Journal of Finance and Accounting – TanasiJournal

Archive for January, 2012

Simply put, accounting is the lifeline of a business. Accounting deals with summarizing, analyzing and reporting the financial data and information about a business. An accounting software records and processes the accounting transactions of a business within its functional modules. Financial statements consisting of the balance sheet, profit and loss account, and statement of changes in financial position can be easily prepared with an accounting software.

An accounting software is all about the various functional modules that it has. Some of them are- General ledger which takes care of the company’s financial dealings; Accounts Payable where the company enters its bills and pays the money it owes; Accounts Receivable where money received is entered.

The different categories or types of accounting software are as follows:

a) Small business/personal accounting software which are mainly meant for home users. They are simple and inexpensive with simple functioning such as management of budgets.

b) Low end accounting software are for small business markets that are capable of serving a single national market. Such software are characterized by ‘single entry’ products.

c) Mid market accounting software are for companies with large businesses. These software are capable of serving the needs of multiple national accountancy standards and facilitate accounting in multiple currencies.

d) High end accounting software are complex and expensive business accounting software that are also known as Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP software.

However, you have to keep certain things in mind before buying an accounting software, like the prices of the software, its different features, its after-sales support and alike. Most of the accounting software include all the important accounting modules. The more specialized features a software has, the more expensive it becomes. Your software features must be compatible with your business. Also, the after-sales support is important like FAQ package, local service center and others.

There are a lot of top accounting software available in every category. So, it is not easy to select the best ones. Below are top five accounting software in every category.

A. Small business/personal accounting software:
1. ePeachtree (Best Software)
2. MYOB Plus for Windows (MYOB Software)
3. Peachtree Complete Accounting (Best Software)
4. QuickBooks Online (Intuit)
5. Small Business Manager (Microsoft)

B. Low-End Accounting Software:
1. BusinessVision 32 (Best Software)
2. MAS 90 & MAS 200 (Best Software)
3. QuickBooks Pro 2003 (Intuit)
4. ACCPAC Pro Series (ACCPAC International)
5. Vision Point 2000 (Best Software)

C. Middle-Market Accounting Software:
1. ACCPAC Advantage Series Corporate Edition (Best Software)
2. Great Plains (Microsoft) MAS 90 & MAS 200 (Best Software)
3. Navision (Microsoft)
4. SouthWare Excellence Series (SouthWare)
5. SYSPRO (SysproUSA)

D. High-end accounting ERP Market:
1. Axapta (Microsoft Software)
2. e-Business Suite (Oracle)
3. MAS 500 (Best Software).
4. Solomon (Microsoft)
5. ACCPAC Advantage Series Enterprise Edition (Best Software)

In compiling the above list, a variety of factors such as feedbacks from customers, scalability of the software, and after-sales support are used. Also, the different attributes for different categories have been considered like for ERP software, attributes such as manufacturing solution, supply chain solution and database solution. The above compilation may not be all inclusive and some people might choose to differ with it but it is almost near to perfect list.

1. Credit card companies can change almost all of the terms of the credit card by giving just 15 days notice.

We get used to credit card companies adjusting their lending rate by 1/4% as interest rates fluctuate but did you know they can alter any of the terms for any reason. For example they can increase the late payment fee and they can increase the interest rate without the need to justify it. If you are late or miss just one payment the low rate you are currently being charged can double or even treble almost overnight.

2. Credit card companies can increase the cost of a purchase months after you bought it.

If you purchased a widescreen plasma TV 3 months ago, using a card which at the time was costing 9.9% apr, and you are late with just one payment, the credit card company can charge you a late payment fee, say $40, and increase the interest rate to 29.9% apr, or even more, and there is nothing you can do about it.

They can, in effect, increase the cost of your TV months, or possibly even years after you purchased it. The TV retailer wouldn’t be allowed to do this but your credit card company can.

3. Discount offers are only good if you keep up all your payments.

Interest free balance transfers and initial periods can dissapear for any minor omission. Failure to keep to all the terms of a card will result in special terms being withdrawn and possible penalty interest being applied. If you have interest free purchases and balance transfers make sure you keep up the payments.

4. It’s not just your card payments you have to keep up.

If you miss a payment on your mortgage, or your car or any other financial payment, your credit card companies can re-assess your credit score and increase your interest rate accordingly.

If you therefore miss a loan payment on your boat or car, but still pay the payments due on your cards, you can find that your credit card interest charges jump to 2 or 3 times the original rate.

5. Credit card companies are today making record profits from you.

If you don’t pay your cards in full each month credit card companies make the majority of their profits from you and a substantial portion of that is in the additional charges they levy.

It makes little or no sense to keep money in the bank earning 5% maximum and pay 29.9% or 19.9% or even 9.9% on your cards. Pay off the card and use the card for emergencies rather than the savings. Without the card payments you will be able to rapidly replace the savings.

Without your knowing credit card companies can hold you hostage at the very time you may really need financial assistance. Don’t allow credit card companies the continuing opportunity to make record profits at your expense, and at the same time the opportunity to benefit from any misfortune.

If you can pay the balance off withing 3 to 6 months do so otherwise consider some form of consolidation loan to remove the noose credit card companies have around your neck.

We’ve been hearing how great automated Forex Trading system is.  There are numerous benefits using it.  But is it all about the good things?  There are two sides in a coin, so what is the other side of an automated Forex trading system?

Some traders and investors would say that intuition means a lot when trading.  Some would say that it played a major role when they are clinching a deal or when winning in a trade.  But some traders would say that intuition does not play a role.  Some would say that it works for them, while others would contest that. But given the fact that some people rely on intuition to get good trades, an automated system would not be able to help them.  Since programs and computers do not rely on intuition at all.

Another common thing that traders who use an automated Forex trading system is make their computers and programs take their place in trading.  Actually, this is a great idea.  Having a machine to do your trade for you making you deal with other matters.  But this turns into a disadvantage especially when you let the program and computer do ALL the work.

It is very easy to be comfortable with this setup, relying with your software too much.  Actually, systems could make mistakes too.  You would also need to recognize opportunities and at the same time do on-hand trading.

Another downside of an automated Forex trading system is making sure that your computer is running all the time and you have a dedicated server to run your automated trading. This is to make sure that your expert advisors or EA would work with your home and work computer.

There would be times when you would encounter a chart pattern or wave analysis which is very hard to accomplish.  So you would have to get some professional people to interpret your charts for you and decode some extremely hard patterns.

Another truth that you would have to face is that not all expert advisors handle errors and other unexpected things easily.  So you would need to brace yourself against anything that could disappoint you.  Not everything is perfect.  So, you would to be prepared to face disappointments and handle them.  This is why you would still need knowledge in manual Forex trading.

Nothing is perfect, even computers and programs still make mistakes and can find it difficult to deal with unexpected and crucial points in trading.  Traders and investors prefer to use both automated and manual trading.  They would use automated trading system if they find manual trading difficult.  While, simple systems like simple chart patterns are left to be done manually.

Aside from all of these, another downside is that automated Forex trading is too popular over the internet.  This can either be good or bad.  The good thing is that getting an automated system is easy and at the tips of your fingers.  While the bad thing is that too much popularity can cause numerous websites to come up with scams and cheating over the internee.

There are a lot of automated Forex trading systems for sale in the internet.  They claim that their products are the best among the systems, but they fail to meet the standards.  That it why, people are advised to check on the comments of customers and have a money-back guarantee for the purchase.