We were joined at a recent webinar by Mark Thurston Director at East Anglian accounting firm Gascoynes to discuss the firm’s move from legacy accounting software into the cloud. The successful firm has grown strongly in recent years, mainly through acquisition, and now employs 35 people across three offices.
Gascoynes journey with Silverfin began several years ago when Mark and his boss Chris Reeve decided that their firm needed to move away from server-based applications and into the cloud.
Mark explained; “Legacy accounting software that lived on desktops was holding us back and creating issues across the board. Silverfin was the first aspect we took on, moving working papers and accounts production into the cloud initially. We now use Silverfin for the corporate tax side of things as well. It’s worked really well for us and has been a big time saver in many areas. Silverfin has also really helped us with some of the fundamental business challenges that we faced.”
The existing technology stack, prior to implementing Silverfin.
Gascoynes uses cloud based QuickBooks extensively internally and with the majority of its customers. The move away from a reliance on legacy accounting software based on the desktop on that side of things had clear benefits. As a result, Gascoynes were keen to tackle accounts production and everything else still tied to the server including accounts production using CCH Central.
Drivers for change
Access was a significant issue with Gascoynes’ existing set-up, specifically how it limited staff’s ability to log-in. Even pre-Covid, the firm had people working in different locations or needing to work from client locations.
Mark adds; “The disadvantages of server-based solutions were significant, including downtime while updates took place and how badly wrong back-ups and other issues could be with legacy accounting software. Compared to this, when it’s online, it’s all backed up and everything is lot easier for us to access.”
How to switch smoothly
As with every software change or introduction, businesses will have fears and encounter challenges. Mark pointed out that it does take time and the first year was quite a challenge for the firm, especially as people got used to very different ways of working. Having acknowledged that they were moving from old fashioned habits, Gascoynes wisely invested in staff training.
Mark explains; “Previously, working papers were done in Excel and, probably, every manager and preparer had a different way of doing things. Silverfin, however, is very standardised, so getting staff trained and comfortable with it was key but delivered significant consistency benefits.”
Prefer to watch the webinar, then click here.
Selling Silverfin and change internally
Silverfin’s training resources and help answering queries during set-up and initial training were key to the overall success of the rollout project. As the initial rollout took place during Covid, the Silverfin team did a lot of virtual training, including Zoom calls and sharing videos.
Mark explains how clients were taken on the journey too; “We started mostly with our limited companies and then moved over to the incorporate businesses. It was important to involve all the clients due to the data implications and service changes. There was plenty of support from Silverfin with that as well, which made a huge difference.
“I think it’s really important with anything like this to do it in chunks and identify which group of clients it makes sense to move first. Also internally, which teams and which people on your end it’s going to make sense to involve in the project at what stage.
“We had a core team of four initially who tested Silverfin, used it on a few of the jobs that we were really familiar with in order to see the differences between the Silverfin approach and the way we had been working.”
Why Silverfin?
Gascoynes were clear that they wanted to move away from legacy accounting software and specifically move accounts production into the cloud.
Mark explains; “There are a lot of other software companies out there who claim to be cloud but aren’t fully cloud. We wanted to make this change once and not encounter access, update or other issues in the future. We were really drawn to Silverfin as you can log-in with any web browser anywhere and the interface is extremely easy-to-use.”
What’s different and main benefits
Now a customer for 4 years, Mark summarises the benefits verses the firm’s legacy accounting software as follows; “Because of the standardised approach, now we’re using Silverfin, everything looks the same so you know where the numbers you want to find are. Even down to little details. Your fixed asset registers, they all look the same, so you know exactly what you’re looking for and where it would be.
“Plus a lot of it is automated. So tiny details like your accruals, Silverfin does the calculation. It’s not done by one of your colleagues on a calculator mistyping figures – everything is automated massively improving accuracy.”
Happy in the cloud
While Gascoynes started their transition to Silverfin during Covid, the firm believe that remote access and cloud-based applications that support working anytime from anywhere is the future.
Gascoynes also uses Karbon for its practice management, and is now looking at the firm’s personal tax technologies.
Mark summarised the company’s experience and plans as it replaces its legacy accounting software; “Gone are the days when one vendor is going to give you absolutely everything you need. We believe it’s also not desirable, because they’re not going to be good at everything. So, our approach was to select best-of-breed solutions – picking different products for different types of clients or applications. It seems to be the way that a lot of firms are going and working well. “
Acquisition benefits
During the webinar, Mark also covered how Gascoynes found that already having Silverfin in place made a huge difference following acquisitions, especially as they came with more locations.
Importantly, Silverfin helped people working in different offices easily pick up jobs – without the need for people to be physically moving printed files and other documents between branches.
Mark adds; “Having Silverfin in place before the acquisitions saved us an awful lot of time, which was especially helpful in January and busy season.”
Summary of main benefits
You can watch the entire webinar here, which also includes a demo of Silverfin Assistant our AI-powered Assistant that is constantly finding outliers, errors and opportunities in client files while significantly reducing the need for manual checking.
The benefits Gascoynes experiences when the firm moved from legacy accounting software to using Silverfin’s cloud first solution can be summarised as;
- Standardised live data
In Mark’s own words; “Live data links are a real time saver for any firm. They remove the need to constantly import and export trial balances or push adjustments. Having the data connect and having it standardised is really important.”
- Improved internal procedures
Both from a job management perspective – making sure that all the completion stages of jobs are done, due dates are hit and much more – plus how the data arrives and the standardising the approach applied to it.
For example, live client data helps with roll forwards. Mark explains; “If you’re doing work for a client on a quarterly or a monthly basis, the ability to just roll that data forward when you come into a new period versus, a very manual process with Excel, is done at the click of a button, accurately.”
- Easy transitioning between jobs
With Silverfin, data flows seamlessly from your working papers into your accounts production and into your tax return and management accounts. The review process is another area that Silverfin helps streamline. End of year accounts can be easily prepared and then shared with managers or end clients to review digitally.
- Client portal for query communications with clients
It’s easy to tag the client against a specific transaction giving them access to the data referenced and the ability to reply in-context. They can also upload a supporting document within the working papers template too.
Mark concludes; “Whether you’re a firm looking to grow, acquire or just provide high quality customer service efficiently Silverfin is a great choice. Cloud access to live client data anytime and from anywhere is fantastic. Combined with standardised templates, automation and insights we now have happier staff and clients.”
