Some years ago BMW used to run a series of adverts on April Fools day “publicising” a new (spoof) feature. One that has always stuck in my mind was a “feature” enabling the driver to check the car’s tyre pressures from inside the cockpit.

The additional clever twist was that the reading automatically adjusted for the time of day, so that after lunch, for example, it would take into account that the driver would likely be heavier having eaten!

I mention this only because my new car tells me when my tyre pressures are low even if it doesn’t account for my eating habits! So predictions do sometimes come true.

I feel that this is somewhat similar to when I first started talking about the Cloud, the reaction from many was akin to me making an April Fool’s spoof.. and yet the predictions have proven to be reality and the Cloud is now accepted as being the standard operating system for today.

Yet I was surprised (well, not really!) by the recent comments of a partner in a small practice who was not looking forward to the disruption caused by a change over of servers.

“Why not put everything on the cloud?”

“Security”….. came the reply. Really?

As my followers will know, we operate 100% in the Cloud and this is a list of some of the software we use:

 

  • Accounting  –  Reviso
  • Personal Tax – Taxfiler
  • Email – Google Mail
  • Statutory compliance – First Order
  • File storage – Dropbox
  • Secure emailing – Sharefile
  • Telephone – VOIP – RingCentral
  • Statutory accounts, Corporation Tax – Caseware (via Hosted Desktop)

It would be interesting to learn what other practices are using.

As for the practice and their server…..well I suppose evolution will take its course.