Accounting software is "application software that records and processes accounting transactions within functional modules such as accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll, and trial balance".
The provision of accounting software for charities is dominated by Sage, which according to Charity Finance’s Accounting Software Survey 2009 supplied to 45 per cent of charities, with 35 per cent of charities using the Sage Line 50 package.
A common complaint is that the specific accounting needs of the charity sector mean that many smaller organisations are unable to find an affordable package with sufficient functionality to cope with the likes of fund accounting, payroll and gift aid.
The fifth annual Civil Society IT Conference 2010 returns to explore both some of the inspirational and exciting developments in technology and its use across a wide range of charitable organisations, as well its role as an enabler of change – whether of internal working practices or in service delivery.
With the impending demise of cheques and the need for greater environmental responsibility both high on the agenda for charities, is paperless accounting the way to go? Simon Kearsley outlines the benefits.
The percentage of charities which would recommend their accounting software supplier to another charity is at an all-time high of 78 per cent, in this year's Charity Accounting Software Survey. Yet for small charities, those with turnover of less than £1m, the rate is just 56 per cent. Diane Sim reports.
International livestock charty GALVmed has chosen to implement the Infor FMS SunSystems financial accounting solution from reseller Sapphire.
British Red Cross has implemented Agresso Business World as its new enterprise resource planning system, replacing its previous PeopleSoft application from Oracle.
Christian book and bible charity IBS-STL UK is looking to sell all its operations and wind itself up after the implementation of a new IT system went badly wrong and capped off a succession of financial problems. It is the first time in recent history that a top-250 charity has chosen to wind up.
The fourth annual Charity IT Conference 2009 returns to explore both some of the inspirational and exciting developments in technology and its use across a wide range of charitable organisations, as well its role as an enabler of change – whether of internal working practices or in service delivery. With sessions aimed both at technicians and strategic managers your Charity IT Conference this year looks at the differing roles technology plays across the breadth of the organisation from frontline services to back-office processes with speakers from a wide range of smaller and larger charities.
More charities should adopt e-banking and become less reliant on cheques to mitigate risk, according to Peter Mitchell, chief executive of CAF Bank.
Senior accounting officers (SAOs) of large companies will shortly be required to provide personal certification that their accounting systems are capable of ensuring accuracy in their tax reporting. The proposals announced in the Budget 2009 draw on Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the US (SOX), and the obligations therein to establish and monitor internal controls over financial reporting processes. The proposals apply to employment, direct and indirect taxes and state that SAOs will be required to:
The National Autistic Society’s finance team needed to simplify its business intelligence to improve budgeting and staff input. The National Autistic Society (NAS) has a staff of around 2,500, and runs six specialist schools and 17 clusters of residential and support services for adults with autism, which account for 85 per cent of the organisation’s expenditure.
The recession appears to be having an effect on every aspect of a charity's operations, and accounting software is no exception. Making an assessment on whether purchasing a new system is justified at present as spending is reigned in, or whether a new product could bring vital improvements to financial decisionmaking, could be crucial in the current climate. This survey will help make that call.
How much priority should IT projects be given in the current climate? January kicked off with considerable excitement at my home. My 18 year old daughter is in her gap year and works for a local leisure company. They have a shop on the premises that sells snacks and drinks to customers and a batch of crisps reached their sell by date at the end of the first week in January. The leisure company had a policy of giving staff any foodstuff that reached the end of its saleable life. So cometh the day the staff enjoyed a super mega feasting of crisps.
Cambridge Assessment, Europe’s largest non-profit exam assessment agency, expects to cut manual data entry by up to 75 per cent by introducing an electronic accounts system that will process more than 250,000 documents a year. The agency, a department of the University of Cambridge, will drop its current accounts payable function and take on Version One’s document management, imaging and authorisation systems.
Microsoft’s entry-level accounting software product has not lived up to the hype, according to the CFDG’s special adviser on IT, John Tate. Speaking at the umbrella body’s London members’ meeting in October, Tate gave a downbeat assessment of Microsoft Office Accounting, which was launched in the UK last year and is available for a minimal fee via the Charity Technology Exchange (CTX).
For the uninitiated, IT can be scary, intimidating, and expensive. But there are plenty of places charities and other civil society organisations can go for free or cheap advice, hardware and software. By Tania Mason
GuideStar UK will continue to capture and display information from all the financial statements it receives from charities regardless of size, despite changes to the reporting thresholds announced earlier this month.
Financial software provider CODA has announced that CODA 2go, the software as a service (SaaS) accounting solution it launched in May through Salesforce's Force.com platform, is to be made available for free to registered UK charities.
CFDG has announced an initiative to review the needs of accounting software for small/medium-sized charities, in partnership with ICAEW and Citra.
In the accounting software survey published in the February 2006 issue of Charity Finance we reproduced a chart which originally appeared in the Charity Finance voluntary sector IT survey 2005. The chart showed the percentage of respondents who would recommend their accountancy package. Unfortunately, due to an error at production stage, the chart was reproduced incorrectly and we would like to apologise to the firms for whom the incorrect version indicated lower satisfaction levels than is actually the case.
Greenpeace has said that donors have been ˜amazingly understanding' over a computer glitch that left many of them hundreds of pounds out of pocket over the Christmas and New Year period. A software problem led to direct-debit payments made on December 28 being altered by two decimal points, meaning that someone giving £10 a month to Greenpeace had £1,000 deducted from their bank account.
Blackbaud has confirmed that it has no plans to introduce its Financial Edge accounting package into the UK.
Nearly a quarter of charities have experienced difficulties with installing, inputting data and/or using their accounting software system and would not recommend the package they are using, according to new research. Almost half of respondents to www.smartresources.org's accounting software survey were dissatisfied with the way their package produced reports and over a quarter were unable to generate the desired reports.
CedarOpenAccounts has launched an enhanced version of its finance and human capital management software suite, which it says has been designed with charities in mind.
How to manage the risk of information security breaches
John Tate and Gareth Jones present the findings from the 2008 Charity Accounting Software Survey.
Deliveries of the latest version of Sage Line 50, the most widely used accounting software package in the charity sector, have been suspended following a stream of complaints to the company's support services. The majority of issues relate to the new Report Designer, which was introduced in response to longstanding dissatisfaction over Line 50's reporting capabilities.
CFDG is formulating a template for accounting software to meet the needs of smaller organisations. At CFDG's accounting software forum last month a list of key functions were discussed. These included the ability to function without add-ons, such as for reporting, stability, intuitive ease of use for those who are not accountants, technical support, training, a low price, flexibility, and receipts, payments and payroll functionality.
How connecting technology can help to improve relationships across an organisation
What exactly does Microsoft's new operating system mean for charities?
An update on CFDG's work around entry-level accounting software for small charities