WHAT’S NOT TO LOVE ABOUT FINANCIAL YEAR END?

Especially when you are prepared…

The month of February is known for two big events. The one is Valentine’s Day and the other – at least in South Africa (and depending on when you have chosen it to be) – is Financial Year End (FYE).

Love and FYE seeming like the least likely of bedfellows.

And yet, here we are to tell you that is no longer the situation. 

Love and FYE now “go together like a horse and carriage”. As they were always meant to. After all, if you learn to love the thing you dread the most – life will become easy, breezy, and rose tinted. All at the same time. 

That’s of course if you have your affairs in order…

So, how would go about approaching FYE?

And how can we convince you that learning to love FYE is quite easy to do?

Just as falling in love (it’s the month of love after all) usually is.

It’s the same as any normal month end!

At AJS, we cannot understand what all the fuss is about. 

Because for us, FYE for an AJS client, is no different to running a normal month end. 

The only extra thing that you have to do is to journalise all your income and expense accounts to a profit and loss account. 

That’s it.

And while that may sound a little “complex”, these journals are all automated anyway.

As you can see, from an AJS perspective, FYE is an absolute breeze. With the important caveat being – if you have left everything to the last minute, the whole process will be daunting. Kind of saying “what you put in is what you get out”.  Just like romance.

At AJS, we always advise that – when it comes to FYE – it’s a good idea to keep everything in one easy-to-find location. In fact, we advise (especially in our training sessions) to create a year-end reports folder for all the required financial reports, which you can then save for easy access when required by your auditors.

Because as is often the case, auditors will usually pay a visit to your firm a couple of months after your FYE is over and done with. And the last thing you want to do is be scrounging around for all your financials. 

So, the best advice here – think like an auditor and keep all your financials in one easy-to-locate place. Stay organised. Because the easier it is to provide, the easier it will be to audit. And therein lies the “magic”.

You know one more thing to fall in love with? On the AJS practice and account management software suite you have a full reporting history function which can collate all your financials for you. 

And if the above small titbits were the point of this article – just bragging about how easy AJS’s FYE is, we could end the article right there. 

But as a company that has a lot of love for our clients, we thought – what better gift to express our affection than the provision of some tips on how to make FYE more lovable.

A little love from us to you

Sure – in reality – no one looks forward to FYE with the audits and taxes that inevitably follow. But there is a way to make it more survivable, far more straight forward and of course (and because it’s the month of love), more lovable.

And it all starts with one simple concept – if you have all your fluffy ducks in a row, your FYE can be completed at the simple click of a button. 

It’s all about being prepared – like wearing just the right amount of aftershave or perfume because you know you may kiss your date goodbye at the end of your Valentine’s Day date (and want to smell appealing).

So, here we go – some tips that we feel will make your FYE more lovable –

Tip One – Outsource your bookkeeping and accounting needs. 

Ok this does sound a little bit like a pass the parcel exercise but the reality is, there are many single practitioner firms (like Holly!) or small firms, that do not have the resources – or know-how – on how to keep accounts up to date and audit ready. 

With AJS’s SBA Function – meaning smart business accountants – outsourcing your bookkeeping and accounting functions makes good financial sense. And here’s why – if you are unable to hire a full-time bookkeeper or accountant, you don’t have to. Simple as that. It is like having your own large-firm finance department – but at a fraction of the price! Bookkeeping and accounting services that actually serve the need of your own practice, even if you are just a one man, woman, or non-binary show.

Tip Two – Back Up your Data!

We cannot overemphasise the importance of backing up your data. We have written about it more than once (you can read these articles here and here).

The essence of backing up data is simple – what do you do if a catastrophe suddenly happens, and you have lost all your data (especially when you have properly and methodically prepared, your financial accounts for FYE). You need to have a contingency plan, right? 

But if you have backed up all your data (which should, no must, include all financial reports prepared for FYE), you can simply access your backed up data – whether this done by your service provider, such as AJS’s managed cloud hosting system, or yourself on a remote server (remembering of course that this is a requirement for all firms who host their accounting information on a remote server -they should also have their own backup copy of the data ).

Meaning – presto, you can recover all your backed-up data – including all your financial history reports – simply and easy, completing FYE without hassle. No mess, no fuss!

Next week we will go through some other tips – helping you not only face this year’s FYE but can also better prepare you for next year’s FYE. Stay tuned…

And never forget – AJS has your back – if you are worried or scared about FYE, we have free training and are both ready and able to guide you through the process. 

We promise that we have you covered (please remember to book your sessions sooner rather than later – the early bird always catches the plumpest worm).

Think of AJS as your very own wing man, woman, or non-binary person – finding you the perfect match for your financial year end (and other practice management) woes.

AJS is always here to help you, wherever and whenever possible!

– Written by Alicia Koch on behalf of AJS