Definitive Accounting and Taxation - Assignment Example

Name: University: Course: Tutor: Date: Definitive Accounting and Taxation Company Description The company is a consultancy firm which will be located in Wollongong. Its objectives will be providing consultancy services to the small businesses and to individuals in Wollongong in areas relating to accounting and tax preparations. The firm will also offer communication services to the Wollongong individuals and business community. Below is an analysis is of the hardware software and communication requirements for the firm. A budget summary is shown as Fig. 1.1. The main objective that Definitive Accounting and Taxation wants to achieve is to assist the local small businesses and individuals at Wollongong in perfecting their businesses by giving them a direction on how to best manage their businesses. They will be trained on how to manage the two key drivers in a business, clients and cash flow. On clients the emphasis will be on how to attract new customers and satisfy them and work on retaining them. On managing cash flow the clients will be assisted on how to prepare budgets, the more affordable sources of finance, how to write business plans. The aim will be on making the small business owners and individual’s better managers in their respective trades. Choice of hardware The business will have five individuals (consultants) who will be away from the office most of the time. Therefore because of the need for flexibility and mobility as they move from one client to the other, the best will be laptops. This will make it easier to work on their clients accounts wherever they go. The laptops purchased will be from a renowned brand to ensure quality and prices will be compared from different shops. The warranty of the laptop will also be checked on. The selection will be based on the size of the processor RAM, and enough storage space to allow saving information from the different clients. The processing speed of the laptop will also be considered (O'Brien, 2008). The laptop should have enough ports to make it adaptable for other services like the need to connect to a printer use a flash disk or when connecting to the internet through 3G EVDO broadband for internet connections while on the move. After all these considerations the cost of each laptop will average on $1500, so two of them will cost $3000. The selected will be will have 2.40GHZ, 4GB/ 500 GB/ 15.6 Inches with a 3G cellular WAN to assist in the internet connectivity while at a clients premises (Myshopping.com, 2010). These laptops will be used by the consultants on the move. While in the office, they will use the desktops, and three of them will be allocated for this purpose. Since the consultants will be working away from the office most of the times, and being a new firm that will need to market itself and make a name for itself, there is the assumption that the firm will require a few more employees, we can assume a minimum of three, the reception, the office administrator and a marketing manager. The receptionist and the office administrator will assist each other in answering the phone and in all the other administrative duties. They can work on the company records which will include sending invoices to the clients and posting of all the transactions to the firms accounting system. As such each of these three employees will require a workstation. The marketing manager will require mobility while moving to look for potential customers, so he will be best suited to with a laptop. However since he need not store as much information as the consultants this means a simpler and more affordable laptop will serve the needs. For this a budget of $1200 will be allocated. The other two employees will be using desktop computers. The budget for this will be lower since PC’s are more affordable than the laptops but with as much efficiency. A 4GB, 512MB and with as much as 8 USB ports will cost approximately $1300. An advantage of Desktops over laptops is they last longer than laptops because they have more access to air making unlike laptops which have less. The repairing for desktops is cheaper since the spare parts are available in the market. A number of desktops will be required, two for the administrative staff, and three for the consultants while in office. The printer will be a quality one so as to give good printed invoices that are appealing to the clients. An all-in-one printer will be selected since it is more economical and will provide several services. This printer has printing, copying, scanning and fax facilities. This will be essential for the office. The printing will be minimized. The customers’ invoices will be accessible in soft copy and will be sent to their emails. This will reduce the printing and stationery expensed. As such the inkjet will be sufficient to do the printing work. This is budgeted at a cost of $800. The desktop will require Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) and one for the printer at a cost of $150 each. The businesses will also require external hard disk drives which will be used for back up of the office and clients data. This will cost on average at $120. The computers and the printer will need to be connected through a LAN network. The required hardware for the connection are an Ethernet switch with 8 ports, at a cost $1140. The wiring and connecting cables will be estimated at $250. An 8 port hub will be required and one will be selected on quality such that reduces the need for multiple servers and need for routers, at a cost of $2,755. A server will be required at an average cost of $7,700 (cnet.com). The office will require a telephone connection. The requirements will be vista cables at a cost of $25 each, two telephone cordless phones at $150 each, analogue adaptors at $70 each. This totals to approximately $500 for the installation. Software There will be several software programs that will be required. The operating system will have to be selected for the desktops and the laptops. The choice is between Microsoft windows, Linux or Apples Mac OSX. Mac OSX is freer of viruses than windows but with limited compatibilities with other peripheries, for example printers and back up drives. These compatibilities are essential in the office therefore with this reason this is not chosen because of the need to install printers for customers who may need hard copies of the invoices. Linux is a more complicated program which needs the experts to run it in case of any question. The only experts that the company has are in the clients offices. Linux will therefore not be a good choice in this case (Communications Consulting Groups, 2010). Windows is still the most preferred operating program in the business world. It has most applications in hardware, and installation is possible even in the simplest of computers. It is compatible with most programs and therefore it is compatible with the printer installations and telephone and fax machine programs. In choosing Windows as the operating system one is left with a selection between vista and XP. Though XP is faster than Vista, the latter is more modern and more applicable in future. To avoid any future problems when XP is no longer supported by Microsoft the economical choice falls on Vista. Microsoft offers several packages that depend on the clients needs. They have home and business packages. Microsoft Windows Vista Business SP1 DVD will be the most appropriate for Definitive Accounting and Taxation as it is efficient for small businesses. This costs approximately $400 and eight