Introduction
The accounting functionality that is needed for a small business that was not discussed in the case is balance sheet automation to track assets and liabilities. Square primarily tracks and monitors cash flows, whereas Quick Books Online is mainly used for income and expense for income statement analysis. The key difference between a balance sheet and cash flow statements or income statements is the fact that it records what a business owns as assets and owes as liabilities. Incorporating such an accounting functionality can greatly complete the automation of the entirety of Nathan Tuckwell’s businesses. For example, a balance sheet can be highly useful to understand and know how much money Nathan’s business could have after he decided to pay off all debts and sell all assets. To properly run a business, including a small one, it is critical to be knowledgeable about the existing state of assets and liabilities.
Discussion
When it comes to alternative software solutions to Nathan’s business challenges, Zoho Books is superior in terms of costs. For example, Zoho Books has a free plan, whereas the cheapest plans for Quick Books and Xero are $25 and $11 per month (SaaSworthy, 2022). When comparing the most premium plans, Quick Books is the most expensive at $180 per month, whereas Zoho Books and Xero costs $70 and $62 per month (SaaSworthy, 2022). Support for Quick Books and Xero is higher compared to Zoho Books since the former two have access to monitoring 24/7, while the latter only operates within business hours.
However, even though these applications are all mobile-based, which means they operate on Android as well as iOS, Quick Books can additionally work on installed Windows and Mac, whereas others cannot (SaaSworthy, 2022). Thus, Quick Books has higher ease of use compared to Zoho Books and Xero. In the case of functionality, all three applications include all key functional elements, and no major distinction can be identified except for Zoho Books. The latter does not have a Payroll function (SaaSworthy, 2022). Interfaces and user-friendliness are mostly equivalent for all three software programs, but all of them require some minor effort in learning all of their functional capabilities to maximize their utilities.
Conclusion
The key advantage of using a cloud-based app is that a user does not require to have his or her servers to store and process data. The latter needs are outsourced to a specialized company, which stores information for them. The added benefit is that a user does not need to worry about cybersecurity and maintenance of their hardware. However, the potential issues are that data can be damaged, made inaccessible, lost, or stolen by a host of the cloud. In addition, costs for plans can become significant in the long term compared to having one’s servers.
Reference
SaaSworthy. (2022). Compare Quickbooks vs Zoho Books vs Xero vs Wave. Web.