Ep. 81: Andrew Royer - Choosing the Right Accounting Software

Contact Andrew Royer:

• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/royeraccounting/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/royer-accounting/

Royer Accounting: https://www.royeraccounting.ca/

Andrew's Recommended Readings:

1. Tim Ferris, 4-Hour Work Week: https://fourhourworkweek.com/
2. Mike Michalowicz, Profit First: https://profitfirstbook.com/
3. Dave Chilton, The Wealthy Barber: http://www.wealthybarber.com/

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Adam: (00:00)
Welcome back for episode 81 of Count Me In. I'm your host, Adam Larson, and I'm happy to share another conversation with you about various things affecting the accounting and finance world. Today's conversation features Andrew Royer, Founder and CEO of Royer Accounting in British Columbia, Canada. Andrew is an entrepreneur who uses the tagline, “Transform Your Business from a Cash Eating Monster to a Moneymaking Machine.” He loves working with other entrepreneurs to help them see cashflow issues and showing them how growth and profit go hand in hand. In this episode, Andrew shares a perspective on various accounting software options, and how it can enhance work productivity to ultimately lead to a more profitable business. For a further explanation on what it means to be efficient and effective in business, keep listening as we head over to the conversation now.

Mitch: (01:01)
So from your experience working with accountants and clients, what are some of the advantages to utilizing a desktop accounting software?

Andrew: (01:09)
Okay, well in some cases you don't really have a choice. If you're in an area that's got a slow or unstable internet connection, you're not going to be able to use an online application. Another benefit is that the, the applications, the desktop versions that are installed on your computer tend to be a lot more robust and have more features available to them. And a couple other, you just, you'll, there's a onetime cost option, which you don't get online generally, and, you have more control over the upgrades. You can decide, you know, when you're going to install it, you don't have to worry about them installing it when you're, you know, you're busy with something.

Mitch: (01:52)
That makes sense. And then I guess the opposite here, the online accounting software, what are some advantages to utilizing some of that?

Andrew: (01:59)
Yeah, I mean, the, the biggest advantage is that you're not tied to your computer. So a lot of the software, you can access it on your phone. Take your laptop, you sit on the beach, not that you want to be working on the beach, but, it's better than working in an office. But yeah, I mean if you get a call at home, you're able to look information up thats, and enter information when you need to. You don't have to worry about like, so the benefit of the desktop is that you, you get control over the installations, the downside, or the benefit of the online,you don't, have to worry about the installation. Somebody is doing the installations, they're backing up the software, they're installing the updates for you. It's also easy to give access to your staff. You give access to, accountants and bookkeepers, whereas on a desktop version, unless you're getting into a really expensive enterprise kind of options, it's hard to get multiple people involved. And the online makes that, you know, the interconnectedness is very powerful. You can also make up, so the shortfall of the online, which I had mentioned before was that you have less power than the desktop, but, with the online, you can actually integrate with thousands of apps that will increase the power of the online. So there's a lot of benefits you're not closed and tied to what the desktop gives you. You can add whatever features you want.

Mitch: (03:21)
So I guess a lot of it sounds like, you know, there are pros and cons to both of these, for those who are interested in, you know, looking at different software options, whether it's desktop or online, we'll start with desktop to stay consistent here. How do you go about determining which desktop software is right for you?

Andrew: (03:40)
In my opinion, it's, it's largely preference. I've used.,I've used most of the different options out there, the big names anyway. So, the primary options are QuickBooks Desktop, and then the Simply Accounting or the Sage version. So those are, those are the two main competitors. There may be some advantages to one or the other based on the size of the company or the particular industry that you're in. But otherwise I find that it's mostly preference. I find more technically minded tend to prefer the Simply Accounting and, the QuickBooks, if you're just getting started, QuickBooks tends to be simpler, easier to use. So a lot of people start with that.

Mitch: (04:21)
Then what are some of your options on the flip side? Like I said, what are some of the ways that you can choose the right online accounting software and what are some of those examples?

Andrew: (04:31)
Yeah, I think so picking the right online software is probably a little tougher. For our firm, what we've done is we've gone just to be consistent. We've gone with QuickBooks online, just across the board for everybody. This is QuickBooks has been in the market the longest and online,aAnd so they have the most integrations with other software out there. They're, it's easier to find people that are more familiar with it and able, so it's easier to find people in, to work with it and so there's less training involved with that. And, I mean, it's not, it's not perfect. I'd like there's issues with it that drive me nuts, but it's kind of, I can say it's the worst system until you consider the alternatives. So then we look at, like Sage has started the game a little bit later. I think they were digging their claws into the desktop version and really just didn't want to let it go. And so they joined the game a little bit later and, they have a lot less integrations thanthan QuickBooks and otherwise I think between the two, it's more of a, just a preference thing. And then the last one, the one that I've been keeping my eye on a lot is XERO. So they never had a desktop version. So both QuickBooks and Sage, they were basically competing with themselves, trying to create some of the same features that they had in the desktop version. XERO didn't have that liability. So they were able to just create something from scratch, make it the way that they wanted to, with an online interface. Some of the issues that they ended up getting into with that is that, people are used to doing things a certain way with all other accounting software and they've kind of done just something completely different. The biggest benefit with XERO isit works great with the foreign exchange transactions, which can be tougher in both, you know, QuickBooks online and Sage. And really, the only reason that we haven't moved everybody over to it is it's really lacking in the Canadian sales side. So the sales tax handling, they're working on it, but, until that's done, I can't even, consider it, but we're definitely keeping our eye on that one is potentially a future leader in this industry.

Mitch: (06:50)
So you've said it a few times where it really come...