I’ve just got back from a job, I won’t say exactly where it was just in case anyone with bad intentions reads this, but I have never seen so many frogs in my life! As I drove down the road, I first thought that they were leaves scattered over the road, what with the high winds we have had around the UK over the last few days. But as I looked a bit closer I realised what they were, as leaves would have been predominantly flat, but what I could see was mainly not, I say mainly as although it was a pretty narrow road this had obviously been going on for some time and several cars had obviously already gone through, leaving quite a few of them squished on the road.

When I got back I told my partner about it and was told that frogs have migration paths, so if it was a particularly large lake over the other side of the road (I don’t know because it was pretty dark by then) that they all head back to the place they were born in the spring to breed and lay their spawn, which all makes sense to me. I must admit to knowing very little about nature being a driver. But this got me onto the web, looking it up and finding out a bit more about British wildlife.

There is loads of info’ so I didn’t get very far, but I did find a few interesting things, both from the wildlife conservation type of groups who tend to specialise in a particular type of species, but there are also quite a few suppliers of wildlife equipment who have lots of related information about wildlife available, so I learnt quite a bit in a short space of time and decided to share that now I’m typing away anyway.

For example, did you know that Muntjac deer give birth all year round (they are the little ones which are about the size of a dog with the tusks). Or that you can tell the difference between a Buzzard and a Red Kite by the shape of it’s tail, the Buzzard has a fan shaped tail, whereas a Red Kite has a forked tail.

All in all it has made me think a bit about nature and animals a bit more, so next time I’m out driving around in the countryside, I’ll take a bit more notice of what I see and then look it up when I get home.

We spent last weekend driving round and round Swindon town centre (it’s in Wiltshire) completely and utterly lost. We were looking for a friends private party, they had hired out a hall and laid on a few nibbles, a disco and a party band (OK, I know this because we did eventually make it there).

The problem with driving in Swindon, is that whoever designed the road signs seems to have completely forgotten that it’s only people who live there who know what the local estates are called, the rest of us (or those who don’t have, or like in my case have a broken satnav) have to base our navigation on road names and numbers.

Swindon is so weird, as all but the major signs, only point to estates, which is absolutely no use to you if you don’t live there. I don’t know where the band came from, but they must have had a sat nav if they weren’t local, as otherwise they would never have had the time to set the PA and lighting rig up, then find time to sound-check before all the party guests arrived.

We actually missed almost all of their first set too, and judging by the second half, I expect that was good too, they played all types of music and had the dance-floor packed all night, with people bopping around. I must confess though, it’s funny that whenever I see a party band, it never fails to amaze me how everyone suddenly converts to doing their wedding dances.

Anyway, the point of this wasn’t to tell you how good the party was, or to harp on about the group who played (although they were good!), it was to warn people not to drive into Swindon without a map or a sat nav, or you may well end up driving into town, then back out, into an estate, then back into town again and the whole time keep finding yourself on the one way system around the town centre, at a point just past where you wanted to turn off, so have to go all the way round again.

Many people approach their finances with a sense of despair.  Accounting for one’s own expenses is not only concerned with preparing an annual income tax return, but should focus on all matters relating to individual or a group’s financial affairs.  This can include not only management of cash flow, but of assets and other valuable items that determine the financial value of an individual or business.
Be Your Own Accountant
Maintaining good business records and maintaining a budget is not difficult if an appropriate platform is created that enables information to be easily and carefully maintained.  Many software options exist that enable the average person to maintain their own records and these are invaluable for those who are attempting to look after their own book keeping and financial records.
For those who may need a little more help, classes are held in local colleges that can provide basic education on the fundamentals of record keeping and use of the more popular accounting software.  Anyone who wants to be their own accountant who feels they lack the skills to use the software or to otherwise maintain their own records to the required legislation standards would be advised to consider taking these classes.
How to Maintain Business and Financial Records
Maintaining business and financial records is obligatory for all individuals and businesses and the reporting time for income tax is an audit of people’s financial affairs and financial obligations to the community at large.  Income tax fraud is considered a major crime and those who don’t take these obligations seriously and break applicable reporting laws can be in serious trouble.
A home or business office must have the capability of safely and securely storing all financial records.   The storage system may be as simple as a locked filing cabinet or a safe and computerised storage system with appropriate back up of records in case of system failure.
If you choose to maintain your own records and submit your tax returns and financial reports it is required by law that your organisations business records are audited annually.  Business records will be reviewed by the tax department regularly and personal accounts can be audited at any time.
Effective Accounting and Your Business and Personal Finances
Whilst accurate and reliable financial records are important for legal reasons, maintaining books and knowing the financial status of your personal self or of your business is good and essential business practice.  At any time, a good manager will know how well the budget is being balanced to ensure that at the end of the year the business will record a profit and not a loss.
Record keeping of all expenses and income is the easiest way to provide a visible tracking of how much the company is at risk of recording a debt or being successful at the end of a financial year, this is easier with a software such as sage 50 though, but if you do decide to use a sage accounts package, you best learn how to use it well..  Preparation of the next year’s budget, planning strategies and goals are made much simpler with this information readily available.  This information is equally important for the individual watching over and accounting for their own personal finances and financial circumstances.

