The Hindu Business Line : Paper-mad accountants

THE headline "`Paperholic' accountants prefer rubber stamps to e-billing" in AccountingWeb seems far respectable than what one may find in Powergen's site, www.powergenplc.co.uk: "Paper-mad accountants costing UK business £168m a year."

The UK company generating and distributing electricity to millions of customers had questioned about 500 accountants in 14 major cities to conclude: "Accountants may think they are the most money-savvy people in the land, but they might actually be costing companies hundreds of pounds — because of their obsession with paperwork."

That does not make a CA happy, but look at the reasons given by the British accountants for not going electronic: "Over half the accountants surveyed said that fear of fraud was a major barrier — even though three-quarters of those surveyed have happily shopped online at home using their personal credit card."

But why should a power company be interested in knowing if accountants are computer savvy? You would know from how the £168 million is arrived at: "Average annual rent per sq. ft. of accountants' own offices stated by respondents is £17.33. Average number of filing cabinets used by each accountant stated is 13.3.

Footprint of typical filing cabinet is 3.12 sq. ft., giving 41.52 sq. ft per office occupied by cabinets, at cost of £719.58. Multiplied by number of registered UK accountants (234,841 Source: Accounting Magazine, June 2003) equals £168.9m." That is, not counting electricity for the air conditioning that the file cabinets and piles of paper can eat up.

"Despite the computer revolution in other industries, it seems many accountants are the office `paperweights', still preferring to rubber stamp a bill than point and click at one," is a comment from the company to stir up the paperweights. A quarter of those surveyed think the changeover will never happen and that they will always use paper, notes Powergen.

Assuming they freed up space by resorting to `e' routes rather than paper hoarding, what would accountants do with extra area? "A third would simply fill the space with more staff to help spread the workload, compared with 8 per cent who would choose a widescreen TV showing live sports channels.

Only one in 20 would have either exercise equipment or a sofa bed to relax on, while just 1 per cent would indulge themselves with an office hot tub."

If laws too become friendlier to soft copies, number crunchers can well give some thought to shedding `paper' weight to increase productivity.

mail to: AccountSpeak@thehindu.co.in

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