Welcome back to our Firm of the Future profile series about thriving firms and consultants who are benefitting from the cloud and QuickBooks® Online Accountant (QBOA) to better serve clients and find new revenue opportunities. In this new article, we spotlight Neal Coogler, owner and senior partner of All About Business Services.
Shauna Maher: Tell us about your firm.
Neal Coogler: We provide QuickBooks consulting and bookkeeping services to small non-profits and for-profit service businesses. We specialize in streamlining financial and administrative processes by creating a tech stack for our clients that includes curated third party apps with QuickBooks® Online (QBO) as the core accounting system.
SM: How long have you been using QuickBooks Online Accountant?
NC: As soon as we began using QBO and as soon as the Accountant version became available, we signed up! We had previously used the Accountant version in Desktop, so we were eager to have the extra tools and the dashboard that the Accountant version provides.
SM: What convinced you to make the move to QuickBooks Online Accountant?
NC: It didn’t take much convincing, actually, but I guess the first attraction was the Reclassifying Tool. How can you live without it? But, the Accountant area has grown into much more over the past few years. I love being able to assign team members to clients so that the team only has access to the accounts they need to work in. I like the overview we see in both the Clients and Work tabs, too.
SM: What are your goals for your practice this year?
NC: We have big plans! We are planning to drill down into a niche and further streamline our processes through the apps that we use.
SM: What’s your favorite away-from-the-office place to get work done?
NC: At the kitchen table or in a garden, as long as there is an Internet connection.
SM: Where’s the craziest place you’ve done work for a client?
NC: Hmmm … on an airplane, in hotel rooms and even in the car once (but I get car sick, so not too often there.)
SM: What’s your number one timesavings tip?
NC: Make good use of the rules in QBO. You can speed up your processing time quite a bit by using rules.
SM: When you’re not working, what’s your favorite way to spend your time?
NC: I like to cook, garden and hula-hoop.
SM: What advice do you have for peers that are still on Desktop?
NC: If you haven’t looked at QuickBooks Online in the last year, give it another look. Go to QuickBooks Connect and ask questions while making some new friends. There are so many things that QBOA can do – project tracking, team organization (for accountants), and collaborating with clients, just to name a few.
To sign in to your QBOA account (or to sign up!), click here.
