Giving Clients Confidence in Their Cash with Generate Accounting
Angus Ogilvie is the Managing Director of Xero’s Small Accounting Partner of the Year 2019, Generate Accounting, based in Auckland, New Zealand.
Using Float, Angus has been able to host more actionable and valuable advisory conversations with his clients. So here’s the story of how this Xero Award Winner uses Float to enhance his advisory services.
Using Float as part of advisory services
Before the conversation even really gets going, Angus announces that he’s currently waiting on a client’s budgetary information so that he can set them up on Float.
“Most of our clients don’t have any kind of budget in place. So we need to give them a little bit of homework.”
It’s a small piece of extracurricular activity, but Angus knows that it’s essential to have in place when initially moving clients from compliance services to the advisory space.
“Float is quite granular. Rather than a traditional cash flow which would just be a monthly exercise, it goes right down to a daily one. So you need that budget in place to get started.”
And as Angus sagely states, if you pay your staff late, you’ll usually only do it once!
“Once the budget is captured, you’re pretty much 90% there, and we can start having genuine conversations about any issues that might be coming up.”
The importance of advisory conversations
For Angus, holding advisory conversations with his clients has been invaluable to his understanding of the businesses he works with.
“Float is far more valuable for businesses looking to grow because these businesses need to watch their cash like a hawk.”
“By having technology in place, we can schedule monthly recurring meetings with clients. We prepare an agenda, and take minutes to make sure we’re all clear on what’s been discussed, what’s going to be discussed, and most importantly what the actions are to take going forward.”
This methodical approach to cash flow advisory is particularly useful when talking to businesses with more than one director.
“Obviously, sole directors tend to be in total unanimity with themselves,” Angus says with a chuckle. “But really, where these meetings come into their own are where there’s more than one director. We can be there to flag issues and to be a sort of referee.”
“Ultimately you’re guiding people towards a commercial outcome. So we use Float as a bit of a pragmatic tool to help make the best decisions.”
Helping a client to grow
For one client, in particular, growth was rapid due to a significant grant from the government. “They had twenty staff, and now they’re at ninety.”
It was in using Float that Angus was able to advise his client on the best ways to manage their newly-acquired cash.
“We were just able to model significant change, from the increase in salary costs to the fact that they were acquiring an office in Christchurch as well as Auckland.”
With Float, it took Angus mere minutes to be able to work model out the significant change to salaries as well as location. But there were also incidental costs that went along with these changes to the business.
“It was factoring in so much more than the rent that became important. We had to look at vehicle costs too, with the onboarding of new staff. With about thirty vehicles on the road, we had to make sure that outgoing was accounted for.”
Using Float with Shelly Davies
Another client that Angus used Float with is one that credits Float with “saving [her] life.”
Shelly Davies is a solopreneur and runs a successful writing training business, bringing “writing, joy, and badassery” into the world. The first to admit that accounting “is like a black hole in [her] brain,” Shelley credits Angus for the introduction to Float that helped her to get to grips with her cash flow.
“Angus is just an amazing accountant, and Float rocked my world!”
“It means I know what’s happening and I can plan for any slump coming my way. I’m just so less likely to hit something and have no idea where it came from!”
It wasn’t only Shelley that benefitted from Angus’ introduction of Float. Shelley was able to introduce Float to her partner, in an airport of all places!
“He was paralysed because he just couldn’t make financial decisions with any confidence – that is, until he found Float.”
It’s clear to us why Angus won the Xero NZ’s Small Accounting Partner of the Year 2019 Award, and it’s clear to his clients too.
Using Float to enhance his advisory services, Angus has been able to give his clients the confidence they need to cure their business paralysis, and we’re incredibly proud to work with him.
To find out how Float can help your firm and your clients, why not sign up for a free trial today?!
