Good morning.

Ever since lock down (you may remember the first one was 25 March 2020) and the catastrophic mess that arose from that, even to this day…. including escalating outbound costs…rent/mortgage/compliance costs, increases in MYOB costs, fuel increase, power, insurance, telephone and BB costs, food prices, you name it …everything has gone up. And up. This is certainly true of bank profits as well.

I have indicated for the last few years that our fees will rise.

It has now come time to recognise that our fees must rise by 10% from 01 March 23 onwards. I have pushed back the need to increase fees, however it cannot remain this way for another day. The increase is GST incl, and as always fully tax deductible.

If we pay your MYOB subscriptions, that fee will increase 35%. If your MYOB is $20.00 a month, it will now be $26.00.Remeber this comes out of our bank account directly. End of Year MYOB Accountants Office software which is used for end of year accounts will increase 30% also. This is a fully loaded tax and company et al compliant, industry standard package, which we own and upgrade each month. We cannot work without it as we have to comply with a raft of compliance requirements, including 2FA (2 Factor authentication) and all anti-money laundering legislation, and reporting to IRD. These alone are mandatory and time consuming.

To look at this another way, the increase will not affect you once you consider you will pay less tax and GST.

Like most, we have suffered losses and have bid farewell to 14 clients over the last year who have, and quite rightly so, suffered too much ongoing fatigue and stress in being a business owner, opting for the comfort of wages, or deregistering for GST and taking a step back. In all cases we have supported these clients unconditionally, which is the right thing to do, even if it costs us time and energy.

Looking at our business model, I still see that the accounting side of things in some cases for our clients is viewed as a necessary cost, or a burden. This is wrong. The amount of information that is available to use as a tool is incredible, and is useful for planning, reflection, budgeting, finance lending and control.

Also the data can be used as a yardstick as such…measuring just how well you the owner are doing. Or not.

The way forward for us here at FALC is to integrate more business strategy, leadership and management tools, available to you to sync in harmoniously with accounting.

A business owner is one thing, a business leader is another in my view.As you know I successfully completed Management Economics at Harvard Business School (HBS) class of 2022. This was a global course of which only 11% of the cohorts (students) passed. This year I have been invited back and will study Business Strategy and then Disruptive Business Strategy. I am also working with the Maxwell Leadership team in the states. John C Maxwell is a pioneer in leadership. I hope to gain accreditation…at some stage. I thoroughly recommend you read his books, they are informative and enlightening.

I believe the way forward as a business person is to have an acute balance of:

Accounting skills.

Management skills

Foresight skills

Leadership skills.

Grit

Focus

Determination

And a willingness to succeed.

These days we need to be sharp, focused and determined. Being in business is rewarding and difficult, often harrowing, but if you are in business, we all should be looking to grow. Being static is going backwards.

Today is 01 March 2023. The first day of Autumn. Like you we are burdened by the lack of a refreshing summer, that glorious time when we go to the beach for a swim, have a summer bbq and get a tan, relax and have fun.

In previous emails ….mailers and newsletters, I have mentioned “help us to help you”.

We have clients going back to 2021 with arrears of filing and years earlier in tax arrears.

So from today on, no further reminders will be issued, because our pleas are ignored. The files will be closed today.

I believe in quid pro quo, which means something for something. Help us to help you.

To help us move forwards, I will be emailing you individually with a request to write an unsolicited google review. I am very grateful if you would assist. To that end my thanks.

As always, I am here and happy to help. But not to see no action taken. Embrace the challenge and charge at opportunities, on a balanced determination.There is skill involved in that.

All the very best.
DC