How to create strong relationships with clients

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The origins of Manchester-based James Scott date back to the 1980s. The firm serves a range of clients in the North West Area, covering individuals, family businesses, owner-managed businesses and large commercial groups of companies with a turnover up to around £10 million.

James Scott provides a full-service offering, taking care of all compliance filing requirements, bookkeeping, management accounts tax advice and strategic planning. They aim to set themselves out from the competition by providing a value for money service, with regular client touch points creating a strong working relationship.

Ten years of cloud working

The firm was one of the first to use cloud accounting software in the UK and signed up as a Xero accounting partner in 2011. Over the last few years have been transitioning the bulk of their clients to Xero and encourage all new clients to take it up.

Matthew Taylor, one of the two partners at the firm, lists Xero’s 800 plus add on partners as integral to servicing clients’ needs. These software partners, which integrate directly with Xero, add extra layers of functionality bespoke to sector-specific clients’ needs.

Citing the example of e-commerce, Taylor references A2X, a Xero add on partner which connects to third party e-commerce platforms to pull in and reconcile sales data. Taylor says: “Amazon settlements are notoriously difficult to decipher and A2X’s integration with
Xero does this for you. It saves a load of time and also works with eBay and Spotify.”

This has been particularly useful during the pandemic when the practice saw a surge in sales from many of their e-commerce clients.

Switching to Xero Tax

James Scott started to make the move from their desktop-based accounts production and tax software to Xero Tax in March last year, and are now switching their clients across for their respective year ends. Taylor lists the main benefits from the switch as being a complete end to end workflow in one piece of software:

“You have your bookkeeping software which produces right through to Companies House and HMRC within the same software suite. Previously we had to extract and import the data into separate accounts production and tax software. Xero Tax has really smoothed that workflow
out.”

Minimal training

Rather than undergo the free training materials provided by Xero Tax Taylor preferred to dive right in to see if he could get to grips with it instantly. He says: “The software is fairly intuitive and takes you through the process in an orderly and reasonable way. Understanding the processes behind final accounts and corporation tax returns is enough knowledge to understand the flow of Xero Tax.”

While Taylor believes there is “no substitute for getting your hands dirty” other staff members in the office went through the Xero certification process to build on their knowledge.

The firm now plans to use the efficiency gains from Xero Tax to take onboard new clients and focus more on growing the e-commerce side of the business. If you’re an accountant or bookkeeper in practice, sign up to the Xero partner programme and access Xero Tax. You’ll get the tools, resources and dedicated account management to help get your practice and clients set up for success. Visit www.xero.com/xero-tax-partner to get started.

Join the Xero partner programme.

This content is brought to you by Xero.

Xero offers a cloud-based accounting software platform for small and medium-sized businesses..

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