5 Unparalleled Benefits of Outsourced Bookkeeping Services

Outsourcing has revolutionised the way accounting firms deal with staffing and scalability challenges. Post the pandemic, the outsourcing trend has seen massive growth, thanks to the downward pricing pressure on accounting firms and the Great Resignation. Therefore, growth-focused practices now opt for offshore accounting and outsourced bookkeeping services to deal with these issues.

Accounting and bookkeeping are core services for an accountancy practice. However, these jobs are cumbersome and extremely time intensive. Since practices already deal with massive skills shortage, focusing only on core tasks hampers their growth significantly. Outsourcing can be a viable solution for such firms as it helps free up internal staff and build capacity.

According to a 2020 ForrestBrown survey on accounting outsourcing, outsourced bookkeeping is a trend to look out for in the post-pandemic world. Of all the accountants who took the survey, almost one-third (33%) of the respondents intended to outsource bookkeeping within the next three years.

Bookkeeping outsourcing offers several advantages to accounting firms, particularly small and mid-sized practices. Let’s look at the top 5 unparalleled benefits of outsourced bookkeeping services for accountancy firms.

1. No More Staffing Issues

The staffing shortages in the accounting industry have been growing phenomenally over the last few years. With the onset of the Great Resignation, staffing has become a significant concern for accountancy practices in the UK.

The increased talent shortage has had a direct impact on accountants’ salaries. Accountants now demand to be paid handsomely along with other employee benefits and career development opportunities, which small practices can hardly afford. Therefore, small and mid-sized firms are the most impacted by the global talent shortage.

Outsourced bookkeeping services can be a surefire way for these practices to beat the growing staffing woes and add skilled accountants and bookkeepers to their team. Top bookkeeping outsourcing providers give accounting firms exclusive access to talented bookkeepers who can handle their day-to-day tasks efficiently.

Outsourced bookkeepers are based offshore and work out of a delivery centre. These resources are trained extensively on UK accounting regulations and can seamlessly adapt to diverse work cultures. They work as an extension of your team and make your processes smooth and hassle-free.

With timely bookkeeping outsourcing, accountancy practices shall never be short-staffed. Outsourced bookkeeping helps free up your in-house staff to take up higher-value tasks and focus on more important services that ensure your firm a steady revenue stream and help strengthen your reputation in the market.

Moreover, with outsourced bookkeeping services, accountants need not worry about employee absences and peak season resignations as the outsourced offshore bookkeepers are always available to handle your tasks efficiently.

Also read: Outsourced Bookkeeping in the UK: Scope and Size (qxaccounting.com)

2. Boosted Productivity

The number of accountants and practices registered with top accountancy bodies in the UK has grown steadily over the last few years. This has led to increased competition and put additional pressure on practices to innovate solutions to sustain it.

One of the easiest ways to retain existing clients and attract new ones is 100% productivity. Clients primarily look for consistency and productivity in a service provider and are likely to stick to a firm that offers them the best services. This is another area where outsourced bookkeeping can be crucial.

Top-tier bookkeeping outsourcing providers hire the best talent in the industry and train them extensively to excel at their jobs. These experts can efficiently handle complex and cumbersome tasks and make your processes hassle-free.

Moreover, outsourced bookkeeping professionals are well-versed with the latest bookkeeping software and use technology to improve consistency and accuracy in critical accounting tasks.

Also read: How we improved productivity of a small UK accountancy practice

3. Cost Savings

Cost savings is known to be one of the most prominent benefits of outsourcing. In fact, many accountants have looked at outsourcing as a mere cost-saving tool for several years. Although there is more to outsourcing than just the monetary benefit, cost savings remains the primary reason practices outsource bookkeeping services in the UK.

Hiring onshore resources and building an in-house team of accountants is a costly affair. The salaries and recruitment costs of accountants in the UK are rather high and are expected to grow further in years to come.

In addition to the rising recruitment costs, the global pandemic has put tremendous pressure on accounting firms to reduce the pricing of their services. Sustaining the growing competition, retaining their current prices, and scaling their firm at the same time is a challenge for accounting firms. The only way to achieve this in the present scenario is to cut operational costs significantly.

Outsourced bookkeeping lets accountants hire talented bookkeepers offshore at highly competitive prices. The outsourcing provider pays and manages these resources, which means accountants need not worry about the hiring costs, employee benefits, and office infrastructure. This helps cut down the undue overhead expenses and thus promotes significant cost savings.

With appropriate accounting and bookkeeping outsourcing, practices can cut over 50% of their operational costs.

Also read: How we increased margins and maximised profitability for a UK accountancy practice

4. Latest Technology

Besides staffing and scalability challenges, technology is another area where accounting firms struggle. Many accountants in the UK are not technologically updated and do not have the experience and expertise to work with the latest accounting and bookkeeping software.

Technology, however, is the future of accounting, especially as the world rapidly moves towards digitalisation in the post-pandemic world. According to a report in Accountancy Age, automation is the future of accounting and practices must integrate the latest technology into their processes to increase efficiency and productivity.

Outsourced bookkeeping can be an effective way for small and mid-sized practices to incorporate the latest technology into their processes. Outsourced bookkeepers are technical experts who are extensively trained in multiple bookkeeping software. These resources have the expertise to automate your processes and thus minimise the scope of errors.

Some of the top emerging technologies for accounting firms in the UK include cloud computing, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Blockchain. Top-tier outsourced bookkeeping services providers specialise in these technologies and can help your firm advance effectively.

5. Higher Capacity to Scale

The world progresses rapidly. As the competition in the accounting world surges with each passing year, small and mid-sized practices struggle to keep up with the speedy changes. In such situations wherein it is challenging to execute even the core tasks and derive profits from them, scalability often takes a backseat.

In 2022, small accountancy practices can only scale by adding new services to their portfolio and attracting new clients. However, this requires an adequate amount of time and resources. With in-house hiring becoming increasingly cost-intensive, the most viable solution for practices is to outsource bookkeeping services.

Outsourcing helps build capacity for your firm by freeing up your internal resources for value-based tasks. You can pass on the tedious compliance tasks to offshore accounting and bookkeeping experts and have your in-house team focus on new services such as advisory and legal, which are in huge demand from clients.

Firms offering a complete package of services, including value-based offerings, are widely preferred by clients for their end-to-end accounting needs. Thus, accountants can scale their firm quickly despite the growing competition and challenges with outsourced bookkeeping.

Also read: The Step-by-Step Guide to Outsource Bookkeeping Services (qxaccounting.com)

Summing Up

Outsourcing has numerous benefits for accountancy practices when done the right way. Accountants must be thorough with their research and due diligence before choosing the right outsourced bookkeeping provider to partner with.

QXAS is a leading bookkeeping outsourcing provider with 12+ years of experience in the accounting outsourcing industry. We specialise in customised staffing solutions with 1500+ highly qualified and trained accounting professionals available to be hired in as low as 48 hours. To know more about our services, log on to Outsourced Accounting, Bookkeeping, and Payroll Services | QXAS UK (qxaccounting.com).