Cloud Accounting: Bright New Skies
Have you heard about cloud accounting? It’s the talk of the town now, especially in accounting field – so let’s see what it’s all about.
So what is Cloud Accounting?
In the simple terms, Cloud Accounting means storing and accessing your books over the Internet instead of on your computer’s hard drive. Cloud-based refers to applications, services or resources made available to users through the internet from a remote provider. These applications live on a company’s computer rather than on your own – think the Apple iCloud, or Gmail.
What about QuickBooks Online?
Yes. QuickBooks Online offers small businesses a wide variety of book keeping and accounting services from the cloud. You can easily see and all of your financial records under one roof. You can also connect your bank accounts and credit cards, link transactions and access this data from anywhere.
All your data is stored on a remote web server, instead of on your office computer. You can access it over any secure internet connection.
What’s so great about it?
Your stored files can be accessed from anywhere via an internet connection. Instead of sending physical reports or big files to relevant parties, you can send them a link allowing limited, controlled access to your records. There will also be a backup of your files stored and available for emergencies!
Since this is all consolidated, you don’t have to buy different software for different services – indirectly reducing the operating costs for businesses.
Do I need internet for this?
Sometimes the merit becomes the demerit and in this case, if you have no internet connection, you have no access to your data.
There are lot of advantages – and concerns – about Cloud Accounting, but this does seem to be the future of accounting services.