InfoPage: Zipaccs - Keeping the books can be easy, and you can prove it free!

Keeping the books - it really shouldn't be so hard​

If you asked most pub managers what attracted them to the trade in the first place, it's a pretty fair bet that keeping the books wouldn't figure all that high in their answers.

A pub is usually a pretty simple business - you buy food and drink and sell it at a profit; you pay your staff every week, the Inland Revenue every month and the Vat man every quarter. It shouldn't be difficult to record all this.

So why is it that one of the principal reasons for pubs going out of business is inefficient book keeping?

One culprit has to be the complexity of most modern accountancy software packages. For the most part they're written for complex businesses that buy and sell on credit, businesses that operate financing packages like invoice factoring and incremental packages. This results in software that's undeniably powerful, but that's full of features that just aren't needed by a simple cash business.

One alternative approach that's gaining considerable recognition in the licensed trade is Zipaccs Cash Accounting. It's unusual in that it makes a virtue of the features that it doesn't have.

The makers say that they've taken a completely new look at the way accounts are kept. "It's genuinely a clean sheet approach," Zipaccs director Jem Shaw told us.

"Most of the accountancy products around today have grown up around the book keeping techniques used by accountants. They use nominal codes, journals and all kinds of similar tools that accountants understand, but that leave the rest of us pretty baffled.

"Our research showed us that people want something simple and understandable. If they make a mistake, they want to delete it, not look for the instructions in the manual on how to reverse out a transaction."

The package is certainly simple to operate. Virtually the whole system is operated from just four screens that boast plain English titles like "Cash into the building". But it actually delivers far more than its more complex competitors. "We wanted to build in a foolproof back-up system," explained Shaw, "So we use the customer's Internet connection to back up the figures to a secure data vault. Obviously, that gives customers reassurance that their books can be restored if something goes horribly wrong. But those backups make it possible for us to produce a pub's end-of year accounts within a few days, and at a far lower price than a conventional accountant would normally charge.

Try before you buy​

"Our advice to people who're looking for an easier way to keep the books in order is to test the system for themselves. We're happy to supply Zipaccs Cash Accounting, fully operational and ready to go, on a no-obligation free trial for 30 days. There's nothing to sign and nothing to cancel; if they don't like it, they can just stop using it. We're confident about making this offer because, In our experience, most customers love the system."

Zipaccs Cash Accounting is available to individual businesses, or the company can offer a back-end management system to groups and accountancy practices. Visit www.zipaccs.com for more details.​