how to use Adobe to reduce costs and communicate better

Acrobat helps accountancy firm keep its balance – well almost

Lindeyer Francis Ferguson

It may be situated between the Victorian splendour of Tonbridge School and the medieval majesty of the town’s famous castle, but four-partner accountancy firm Lindeyer Francis Ferguson has made full use of 21st century technology to help it provide high quality services to its clients. John Francis, one of the firm’s founding partners, spoke to the Zone about the part played by Acrobat and PDF.
So why are PDF files important to LFF? "We don’t send stuff to clients by post if we can avoid it." said John, but sending documents produced directly by applications like Word and Excel can present problems. "If I send someone a PDF report it will print out looking as I intended it to look. I can send a PDF and know that when my client prints it out, the report on their desk will look the same as the one on mine."

Losing a button

LFF adopted the use of PDF six or seven years ago. John still remembers the actual incident that led him to realise the necessity of a standard format such as PDF. "A particularly good client of mine phoned up to say that he was in the middle of printing page 267 of the Excel workbook I had sent him, and he still hadn't come across the management accounts. This was in spite of me having reminded him that I had included a massive grey button on the first sheet of the workbook labelled 'PRINT'!"
Since that phone call, Adobe Acrobat has helped LFF to send clients their information swiftly and reliably. Now, when John wants to send a client the key sections from an Excel workbook, he converts the relevant worksheets, or part worksheets, into PDF files. He then uses Acrobat to create a single file that includes all the information he needs to send the client, and only that information.
"Acrobat is essential to the firm for enabling us to combine different files into one PDF report. For example we produce lots of charity accounts. Using a combination of Word and Excel gives us great flexibility in the way we produce the charity reports and accounts. We can then use Acrobat to put the different elements together to create a final document that looks exactly the way that we, and the client, want to see it."
As well as Word and Excel, John uses a whole range of applications to produce PDF files including QuickBooks, PTP Tax Return, Viztopia Accounts Production and Blueprint Company Secretary - all of which can be converted into a single, polished PDF document from within Acrobat.

Return service

LFF's use of Adobe goes well beyond just sending information to clients in a reliable format. John gave the example of tax returns: "We send the tax return to the client in PDF format. They print it out, sign it and send it back to us – some put it in the post, others fax it to us, some scan it and email it back. However they send it, we can convert it back to PDF format – either electronically or by scanning if it comes in the post. We then have a reliable electronic copy of the tax return containing the client's signature which we save in the client's folder." John was pleased to note that HMRC had recently acknowledged that either an electronic or paper copy of the signed return was acceptable.(HMRC Working Together Issue 24 – February 2006 – SA Online for Agents - Frequently Asked Questions.
In fact the whole area of keeping a reliable electronic copy of key documents is one in which John finds PDF has an important role to play. "PDF is a vital tool for archiving final reports from our accounting and tax packages. Often accounts formats change or suppliers upgrade their packages and, unless we've got a PDF copy, it can be very difficult trying to recreate a set of accounts, or a tax return for a previous year. We keep electronic folders for all of our clients containing the PDFs of accounts and tax returns for archive purposes."

No more office tiffs

In addition to PDF versions of documents created by LFF, the firm's electronic folders are used to store scanned copies of incoming documents. Each morning the incoming mail is scanned using a multifunction Kyocera Mita. Until a year or so ago LFF used the 'tif' format as the default for scanning, but then they changed to scanning directly to PDF. "PDFs seem to be becoming more and more ubiquitous so I switched the default to PDF" said John. "We also found that PDFs worked better with the file viewer built into the PowerDesk application that we use."

Don’t try this at home (or anywhere else for that matter)...

We must finish with a word of warning. Please don’t take the Acrobat name too literally. When we spoke to John he was nursing a very sore right arm. This was the result of a compound fracture sustained during a bad landing from a reverse twisting backward flip off a kitchen worktop. It is, John assured us, a long story...

Lindeyer Francis Ferguson (LFF) is the leading firm of Chartered Accountants in Tonbridge, Kent. The firm specialises in providing clients with high quality management accounts, and works with many charities.