5 Reasons To Outsource Your Accounts
Written by Nicholas Hastings, CEO and Founder
It’s been a wild ride through 2022 and, as we herald in the New Year, conditions are set to remain chaotic for Australian businesses. As supply chain disruptions and interest rate hikes collude to reduce profit margins, the onus remains on ownership and management to keep the ship steady. Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) programs can alleviate the cost pressures, but where should they be applied? Which department will see the biggest gains in productivity and workload management with the support of expert offshore personnel?
In our experience, a resounding benefactor of outsourcing programs is the Accounts team. Often the unsung heroes of the business, these team members act as its engine room. If the output of Accounts slows, the rest of the business is liable to respond in kind. Payments stall, suppliers grow increasingly restless, and reputations are tarnished quickly.
Core Accounts personnel need support and guidance to keep the machine ticking. They need a clear priority of tasks to accomplish and the resources to do so effectively. Our hammerjack team members from the Philippines can provide that essential support on a cost-effective basis, creating a sustainable model that’s scalable as your needs change. It’s a no-brainer, and we have the reasons why.
1. Saving Money Doesn’t Mean Overloading Employees
I understand that the cost pressures are high for business owners, especially if you’re within a volatile sector such as construction or hospitality. Regardless, there’s a truth you need to hear. Cutting down on support personnel and expecting a few core accounts heroes to cover the gaps will only breed resentment and burnout. People are only capable of so much for so long, and the additional weight will eventually take effect. You may end up alienating those staff who you consider the most indispensable.
The goal is not ‘minimal spending’ but ‘targeted spending’. If an extra, low-cost offshore team member allows your Accounts personnel to thrive within your business, then you actually stand to save money in the long term. Money is saved on contracting expensive local third parties to cover the inevitable overflow of work. Money is saved when you don’t need to direct staff to commence a new recruitment drive due to burnt-out ex-team members. Money is saved when customers deal with an Accounts team that is efficient and effective, reducing requests for refunds and negative reviews.
The old expression is that it ‘takes money to make money’. The real meaning behind that phrase is that expenditure is necessary for a business’s success – so long as it isn’t reckless. It can seem like a complex problem until it’s not. Your accounts team need support to want to remain at your business and feel valued and supported, yet employing extra domestic staff increases the wage pressures too dramatically. Offshore staff provide the key. Your core team members will feel more seen by your business – they’ll feel their concerns are being listened to. At the same time, you can avoid breaking the budget with high-cost local skill providers.
2. A Balance Sheet Is A Balance
Accounts benefit hugely from outsourcing support because of the consistency in the profession and the universal language of numbers. Reconciling Accounts Receivable and Payable is a matter of maths, and maths knows no borders. In many ways, a t-ledger is a t-ledger – no matter which institution trains you (or the nation you work from). That’s not to say that compliance with local regulations isn’t a real factor, but that’s why our hammerjack team is here to assist you.
As long as you partner with an outsourcing provider who can onboard offshore staff seamlessly (as we can), the barriers to entry for Accounts support players are minimal. They simply need compliance training and in-house procedure training, both of which we can help facilitate, and then they’re ready. It is a department that can see the most results in the shortest turnaround. This process is more efficient if offshore team members are liaising with an experienced onshore team member who can advise them on best practices at your company. The core team member may be more than happy to collaborate with our offshore skill providers, considering the positive impacts on their own workload and time management (see point 1).
3. Outsourcing Accounts Is Easily Scalable
Once they know the in-house procedures and steps for regulatory compliance, our skilled offshore Accounts personnel can be implemented into your infrastructure without hassle as your needs dictate. As seasonal revenues fluctuate, the breathing room this flexibility provides for you and your staff is invaluable. If the cost pressures get too severe – relax; it’s ok. You can scale the program down until customer numbers return to normal. The agility provided by a BPO program creates the critical time and space to respond to changing demands on staff without reliance on overinflated domestic wages.
As soon as you enter the bumper season, you can bring on as many additional expert offshore team members as required to accommodate the increases in demands, customer queries, database entries and payments. Partnering with hammerjack throughout this process allows us to match our skilled professionals to your team over the long term to create efficiency. If we have staff who previously supported your team, we’ll endeavour to re-pair them with your business to ensure consistency and seamless integration.
4. One Person, Two, Or A Whole Department
Further to the point above, Accounts are a department that, if necessary for margins, can be entirely remote and offshore-based. These team members traditionally have far fewer customer-facing hours than other staff within the business. A fully outsourced, dedicated Accounts team can produce excellent results so long as the communication and task management infrastructures are up to scratch.
Outsourcing a dedicated team is an instance where partnering with a high-quality BPO provider in hammerjack makes all the difference to the program’s success. Outsourcing programs fail when the provider just sets a backside in a chair and wanders off. We ensure that the lines of communication are in place and working as they should. We ensure that the task management systems are in place so that everyone knows what is due, from whom, and when. We manage the relationship to ensure that every party involved feels as though it’s the right fit. Without a partner such as our hammerjack team, outsourcing a full department can be dangerous work. Crucial information falls through the cracks and ownership misguidedly thinks that outsourcing is a flawed remedy. Without our support, you’re setting up all team members (on and offshore) to fail.
5. Time Is Money
Small business owners especially need to take heed. You need time and space for creativity. Time and space to envision where the business could go – what products it could develop and markets it could enter. If you’re locked up in spreadsheets and payment systems, trawling Xero or MYOB as you work out taxes, you’re losing this valuable time. You may think you can make do, but are you moving forwards? Are you taking your business to the next level? Time lost is money lost, and having your attention absorbed by menial accountancy tasks is an easy way to lose a lot of time.
This is work that can be completed elsewhere. You’re not saving money by keeping it in your office; instead you’re hamstringing your potential. Allow a low-cost, high-quality offshore team member to alleviate this pressure so that you can perform at your optimum; focus on the bold next steps you need to take. Every day your competitors are thinking about ways to capture your market share. Focus too long on the minutiae, and they may just sneak past you without you recognising it.
Accounts work is work that you do not have to do yourself. It is procedural, mathematical and direct. It is delegatable. Allow yourself to be supported, and you’ll see the transformation that a little bit of time affords your vision for the business. So long as you partner with hammerjack, you can rest assured that we’re keeping the lines of communication open and the relationship secure.
—
The impact of outsourcing your Accounts tasks can be immediate and profoundly positive for your business. It’s work that easily allows support players to quickly onboard and play a role – due to its universal nature and basis in numbers. The critical component is ensuring that all staff, whether on or offshore, feel as though they’re being set up for success, not failure.
The way to guarantee that is to partner with an outsourcing provider that is genuinely invested in your success, as we are at hammerjack. It’s not enough to simply set and forget – we want to see your business truly succeed, and we want our highly skilled team members to be a part of that success. It’s a partnership for the long term, which sets us apart from so many other providers.
To begin a conversation about how outsourcing could unlock the potential in your business, speak to one of our expert team today.