It is extremely difficult to maintain an in-depth knowledge of tax laws which are regularly updated and modified.  Knowing how to avoid ethical accounting problems whether you are looking after your own tax records or employing the services of an accountant is essential to the average citizen and business owner.  Ethical accounting practices balance business responsibilities and legal accounting requirements with moral and justice based decision making.  Most people who do their own tax returns and maintain their own tax records are honest people who intend to maintain all applicable state and national tax laws in the preparation of their returns and the maintenance of their business records.
Problems arise when people don’t understand or in some cases the complex tax laws that apply to their individual station.  Any suggestion of unethical practices or actions on the part of a business, individual or organisation can not only lead to criminal investigation but at worst prosecution, whether or not unethical behaviour has occurred, reputations are tarnished at best.

Transparency is the Ethical Approach
Transparency is the key to avoiding ethical accounting problems and creating a business environment that ensures an open book approach to accounting is the sensible approach for all business practices.  It reduces the potential for unethical practices to knowingly or unknowingly take place in the home or business.
New and existing businesses can adopt best practice principles into their work environment and should ensure that all employees subscribe to these practices and adopt them into their daily routines.  Once these practices have been adopted, it is essential that someone takes responsibility for ensuring that the business continues to receive current and updated information as it applies to legal responsibilities.
It is equally important that these are accommodated into the workplace either through personally adopting them or providing personal development sessions for staff that ensures that all staff are aware of any changes or legislation that they need to implement into their work practices or in the accounting software which is being used.

Best Work Practices to Avoid Ethical Problems
Adoption of best work place practices is essential to preventing poor work habits creating the potential for ethical problems in accounting. Auditing of departments and ensuring adequate lines of accountability exist for all levels of staff and are essential to ensure that if any problems exist they can be immediately identified and resolved.  Company and business culture should reward transparency and excellent work practices that encourage transparency and improved work practices amongst staff; individually and within departments.

Information Services and Ethical Accounting Practices
Online sources such as the tax department may provide regular emailed updates of changes to legislation that business, not for profit organisations and personal taxpayers need to know to maintain transparency and ethical accounting.  Subscribing to this information is an excellent way of being alerted to changes as they occur.
An accounting service can provide a cost effective means of providing the initial support in developing the recording and reporting frameworks businesses and individuals use to maintain transparency and should also be able to provide follow up information services.  Individuals and businesses have a civic duty to identify and avoid unethical accounting problems.  It is the responsibility of each person involved to play their part and help ensure a transparent and ethical workplace.

So where do you stand if you are involved in a traffic collision in the UK? A tricky question, as there will be a number of factors which could affect the perspective of who was at fault, please notice that I have referred to it as a traffic collision, not an accident, this is simply because the term accident implies that nobody was at fault, even though this can be the case in rare situations, it’s very uncommon that neither party is at fault. We are also talking here about incidents which involve trucks, cars, vans motorbikes and pedestrians.

So let’s take an example of a fairly common situation, one vehicle is at the roundabout, it’s quite busy and edging forward ready to jump out when a suitable gap appears, then bang, somebody drives straight up the back of them.  The car in front says it’s the fault of the person behind as they had obviously pulled out before the care in front had gone, however the person behind says it’s the fault of the person in front of them, as they were watching right, a large gap came along and the person in front of them should have pulled out, this situation is almost always the fault of the car behind, as they have pulled away without looking to see if the vehicle in front of them had gone, they may be slow but it’s your responsibility to check first, it’s usually the person at the rear who is at fault if they bump the car ahead of them.

Whilst this kind of situation is quite common, most likely nobody was hurt due to the slow speed at which the vehicles are moving, however it can cause whiplash, this is an injury to the neck which was caused by rapid acceleration or deceleration causing the neck to be jarred.

If the driver or a passenger (usually the person who is hit from behind) has whiplash, they could need to visit hospital and be fitted with a supportive brace for their neck, without one the injury could become worse, in any situation like this it’s always best to be safe and stop by the local hospital just to be safe.

Please bear in mind I am not a solicitor and am not offering legal advice here, if you need legal advice after being involved in a car crash or any type of traffic related incident you should contact a specialist solicitor. It’s a good idea to try to find someone quite local so if you are in Wiltshire look for a Swindon solicitor or Cheltenham solicitor, if however you are in Oxon you are best with someone more local so try to find an Oxford solicitor. It’s handy if you can find someone local to you as then you can pop in to discuss the details of the claim. Personal injury solicitors will be able to advise about accidents at work or clinical negligence too as they will usually cover a wide range of cases. Often on a no win no fee basis too, so you have nothing to lose.

A great bit of software for anyone running a chauffeur, taxi or garage related business is Sage 50 Accounts. It’s what I’ve been using for years, so thought I would just say a few words about it, that is of course assuming that anyone reads this anyway.

