Accountant coaching group Proactive Accountants Network has reinvented itself as software company Panalitix.
Panalitix is part dashboard for monitoring clients’ businesses and part educational library for training accountants to deliver business advisory services.
CEO Rob Nixon sees online accounting as a “rising tide” and that accountants face a capacity gap.
“We recognised that cloud accounting is not going to go away. The capacity gap is real, so we’re enabling the accountants to fill that capacity gap, that cloud accounting creates with business advisory solutions for their clients,” Nixon says.
Panalitix draws information from Xero, MYOB and QuickBooks Online.
Panalitix is not an online accounting software but a business advisory tool for accountants, Nixon says. “We don’t compete against any cloud accounting software company. In fact, we integrate their data into our solutions. We are not a competitor.
“We’re alerting accountants to what’s going on, showing them how to analyse that data and, most importantly, we’re giving them resources and tools to do something about the data that is in front of them.”
Panalitix operates in four stages. The first stage is to consolidate client data from multiple accounting programs for the clients of accounting firms and combine it into one dashboard. The accountant can then see what’s going on in their client base in real time,” Nixon says.
The second stage monitors the consolidated data and alerts the accountant to the good and bad issues within the client base based on key performance indicators set by the accountant. If a client is showing worrying trends in cash flow, profit or receivables, the accountant can be notified immediately.
In the third stage the accountant analyses the data. While clients are different in the way their accounts are set up, Panalitix has “made the data consistent no matter which software [the clients is] using”. This allows the accountant to look at trend analysis, performances reviews and summary data, “making all the data consistent for the accounting firm”, Nixon says.
The fourth final stage is the advice element of the Panalitix software. By using the software, the accountant is able to go back to their client after identifying worrying trends and assist them by delivering business advisory services. The Panalitix e-learning platform helps accountants to train their team in this area. In this way, the software enables accountants to be proactive, instead of reactive.
