Our Member of the Month feature celebrates our members and the work they do. This month we’re taking a look at GoSimple and how BASDA has helped them into the inside track of Making Tax Digital.
After selling Keytime in 2015, Director Anthony Boggiano decided to take a new direction. He anticipated that the future was moving towards cloud, so his next business decision was to acquire SimpleTax, a cloud product designed for individuals who filed returns instead of using the HMRC system. Anthony and GoSimple put time, effort and investment into developing the basic product into a fully featured tax product individuals could use to file any kind of tax return.
When Making Tax Digital was announced GoSimple saw the opportunity to take the lead over their competitors. Anthony said that
“one of the benefits of Making Tax Digital for us is that we can be first to market with solutions. Our solutions will help individuals and small businesses to deal with the challenges that Making Tax Digital is going to present over the next two or three years.”
When asked what GoSimple’s next steps were, Anthony continued to say that
“we want to make sure that we’ve got a presence in that market, so that when HMRC start promoting Making Tax Digital people know that we’ve got a great product that will meet their needs”.
In December 2016 GoSimple launched a smartphone app which scans receipts and has taken off beyond expectations.
Keytime had previously been members of BASDA for a long time, so when Anthony established GoSimple he was well aware of the benefits of membership. For GoSimple, BASDA provides access to good industry knowledge as well as contacts. BASDA also offers the latest insights into Making Tax Digital developments. Mike Parks, GoSimple’s technical director, attends the BASDA Annual summit and Specialist Interest Group meetings to gain vital information first hand, which shapes their product. Anthony commented that
“we also like to find out what other people are doing, what are other people thinking, what are other people offering – there’s no point in everyone reinventing the same wheel”.
GoSimple hope to continue to participate and contribute to BASDA’s pool of industry knowledge. Anthony told us that
“we want to carry on learning because we know we don’t know all the answers”.
More information can be found on GoSimple’s website: http://l.gosimpletax.com/zen/
If you would like to be featured as a member of the month, or if you are not already a member and are interested in joining BASDA, then please let us know via info@basda.org.