Invest in your clients

Resly Invoicing & Jobs resly.com.au

Resly combines the latest technology with simplified trust account- ing, all wrapped up in an intuitive and easy to use system. Specifically built for management rights and holiday letting.

Rise People Accountant Tools risepeople.com

Manage HR, benefits, payroll, and more with Canada’s first and only all-in-one people management platform that helps companies and their people thrive. Effortlessly map journal entry items and sync your payroll data.

SortScape Invoicing & Jobs sortscape.com.au

A simple job scheduling software for lawn & garden maintenance businesses. Add route planning, time tracking and customer messaging to Xero. Spend more time earning and less time driving.

Super Simple Payroll HR yellowcanary.com.au

Easy to use software that allows you to quickly automate Superannuation Guarantee Charge Statements. Super Simple is designed to help you stay compliant with your superannuation obligations.

Sync by theFinanceStack Accountant Tools syncdata.app

Sync by theFitnessStack converts existing spreadsheets into a centralised hub to monitor and organise all your financial data. Connect on your own terms and create any combination of reporting you can imagine.

Synced Accountant Tools syncedhq.com

Reduce data entry by automating document processing and publication from bills, receipts and supplier statements into Xero. Synced makes bill management and bookkeeping a breeze.

Syrve Point of Sale syrve.com

Smart hospitality software to cut through the monotony of everyday tasks, to help you focus on and build a strong business advantage. Syrve drives your operation in powerful new ways, simplifying your accounts.

Tahua Bills & Expenses tahua.io

Reduce double handling, reconciliation, reporting and transparency to help impact your grants mission with Tahua’s grants/ contracts management platform. Integrates with Xero to reduce double handling.

TaxFitness Accountant Tools taxfitness.com.au

TaxFitness has over 100 tax planning strategies for accountants! Evolve beyond the spreadsheet and create professional, automated tax planning reports for your clients, giving yourself a competitive edge.TaxFitness has over 100 tax planning strategies for accountants! Evolve beyond the spreadsheet and create professional, automated tax planning reports for your clients, giving yourself a competitive edge.

Taxify (UAE) Point of Sale taxify.ae

VAT compliance made simple for the UAE. Generate UAE compliant VAT returns with an audit file in a simple and quick process with TaxifyUAE and Xero. Ease the pain of VAT compliance.

Transport Exchange Group Custom Integration transportexchangegroup.com

The leading SaaS and marketplace platform for road transport and logistics! Collaborative trading, efficient resource allocation, invoice and billing functionalities all tailored to the road freight industry.

Wagestream Financial Services wagestream.com

Give your team the flexibility, tools and advice they need to improve financial health, including access to flexible pay, real-time visibility of earnings, supermarket discounts and expert financial coaching.

WOWzer Backup & Restore Accountant Tools wowzerbackupandrestore.com

WOWzer backup and restore is designed by accountants, for accountants to automate the backup function for your Xero data. It allows you to restore a full copy to a new Xero organizations.

Xelation

Ecommerce xelation.org

Take the headache out of reconciling WooCommerce orders as invoices in Xero by synchronizing in real-time. Map line items to their corresponding accounts in Xero. Multi-site and multi-currency.

Rob Brady, Sunshade Business Advisor

XU: Congratulations on the release of the cloud version of Castaway. Compared to previous product builds, how does this one feel?

MF: Thank you. Ah, what a question. This is the third complete rebuild of Castaway in 15 years and of course a necessary one as the world moves away from desktop products. Building cloud software has been a mammoth challenge, especially for a complex forecasting tool. There’s a different technology language, intricate calculations to wrangle, security, privacy, and legal pathways to navigate. I’m so proud of the product we’ve created, it’s powerful engine and the futureproofing we’ve set up. I can’t say I enjoyed every day of the last 3 or 4 years, but I can see a bit of blue sky now we’ve released.

XU: Will you share with us what’s new and what we can expect?

MF: Sure. Castaway cloud is a brand new tool. It’s more powerful than Castaway desktop and we’ve spent time focusing on the user experience. Castaway is known for it’s powerful modeling engine and that’s still there, for sure, but we’ve introduced some incredible dashboard and reporting capability that takes this version way beyond anything we’ve been able to offer with our desktop versions. Castaway is built to enable quick, but robust forecasts with fantastic professional output. Of course, it also delivers the traditional powerful, flexible, robust and thorough forecasts our tools have always been known for.

XU: You’ve spoken with us before about the impact of COVID on your business and how important collaboration and communication were for the team.

Since then, we’ve seen a global shortage of staff in general, but software engineers in particular. How did Castaway respond to this resource challenge?

MF: Our engineering and product teams are led well, so we have retained the core teams throughout the cloud build. We did see a bit of a reshuffle as one or two of our staff moved around. We also managed to hire a few excellent staff in all areas of the business. I’m always looking for the right people to join us as we grow. I’m aware there are so many companies like ours in this situation and have spoken to a few peers about how they manage. Things are starting to settle down and, at the same time, collaboration technology is enabling more resourcing options.

XU: Your passion for the sustainability and health of small businesses has driven your career and delivered your legacy. Do you still feel strongly about small business?

MF: Absolutely. Nothing has changed for me and there’s so much work to be done. I guess I will always be looking for ways to educate and communicate with businesses and the accountants who serve them. I have hundreds of ideas for tools and processes to help various industries understand business operations and improve financial literacy and performance.

XU: Where will we see you and the team this year?

MF: We’ll be exhibiting at Accountex Sydney in March, exhibiting and speaking (hopefully) at Accountex London in May and likely exhibiting at Xerocon Sydney in September. We’ll be out and about speaking and making appearances at other events, but these are our current commitments. We’ll find ourselves on the road a bit more in 2023, keen to connect again with our customers.

XU: ChatGPT and similar AI tools. What are your thoughts on how these language models will impact the accounting industry?

MF: Like most people interested in technology, we’ve looked at ChatGPT and I think it’s impressive. The natural language responses are only going to improve and these types of are here to stay. We’ve asked it all sorts of questions and I’m impressed at the standard of output.

AI will augment the routine and repetitive tasks that accountants do, freeing them up for highervalue work requiring thoughts, ideas, decisions and innovation. AI should improve the accuracy of financial reporting and make auditing easy. From a forecasting point of view. AI can certainly help with the maths but not so much the qualitative aspects of financial forecasting or business modeling. Calculators are required for the output, but the process still requires a combination of hindsight, insight and foresight from the business owner for the input.

At the moment, I don’t think accountants and advisors need to be concerned too much about AI taking over their entire roles. Accountants are currently under so much pressure from their clients to deliver all sorts of value. If AI can reduce this pressure, then it’s a great thing for the industry.

XU: Are you still cycling 10,000km a year?

MF: It’s only early, but I’m on track to reach 10,000km in 2023. My workload in 2022 prevented me from meeting my cycling and charity leadership responsibilities. This disappointed me because I ride to support Tour de Cure Australia, our chosen charity. We raise funds for cancer research and help to raise the awareness of cancer prevention and the importance of research in communities and schools.

To find out more about Castaway Forecasting visit our website: castawayforecasting.com