Anna Curzon, chief product officer at Xerith, reflects on growth accounting software companies in the UK market over the past year.
What are the eye-catching events or announcements from Xero this year?
In 2019, Xero is our innovative product focus on delivering fast and accurate data, streamlining tax and compliance workflows and gaining deeper insights to help our clients not only make sense of their current data, but move into a new era where we can predict what will happen in the future.
We want to create products that will stand the test of time, but also support our growth. That's why we're constantly balancing solving the problems of today with creating products and features that our vast customer base will enjoy and enjoy in the future.
In the UK, these were some of our main innovations:
- From April 1, enterprises on the VAT threshold had to send the tax electronically. We have worked closely with NTS to get SMEs and their advisors and launched the production of digital tax functionality at no additional cost.
- Another area we've focused a lot of our attention on is how we make getting paid and making payment easier. This year, we embarked on a deep integration with Stripe to help small businesses get paid faster, and recently released the TransferWise payment service to allow businesses to manage and pay bills more smoothly.
- We've also made it easy to get ready for card or direct debit payments. Smooth Placement now makes it even easier for small businesses to accept credit card payments, as well as debit card or Apple payments via Stripe, or direct debit payments via GoCardless, helping them get paid faster.
How did Xerita manage to become the market leader in the UK in 2019?
We have been fortunate to see strong continuous growth in the UK for over a decade now. We are investing this time to grow what is now a big business.
Being designed specifically using cloud services has helped us a lot, and by offering different ways to do things, Xerite subscribers love a smarter, smoother, more efficient way to manage their finances.
Our accounting and bookkeeping partners have built an entire business around Xero and our ecosystem, like software as a service (SaaS), which is incredible. This means we've built strong relationships and advocates in the accounting industry, helping us get more small businesses on the cloud.
But we don't want to rest on our laurels. We are constantly looking to the future and innovating our products to support SMEs and their advisors. As part of this, we listen carefully to the needs of our clients who have invested their time and resources so heavily in Xero.
How has the government's implementation of digital tax solutions helped Xerite benefit?
The roll out of Tax Digital Solutions (MTD) has meant that many businesses that are no longer using MTD-compatible cloud-based accounting software have already made the switch.
You don't necessarily have to be on the cloud to digitally submit to NTS, but this is by far the most efficient and painless solution.
Cloud-based platforms like Xerite mean less paperwork and fewer errors, but more importantly, it gives businesses a real-time view of cash flow. After rolling out the MTD we are definitely seeing growth in sign up numbers and interest in products.
Do you see your customer requirements changing as more financial activity goes online?
Traditionally, the relationship between an accountant and a small business has been a long-term local basis, focused on tax accounting. Whereas for large businesses, with larger teams and more resources, they had the luxury of aside from tax returns.
As more financial activity moves to the cloud, we're going to see more small businesses moving away from the sheer desire to help with their tax returns. They want more access to information that will help them make decisions about the growth and direction of the business.
This requirement for data-driven decision making is what will drive the next generation of online finance and fintech and level the playing field between big and small businesses.
SMEs and accountants are also looking for technology oriented partners to help build their business. With this in mind, we are working on further expanding the Xerite platform. We already have over 800 business applications integrated with our customers, increasingly relying on the scale and power of our ecosystem to support growth.
How does the UK compare to other markets when it comes to introducing new services and solutions?
Globally, in countries such as the UK, we estimate cloud accounting penetration of around 20% will be sufficient, and in many cases we feel much less than this minimum. Digitization of taxes and compliance (through Tax Clearance Digital in the UK), disruption and innovation in financial services and the increased adoption of cloud storage technology are all contributing to the demand for cloud accounting worldwide and this is also driving in the UK.
In the AU and NC markets, cloud accounting penetration is much higher, estimated at over 50 percent.
What to spend on Xerit in the next 12 months?
As the business grows, Xero is continuously testing and revising its strategy. Over the next 12 months, we have focused on three strategic priorities; cloud disk accounting, grow small business platform and building global scale and innovation.
Next year, Xero is bringing comprehensive, holistic compliance to our clients through Xerite's tax preparation as a 100% cloud-based tax preparation program. This will give UK accountants smarter, seamless tax preparation processes.
We have completed the integration of Hubdoc into the Xerite platform, which is an integral part of our data automation vision. All customers now have access to this world-class technology that captures invoice and receipt information, eliminates manual data entry and makes reconciliations easy. This feature saves them significant time, which they can focus on working on the business instead of in it.
We believe data collection tools like Hubdoc do the essential job that all small businesses and consultants need to succeed with ever-new government reporting requirements and hold digital records. We wanted to make this technology available to all of our customers, because of the impact of the time saved on their success.
We are also working on further expanding the Xerite platform in areas such as fintech, where we see huge potential for growth in services such as payments and lending.
- Keep safe from malware online with the best antivirus program.
Curzon
REPLY