The reason I like it is because it’s just simply so easy for absolutely anyone to learn how to use it, the interface is incredibly simple with great big buttons which are clearly marked, so when I want to go and enter an invoice from a particular supplier, I just click on my suppliers button, then select who it’s from and enter an invoice against them.

Likewise doing my bank reconciliation is pretty easy too as I can upload an electronic version into the software, so there’s no re keying it, I just match up the transactions and OK them, well to be perfectly honest, when I say I, I actually mean the wife who does all the accounts if the truth be told.  But if she didn’t do such a fine job I wouldn’t keep asking her would I? She even does out VAT returns, which is something which the accountant used to get paid for before we bought our own copy of sage 50, so it’s paid for itself in no time.

Some key facts about Stonehenge

Stonehenge is one of the historical places in England that dates back to 5000 years ago and is one of the major tourist attractions in the area.

Stonehenge is located in Britain nowadays is the version that was made 3500 years ago and it is actually the fourth version. The first version of the Stonehenge dates back to 3100 BC. The first version of the Stonehenge had Aubrey holes which were deep and round holes in chalk. People thought these were for the purpose of graves but actually it was for religious ceremony.

The second version was made after 1000 years when some heavy rocks were transported from a long mile away to make a double circle with an entrance in it. The stones were so heavy, about 4 tons each that such an effort would have been made in transporting them from the mountains. It is thought that they were transported first through rollers and then by water.

The third version was made in 2000 BC when very heavy, about 50 tons each Sarsen stones were transported from the mountains. With such weight of the stones, it was impossible that they were transported by rollers or boat. It is most likely that people pulled the stones down using ropes. Given the weight of the stones, it is probable that 500 men pulled on the ropes of each stone to transport it. Anyway, the stones that were brought were set in an outer circle and inside the circle, there were five trilithons which were erected and organized in a horseshoe way. The remains of these trilithons are still available today.

The final version of the monument was made after 1500 BC when the stones were reorganized in a horseshoe way and in a circle that we get to see in England nowadays. However, the original Stonehenge had 60 stones or more, many of which are broken and removed and there are only a few left.

With all the effort that was put into making the amazing Stonehenge, the question which has marvelled historians and scientists is why it was made. A long time back, there were only historical and mythical theories about it that the devil made it, or Merlin had it built by a giant he had. Other theories were that it was made for the purpose of a burial place for the royal family. Some historians had the view that it was a roman temple. There have been scientific studies also on the stones of the Stonehenge to unravel the mystery surrounding it as to why it was built. However, the mystery remains unsolved as no one can give an accurate account of something that happened a long, long time ago. The most popular, however, is that it was made for some religious purpose and that is why people still have religious ceremonies over here.

The Stonehenge that we see now is nothing compared to the giant, breath catching one that was built 5000 years back. Only some idea can be obtained as historians have made pictures to show how it would have looked like. What remains now is only a very small proportion of it as most of it has been destroyed by weather conditions and constructions in the surrounding area

The market town of Marlborough is close by, so if you need accommodation, Marlborough is a great place to find a hotel.

In today’s environment of computerization and digitalization manual accounting has become impossible as manpower is not constant and drains with increase in work and time also it would mean a loss of precious time which otherwise could have been made use more effectively. Irrespective of the type of business you do good accounting software suiting your business needs helps in simplifying your business accounting system. Before you decide the type of software you need for your business several factors that are present needs to be considered. All software has its own specialization and the focus of software varies from one need to the other. It should be made sure that the software you select should focus on your business needs. Also reviews and comments from people are important and these are needed from people who have previously used this software to know the real time usage performance of this software and also use blogs and internet forums of this software.

It would be very difficult for a small business owner to appoint a full time account or tax expert. Further there would be a need for it.  In such a scenario it makes better sense to go for accounting software.  There are many big names in this field such as big giants like QuickBooks and Sage with their flagship product Sage 50 Accounts.  The accounting software of these companies is flexible and can be customized according to individual requirements.  They do offer very good discounts which small players look forward to.  These are some benefits of small software.

Even the best accounting software will not produce any results unless if it is used properly.  We should know how to make use of it.  It often happens that people are not thorough with such software and they commit lot of mistakes and every time there is a need to seek professional help to correct the mistakes.  This not only costs money but also results in loss of time and energy.  The best option to avoid this is to opt for help desk assistance.  This can be had by paying small extra money but it is worth the cost.  These help desk options are available both from large companies but smaller companies are yet to offer this feature.  The help desk will assist you to learn the software thoroughly and will enable you to become independent over a period of time.  This is the most intelligent way to save money which is one of the main objectives of any small company.

If you have decided to buy software which you will use on your own, it is better to go for training so that you don’t end up making mistakes and complicating things which ultimately might result in costly repairs.  The best way to become independent is to do some serious homework on both accounts as a subject and the accounting software which you are handling.  You could approach accounting firms and some accounting software firms who would be ready to provide you with training and assistance.  This will be within your budget.  Additionally, if you have the time and energy you can even find some free accounting software on the internet.