keys for each of the laptops and the desktops at a cost of $80 each. A disadvantage that comes with Windows is that it is prone to viruses. This adds the cost of maintaining it in buying antivirus. Microsoft office will be required in the office, for MS word in writing memos and MS excel for presenting the reports after they have been compiled within the accounting system. MS PowerPoint will be of essence to the marketing manager and the consultants as well. This will at the cost of $700 and a key for each computer, also at the rate of $80 for each. As discussed earlier one of the disadvantages of Window operating system is its weakness to attract viruses. Therefore it is essential to have a good quality antivirus. With the consultants need to visit their customers there are times they will have to share with the clients accessibility to the clients computers through some network or shared flash disks. They will thus need an antivirus to protect their computers. The clients accounting program will be networked, another risk of shared viruses. In choosing the antivirus, the best choose is one which is easy to use, is frequently updated and allows users control. In making the choice popularity was also considered (O'Brien, 2008). Kaspersky Antivirus is popular and is updated on an hourly basis. It has a firewall and intrusion provision. The intrusion provision is of important to prevent clients’ information being illegally accessed through network. Kaspersky offers a package of five computers at a cost of $199 and another package for three computers at a cost of $99.95. This will total to approximately $300 for all the computers. This is almost half the price of buying one key for each. This can serve six of the computers and an additional two keys for the remainder. Definitive Accounting and Taxation will need to have its own accounting system, which will take care of the firm’s expenses, invoicing and profit and loss calculation. The software can be selected from the various firms that Definitive Accounting and Taxation have a relationship with. This will probably lead to a discount being offered. Saasu specializes in online accounting. Definitive Accounting and Taxation has only one office so online accounting may not be applicable in this case. QuickBooks has the advantage of easy to use and an easy invoicing system. However MYOB products are adaptable to ensure efficient time billings and accessibility by multi users. This is an advantage since all the consultants can monitor the profitability of the firm at their own convenience. Therefore the best option will be MYOB Account Right Premier which is at the market rate of approximately $1700. MYOP was selected because it offers the following advantages, its adaptability makes it easier to manage and adapt to an ERP system. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is the modern way for businesses whereby the entire business process is integrated covering all the core functions of the business. There is coordination in the entire business system from when a contract is signed to the billing system, to when a client has paid. Another advantage with MYOB is that the system has a facility whereby a targeted piece of information such as a marketing campaign message directly to a specific category of customers. This gives it the advantage to work as an accounting program, but also a marketing tool. These advantages will be enjoyed both by the Definitive Accountancy and Taxation staff and their clients. Another advantage with MYOB, apart from its adaptability is the advantage that comes with it whereby in case of a hitch, the client can send a feedback, query and suggestions directly to MYOB producers. The office will require a database management system that will be used to collect data and information from the clients, to make it easy for managing the clients according to their needs. Being a small office an SQL will be appropriate at a cost of $2300. Communication Definitive Accountancy and Taxation will have as apart of it business a Communications department. This department will specializes in offering business planning and consultancy services in addition to the accounting services to individuals and the small businesses in Wollongong. In this training they will be trained on how and in which area that they need to improve in order to make their businesses more profitable they will be trained on how to choose from the several available sources of finance, the advantages and disadvantages of each one of them. The department will also offer interpersonal communication training services whereby the business owners, the employees and other stakeholders in each business will be trained on hot to communicate effectively and make the business more profitable when they all work as a team. This same people will also be trained on writing business documents which leads to effective communication to clients, creditors and banks. The consultants at Definitive Accountant and Taxation will also train the Wollongong business community on how to make presentations to potential clients or creditors (Communications Consulting Groups, 2010). In so doing they will be at an advantage to achieve their desired business objectives. There are equipments that will be needed to offer these services. The communications department will require LCD projectors. The projectors will be used in the presentations to the clients. They will also require a DVD or Video player plus a television set, which will also be used for the same services, presentations to the clients. The LCD Projectors will be at a cost of $ 2000 each while the TV a 32-inch-screen TV will cost approximately $1300 and $650 for the DVD Recorder. Training Requirements The new employees will need to be trained in order to adapt to the specific needs and requirements of the firm. Definitive Accountant and Taxation being a new firm, the emphasis will be on acquiring new customers and retaining them by satisfying them. This will therefore call a need for a customer care training program for the new employees. The employees will need basic IT skills and this will be included in the training program. The training for the whole year will cost approximately $2000. Fig 1.1 Budget On Hardware, Software And Communications  Amount In $ Hardware   2 Laptops @ 1500 3,000.00 1 laptop 1,000.00 5 Desktops @ 1300 6,500.00 Printer 800.00 3 UPS @ 150 750.00 External Hard disk drive @120 120.00 Ethernet switch with 8 ports 1,140.00 A server 7,700.00 8 port hub 2,755.00 Cabling 250.00 Telephone installation 500.00 Subtotal on Hardware 24,515.00     Software   MYOB AccountRight Premier Accounting software 1,700.00 MS Windows vista Business SP1 DVD 400.00 8 MS Windows Vista Keys @ 80 640.00 MS Office Small Business 2007 700.00 8 MS Office Small Business 2007s @ 80 640.00 Antivirus 300.00 SQL Database system 2,300.00 Subtotal on Software 6,680.00     Communications   2 LCD projectors @2000 4,000.00 Television Set 1,300.00 DVD Recorder 650.00 Training of employees 2,000.00 Subtotal on communication 7,950.00     Total budget 39,145.00 References Communications Consulting Groups. (2010 ). Description Of Services And Programs. Available at: http://www.ccg-usa.com/services-programs-desc.html. Accessed May 17, 2010. Myshopping.com (2010). Laptops. Available at: http://www.myshopping.com.au/PT--3_Laptops Accessed May 17, 2010 O'Brien, Terrence. (2008). Five Things To Consider Before Buying A Computer. Available at: http://www.switched.com/2008/10/01/five-things-to-consider-before-buying-a-computer/ Accessed May 17, 2010 Read More