It’s been a good week so far.
It is only Wednesday and I’ve signed a payments advisory contract, been interviewed on my thoughts on the progress made with Open Banking and written a piece on the importance of consumer education when implementing regulatory change.
Even my 20 year old imported Renault Twingo successfully managed to get a new MOT on Monday.
So, all in all, a good week with much more planned for the rest of the week.
But as I take a mid-week checkpoint can I honestly say that everything I have done has really added value?
How much time have I spent on non productive administration tasks?
Time I could have spent much more profitability?
Far too much!
Far too much time raising invoices, processing expenses, managing finances and navigating the tax system.
With a resolve to do something about it I stumbled upon a report from Starling Bank called #MakeBusinessSimple
The report includes six statistics reassuring me that I am not alone.
Small businesses are spending too much time on financial admin which is holding back value adding activity.
The report even suggests that banks ought to provide better support, now there’s a thought.
Helpfully, Starling Bank have devised a five point plan to help reduce financial admin.
Five simple and practical steps to #MakeBusinessSimple.
If, like me, you think you have spent far too much time on non productive administrative tasks this week you’ll be clicking on this link to Starlings report pretty swiftly – #MakeBusinessSimple
Part of the research conducted by Starling Bank concludes that “only a quarter of micro businesses feel supported by their bank when it comes to financial admin.”
Well, if Starling are going to make this claim I feel that they ought to provide a solution – and it turns out they have.
The challenger bank has placed a Sole Trader Toolkit into Beta and offered an invitation to join a waitlist.
Billed as a reliable and invisible part time bookkeeper it is claimed that the toolkit takes the features of the free to use Starling business account and supercharges it with extra bells and whistles.
With Starling suggesting that the Sole Trader Toolkit will be great if you feel overwhelmed by admin, want to keep everything in one place and like the idea of automated bookkeeping it will come as no surprise that I immediately joined the waitlist.
For now all I can do is point you to the sole trader part of Starling Banks website. As soon as I get off the waitlist and have access to the Toolkit I will let you know how I get on.
So, having spent far too much time on (financial) admin this week, I resolve to #MakeBusinessSimple – will you join me?