Accountancy firm urges business contacts to help California dream come true

The Hemingway Bailey team who are winning recognition as a firm of the future. From left, Alan Hemingway, Ruby Magson, Evie Molloy, Joanne Overment and Dave Good.

A SMALL accountancy practice from Beverley is counting on the region’s business community and a film from their fantastic hometown to help them overcome rivals from around the world and win the title of Firm of the Future.

Chamber member Hemingway Bailey, based in Walkergate, Beverley, has already secured $5,000 and a trip to California as part of the competition which is organised by accountancy software giant Intuit QuickBooks.

Alan Hemingway, who founded the firm in 2010, will make the trip to the QuickBooks Connect conference in San Jose next month with his wife Hazel and Dave Good, a Hemingway Bailey apprentice who won a staff vote to take the final place.

They are hoping that the event will see Hemingway Bailey crowned as winners of the worldwide poll to find the QuickBooks Firm of the Future, sharing the conference stage with celebrity speakers including Olympic stars Simone Biles and Michael Phelps and basketball legend Shaquille O’Neal.

Voting will open on Monday 3 October at http://firmofthefuture.com/contest and while Alan is delighted with his team’s success so far he’s hoping people will be impressed by their commitment to improving the service to clients by investing in people and technology – and by a secret weapon in the shape of a promotional video shot on the streets of Beverley.

Alan said: “As part of the competition we had to show how we use software for our practice and also to benefit our clients. The advances we have made enabled us to win $5,000 and a trip to California, where we’re in the world final against firms from the United States, Canada and Australia.

“It will come down to who gets the most votes when polling opens and given the population of the States we’ll be up against it so we’re trying to use our business networks and those of our contacts to mount a strong challenge on behalf of the UK!

“The video should definitely help. QuickBooks sent over a film-maker from Atlanta to get footage of our team and where we work. It will be available online next week and we hope international voters will be impressed by the charm and style of our traditional market town.”

Alan invested in futureproofing the business from the start. Everything is cloud based, enabling him to update clients on their financial position by using his smartphone as he walks around Beverley.

His four colleagues, all recruited since 2013, include three who joined the firm as apprentices. When it came to deciding who should take the third place on the trip to California they held a ballot with the simple rule that they could not vote for themselves.

Dave, who is 18 and joined the firm a year ago, secured the most votes. An accomplished ice hockey player, he last visited California two years ago as part of the Great Britain junior roller hockey team. He plans to take in a National Hockley League match while in San Jose but his priority now is business.

He said: “We’re all very excited about our success in the competition so far and we don’t see any reason why we can’t win it outright. We just need to get people to vote for us. My reaction when my colleagues voted for me was disbelief – I didn’t speak for about 25 minutes!”

The poll opens on Monday 3 October. To vote for Hemingway Bailey visit http://firmofthefuture.com/contest