to the office. The application, the data, and the accounts sat on a local drive. And this limits the access they can have to important data.
QuickBooks on the cloud frees you up from such restrictions. All the files and records are encrypted and stored on the cloud server. Users simply have to log in and work from a web browser, wherever they have an internet connection.
4. High security of the data
Security is critical for any company, and it is particularly important for accounting firms. An evident benefit to keeping important and sensitive data on the cloud is the removal of human elements and the likelihood of stolen or lost devices. People do make mistakes and can lose their devices full of sensitive data and months of hard work. Fortunately, the cloud service providers manage the backups and businesses need not worry about losing their QuickBooks data.
With hosted QuickBooks, the owners can invite other users with limited access. As cloud providers are constantly making updates, it is ensured that the privacy and security of the data are always airtight.
5. Reduced IT costs
Businesses hosting their QuickBooks on the cloud need less initial server infrastructure – that’s the cloud provider’s problem, not yours. There is no need for IT staff to maintain or update it. There are fewer overhead expenses, which would mean greater savings for companies.
For desktop QuickBooks, it’s the exact opposite. Every time a company expands, it encounters maintenance costs, infrastructural investment, the hardware investment, and running costs of a server (which is significant on your electricity bill!).
Leading the Pack
The pandemic has accelerated the migration of QuickBooks to the cloud – not because the clients are demanding it, but because the old way (working on QuickBooks Desktop) wasn’t working as expected.
Agility is the guiding principle for businesses that want to grow – new trends are constantly emerging, giving small accounting firms a competitive edge. The pandemic was an obstacle thrown in the path of many sectors without warning. Such obstacles will always come up, but will your business be equipped to transcend them?
Many firms are reviewing their future mode of working and hosting their QuickBooks on the cloud is considered a key factor in defining it.
Want to learn more about QuickBooks hosting, chat with our Solutions Consultant at 1-855-781-8934.