Genealogy
NetBasis
NetWorth Services Inc.
www.netbasis.com
We spend millions learning where our ancestors came from and how our families got where they are - all of which the Internal Revenue Service could not care less about. It does care, however, about where your stocks and other securities investments came from and how they got where they are. They've been focusing on this area of cost-basis reporting more stringently in recent years, and while recent legislation requires brokers to start reporting cost-basis information for securities bought after the beginning of this year, for anything before that, investors (and their tax preparers) are on their own.
NetBasis, which offers professional-level cost-basis services to brokerages, accounting firms and other large entities, is now offering its cost-basis research tools to the individual investor, so that for a small fee they can enter all their buys and sells for a particular security and receive a complete report on their adjusted cost basis, gain or loss, sale proceeds, a list of corporate actions, and whether the security came in through Ellis Island.
Inside the box
Business-in-a-Box
Biztree Inc.
www.biztree.com
You know that box you're always supposed to think outside of? Sure, it's dull and boring, but it also has some useful things in it, like standards, time-tested best practices, legal precedents and the accumulated wisdom of the ages, so sometimes it pays to think inside it. One useful box to think inside is Business-in-a-Box, document-writing template software that contains more than 1,500 business and legal document templates for things like contracts, business plans, proposals and spreadsheets written by legal and business professionals that you can easily apply to your own business. It comes in eight languages (including Spanish, French, Chinese and Arabic), integrates with MS Office, and has an auto-fill function to make it easy for you to stay inside the box. Because you know who doesn't think outside the box? Bankruptcy courts and federal marshals.
They do the work
Retirement CFA
Emerging Information Systems Inc.
www.eisi.com
As we all know, the point of the Web is to relieve you of the burden of working, or to ease the pain of having to work. In the case of EISI's new Retirement Consumer Facing Application for its Profiles Professional financial planning software, it's the former: It's a retirement calculator that sits on your Web site, where it generates leads by letting prospects go through a series of questions and interactive slider bars to see financial projections and explore planning strategies. They get a report and encouragement to contact you; you get their contact info. And should they sign up with you, you don't have to re-enter all the data they put in the calculator, as you can import it directly into Profiles Professional. All you have to do is let referral sources and prospects know the site is there, and they do all the work for you - except, of course, for the part where you do the actual financial planning.
Forces behind IFRS
IFRS Partner on Checkpoint
The Tax & Accounting business of Thomson Reuters
http://ria.thomsonreuters.com
In the end, it might not be the Securities and Exchange Commission that inflicts IFRS on U.S. accountants, but their clients: So many are operating or working with partners overseas that you may end up being exposed to IFRS whether the SEC likes it or not. Fortunately, Thomson Reuters has partnered with Issues Central to add the latter's IFRS Partner software to the former's Checkpoint research platform. IFRS Partner offers all sorts of conversion aids to make the switch to IFRS easier, including tools for project planning, scoping GAAP-to-IFRS differences, drafting new accounting policies, creating draft IFRS financial statements, and much more. So whoever pushes you into IFRS, you'll be ready.
Apps you might want
FreshBooks Add-on Store
FreshBooks
www.freshbooks.com
Apple likes to remind us that there's an app for "that," but they leave unspoken the question of why you would want to do "that" in the first place. That's not an issue with the add-ons available in the new Add-on Store from online invoicing solution provider FreshBooks. The third-party apps available there all extend the company's invoicing functionality for accountants and small businesses, with offerings such as the Peachtree Connector, ReportAway! for BlackBerry, Constant Contact Export, and more, some of which are free.
Many more ways to pay
Sage Mobile Payments
Sage Payment Solutions
www.sagepayments.com
For small businesses, there can never be enough ways to get paid. Sage Payment Solutions is doing its best to help, by releasing Sage Mobile Payments, which lets businesses accept credit and debit cards on over 400 types of mobile phones and computer devices. It's Payment Card Industry-compliant and available with an optional card-reading device, and all data is encrypted from one end of the service to another. Starting at as low as $10.95 a month, and with no incremental mobile processing or transaction fees, it promises to make it a lot easier - and less expensive - to get paid.
A better Vault
SmartVault Version 3.3
SmartVault
www.smartvault.com
SmartVault has released Version 3.3 of its document storage and sharing solution, with a number of enhancements that make it both more secure and easier to use. The new User Activity Logs (available for Professional Plan users only) provide an audit trail to see what documents were uploaded, downloaded or deleted, and which were changed and when, while the new Copy Link Feature lets you easily create a link to any file or folder in SmartVault to store on your desktop, or embed in a file or e-mail. There are also over a dozen enhancements to existing features, including making it easier to personalize e-mail messages when sharing documents or folders.
Look out, Charlie
CCHPayrollTalk on Twitter
CCH, a Wolters Kluwer business
http://twitter.com/cchpayrolltalk
Hard as it may be to believe, Twitter isn't just for teens to record their miserable adolescence in real-time, or for celebrities looking to chronicle their latest meltdown. It also offers opportunities for staying up to date on things that actually matter. Case in point: CCH's new Twitter feed on payroll, which offers professionals with an interest in the subject instant updates on both federal and state payroll compliance regs, as well as peer feedback and interactive exchanges on current industry issues. And while we don't expect CCHPayrollTalk to amass 2 million followers quite as quickly as Charlie Sheen, at least CCH's tweets will be in English, and won't make you doubt the nature of reality.
If it's not fixed ...
BNA Fixed Assets Version 2011.0
BNA Software
www.bnasoftware.com/fixedassets
Your fixed assets may be fixed, but many of the rules that govern their accounting treatment are not - as proved by legislation last year that extended some depreciation rules and changed others. Version 2011.11 of BNA Software's BNA Fixed Assets asset management solution has been updated to handle all 12 of the major tax law changes introduced last year, including the extensions to and increase in first-year-depreciation, the updated luxury vehicle limitations, and the updated Section 179 amounts.
New and improved!
Stonefield Software has released a new version of its Stonefield Query for Sage Accpac, with a dashboard wizard, new comparison options, drill-down capabilities for charts and graphs, and more. ... Lyquidity announced that its Comply XL spreadsheet management solution now supports rights-protected and encrypted files. ... Maxwell Systems has released Version 2.5 of its ProContractorMX construction management solution, with mobile data access, document management capabilities, payroll e-filing and more.
