Six Steps to Battle Cybersecurity Risks
What cost or time investment would you pay to protect your firm and your clients?
By Donny Shimamoto for Cybersecurity for Accountants
ADVISORY & CONSULTING
Eight Steps to Putting Back Office Support into Place
Includes details for the Client Operations Manual.
By Penny Breslin
It’s Not Just the Numbers
Moving from compliance to reliance services is not an easy task. If you are feeling a bit overwhelmed at this point, that’s okay. However, the joy of offering back office support (BOS) services and working closely with clients to help them meet their goals is well worth the effort. Having a strong team, clear procedures and technology that works for you are the building blocks that allow you to succeed in this endeavor.
MORE: After You Check Your Cybersecurity, Help Others | Cover These Five Areas of Information Security | Three Examples: Pricing Your BOS Value Add | Use Timesheets for Productivity, Not Billing | Revisit Your Back Office Support Procedures | Federated Search: What It Is, Why It Matters | Accounting Tech Tools to Minimize Your Pain | Do Your Apps Play Well with Others? | It’s OK to Have Favorite Clients | Ten Questions for Teamwork | Yes, You Can Be an Outsourcer
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The next layer is the clients – meeting with them, working with them and setting up the procedures to ensure that you are truly their advisor. When you carefully select your clients, take the time to understand their needs and goals, and hold them to a paperless work environment, both your team and clients will reap the rewards.
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How to Start Providing Family Office Services
Including a sample engagement letter.
By Ed Mendlowitz
202 Questions and Answers: Managing an Accounting Practice
Question: Some of my clients are getting older and are becoming unable to handle their own financial affairs and I have been asked if I could assist them. What is involved and how do I charge for it?
MORE: Higher Fees to Start: Ten Ways to Make Your Tax Season Better | Nine Tips for a Healthier Tax Season | Fifteen Strategies for First-Time Supervisors | Measure Knowledge Gaps (Then Close Them) | Should You Offer Financial Services? | Ready to Retire? Selling Your Practice Is No Strategy | 20 Things You Need for a Business Valuation
Response: Many large firms provide “family office” services. This is a complete one-stop financial service that helps clients manage their money, pay their bills, collect their dividends and interest, and make sure insurance isn’t cancelled, mortgage, car lease or condo fee payments aren’t skipped, and tax payments paid on time.
Following is a sample engagement letter that I use with clients needing such services. Also, this letter provides a detailed description of what the service involves.
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Cover These Five Areas of Information Security
How to thoroughly safeguard client information.
By Penny Breslin
It’s Not Just the Numbers
Your clients trust you with their information; however, in today’s world, where sensitive information can be compromised and distributed, clients want assurance that their information is safe and that you are protecting them from identity theft.
MORE: Let Tech Make Communication Easier | How to Craft a Service Level Agreement | How to Maximize On-Site Client Meetings | Sixteen Guidelines for Naming Conventions | You Have to Manage Three Kinds of Procedures | Tech Tips for Back Office Support | Decoding Accounting Tech (and All Those Acronyms) | Digital Marketing Strategies Level the Playing Field | Eight Tasks to Delegate Today
Although certain state laws (check with your state); federal laws such as Gramm-Leach-Bliley (GLB), which covers individual privacy disclosures; and the AICPA rules of ethics do provide some protection, we recommend that as the trusted business advisor, you should disclose to your clients how you:
- Safeguard their information in your office and on your servers
- Securely transmit sensitive data
- Closely supervise access to authorized parties only
Stress Test Your Clients’ Financial Plans
What’s the worst that could happen? Ask that now.
By Anthony Glomski
I wrote this series of posts to help successful entrepreneurs and their advisors learn how they can build on their impressive accomplishments and utilize their wealth to achieve even greater things going forward – for themselves, for their families, for their communities and for the causes they care about.
MORE: When Clients Want to Manage Their Own Wealth | Four Attributes Your Experts Need | How a Virtual Family Office Can Serve Your Wealthy Clients | Is Your Client’s Wealth Truly Protected? | Control the Level of Risk | How to Flip the Switch to Wealth Preservation | Three Ways to Work Together on Wealth | Five Challenges of Liquidating a Business
The fact is, your clients should take their financial health as seriously as they take their physical health. One of the best ways to ensure that their financial plan is strong enough to withstand whatever the market, the economy and life circumstances throw their way is to perform a regular “stress test” of their financial plan.
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Let Tech Make Communication Easier
How to create effective systems.
By Penny Breslin
It’s Not Just the Numbers
Open and clear communication is essential when you provide back office support (BOS) services. You cannot take on this type of work and not stay on top of it. Previous examples have shown what happens when you do it right. Here’s what happens when you don’t.
MORE: How to Craft a Service Level Agreement | Three Examples: Pricing Your BOS Value Add | Use Timesheets for Productivity, Not Billing | Revisit Your Back Office Support Procedures | Federated Search: What It Is, Why It Matters | Accounting Tech Tools to Minimize Your Pain | Do Your Apps Play Well with Others? | It’s OK to Have Favorite Clients | Ten Questions for Teamwork | Yes, You Can Be an Outsourcer
Case Study: When You Don’t Keep Up Your Side of the Agreement
A CPA wanting to provide BOS services to his clients contacted us to help with the first setup. The software of choice by the business owner was QuickBooks.
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When Clients Want to Manage Their Own Wealth
Can they? Maybe. But should they?
By Anthony Glomski
I have told you that your business owner clients will face new challenges, new transitions and new opportunities as they navigate their way through a liquidity event and emerge on the other side. I also have emphasized that you must do everything in your power to help them preserve, protect and maintain the wealth that they have worked so hard to build.
MORE: Four Attributes Your Experts Need | Your Wealth Management Team Needs These Five People | There’s More to Giving Than Tax Implications | Eight Questions for Estate Planning | Clients Who Don’t Listen | How to Outline Your Client’s Big Picture
Nassim Taleb, author of the bestselling book “The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable,” argues that we can not only learn to navigate these frightening and overwhelming events, but learn to become stronger as a result of them and to take advantage of the opportunities they provide.
By helping your clients prepare the right way to withstand the next black swan event, you can help ensure that they’ll be able to have a huge impact not only in their life, but in their family’s life, in their community and even in the world at large.
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How to Craft a Service Level Agreement
BONUS: A sample checklist.
By Penny Breslin
It’s Not Just the Numbers
Anytime there is a business relationship between entities, expect to see a contract or some form of written agreement. In outsourcing, as in many other relationships, this is called a service level agreement (SLA). This agreement is used to establish the scope of the engagement. It clearly states who is responsible for what, when, where and how. It provides a quid pro quo that you can verify with the business owner(s), so that both parties are fully aware of their obligations.
MORE: Three Examples: Pricing Your BOS Value Add | How to Assess Needs for a Client Proposal | Best Practices for Source Doc Permissions and Handling | Every Back Office Support Client Needs a Playbook | Strengthen Client Ties with Workflow Tools | Understand Your Online Marketing Options | Narrow Your Prospects by Choosing a Vertical | Build Your Team, Then Choose Your Clients | How Back Office Support Adds Value
The important thing is to go through each function and each area with the business owners(s), have them read it with you together and check off each item so that they are clear on what you expect from them, and so you are clear on what deliverables you are promising.
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