Ignition feature puts the profit back into scope creep
Instant billing facility enables practices to charge for ad hoc or additional work without a fresh client proposal.
Ignition has added an instant billing facility to its professional services software that allows accountants to charge for ad hoc or out-of-scope work without creating a fresh proposal or client agreement.
Co-founder and chief product officer Dane Thomas said unrecovered out-of-scope work affected 95 per cent of accounting and bookkeeping practices and cost on average more than $103,000 a year.
“It’s never been more important for professional services firms to maximise revenue in today’s economic climate,” he said.
“With Instant Bill, our goal is to make getting paid for out-of-scope work simple.”
“Our research shows that 35 per cent of accounting professionals in Australia absorb the time and cost of increased scope of work themselves.
“Instant Bill helps ensure they’re not leaving money on the table when the scope of work changes or clients request additional services after they’ve signed the engagement letter.”
Ignition said Instant Bill delivered the ready ability to charge and get paid for work outside an existing client agreement. It also saved time by removing the need to create a new proposal for either one-off or recurring services and allowed for greater transparency of practice performance.
Inspire Accountants founder and Ignition customer Ben Walker said the feature works well for raising quick, pre-agreed bills.
“Billing for jobs like SMSF audit reimbursements and out-of-scope items where we’ve had a quick phone call with a client is going to be far more efficient,” he said.
Ignition said Instant Bill built on the recently released Service Edits feature, which simplified altering the scope of an existing client engagement – such as the price, quantity or billing of agreed services – after a client had accepted the proposal.
Mr Thomas said tackling scope creep would help accountants get paid for all the work they did.
“Customers can use Ignition to engage clients with a clear scope of work from day one, with the confidence that they can easily adjust the existing scope or charge for additional services when things inevitably change,” he said.
Ignition said its software helped customers save an average of over 18 hours a week engaging clients, managing scope changes, and billing, collecting and reconciling payments.
Founded in 2013, Ignition has more than 6,500 accounting and professional services clients globally.
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