McPhersons

They’ve recently pushed their business leaps forward by migrating their working processes to the cloud. But, for such a move to be successful, they needed guaranteed connectivity. This is where Beaming came in.

Challenges

Any modern business will be left behind if it doesn’t stay up to speed with technology. The accounting industry has its particular benchmarks, as McPhersons’ Director Mark Finch explains, “The landscape’s about to change for everybody: the digital tax revolution is two years away, and every business will have to submit quarterly tax information online. That’s not going to be possible if they haven’t got the right connectivity.” In readiness, the firm made the decision to migrate from local in-house servers to a hosted desktop environment a few years ago. But the accompanying challenge was to make sure they could confidently connect to the internet. “When you’re on the cloud,” adds Mark, “everything you do is somewhere else – you have to be able to connect to it.”

Solutions

Beaming’s solution was to put them on a fibre optic ‘leased line,’ and they were one of the first in the area to have it. By having dedicated bandwidth, the service provided by a leased line is faster and more resilient. Plus, as it’s a fibre connection the speed can be increased when necessary, future proofing the connectivity.

Before the jump into the cloud, McPhersons took a number of steps, including the other major change: the transition to paperless accounting. And, as with so many businesses we work with, security is a critical issue. The managed firewall and antivirus software we supplied offers huge peace of mind.

Results

The cloud-based service, the robust connectivity that supports it, and the fact that all their software is integrated, enables the firm to be efficient and provide a better service. And, if clients are also on the cloud, it’s easier to collaborate and share data, making them more integrated with their business. Mark knows that keeping pace with progress is a continual process requiring a committed investment, but he’s confident that his firm is one step ahead. “We know this investment allows us to support our clients in the best possible way.” he said.