Not Just Your Average Billing System

Not just your average billing system.

As an accounting firm, Accodex wants to see its clients succeed in every aspect of their business, and the best way we can help in this is adding as much value to them as we possibly can. We believe that our clients deserve value based pricing, as opposed to billing them on an hourly basis.

Value based pricing is fantastic for both our clients, and our firm, as the cost and scope of the job is set, our partners can plan and budget their time, and our clients are not disadvantaged financially if we take a little longer on a job, to deliver the quality and value that they deserve.

Accodex’s proposals are predominantly set up using Ignition’s “Recurring” Billing Type. This functionality allows us to split the total proposal into monthly payments, which allows the client to manage and smooth their cash flow, and enables the Accodex finance team to manage and forecast ours.

How do I forecast cashflow?

As our retainers are set with monthly payment amounts, I know with a high level of certainty the minimum amount of cash that I can expect to receive each month. With this knowledge, I can manage our cashflow and ensure that necessary bills are paid, and how much surplus cash can be put towards building the business.

How do I manage cashflow?

Among other cashflow management tools, I have created a “Strategic Release of Creditors” spreadsheet, which allows me to keep track of all our creditors, payment amounts and their estimated payment dates. This is for all creditors, either on manual payments or direct debit (which prevents the shock of forgetting about a massive direct debit!).

Our monthly direct credits from Ignition are consistent and this means I can ensure that the highest priority creditors are paid first.

So, what do I do after?

After all our most important bills are paid, it is important to decide how we are going to allocate the surplus cash. With a business that is growing as fast as we are, it is important that all the money goes back into building and expanding the business.

At the current moment, we are focusing on building out our partner resources and partner support system. With our partners spread across three countries, it is important that we are servicing and supporting our partners to provide them with the best Accodex experience as possible!

Accodex creates content and resources for its partners to help streamline their businesses. Some of this content and resources includes intensive business education, as well as templates, checklists and work instructions. The Accodex partner support system includes our Partner Relationship Managers (PRMs), who look after their cohort of partners and are their first point of contact.

What are the consequences of not using Ignition

This blog has explained that the best way for Accodex to smooth cashflow is to have equal payments spread over the 12 month retainer, and how Ignition has given us this functionality. But what if we didn’t use Ignition, or another billing platform? For one, we definitely would not be able to smooth our cashflow.

Clients would not be willing to pay us on a recurring basis, if they had to manually process the payment each month. This would mean that we would need to send out an invoice for the whole year’s worth of services, which would result in a spiky cashflow. This would be disruption enough, without even considering what would happen to our debtor days!

Ignition provides me with an in-depth list of our direct debits that have failed, which gives me the ability to follow up with our clients to collect updated payment details. There is less resistance in opposition to manual invoices where we would be constantly chasing payments (which can get very laborious!).

The beauty of real-time information.

We have configured our Ignition instance so that both the partner and I receive an email when a client has accepted their proposal. It is through this real-time information that I know when cash is to be deposited. It is also beneficial for our partners.

To prevent scope creep and non-payment, our partners generally do not begin any client work until they have a signed proposal. By receiving the acceptance email the moment the proposal has been signed, the partners can begin to plan their workflows.

Accodex has been very lucky to have such a great relationship with the team at Ignition!

Accodex is a global accounting firm, with a partner network all over the world.

You can find more information about Accodex and their global adventures online.