September 1993 Accountancy Magazine “A Window on Accounts Production”

Alan had asked Lesley Meall, the technology editor if he could do a review of some new Windows accountancy software. He was told that they no longer published software reviews and that they had a three page article ready for September. Thank you for the offer. Goodbye. After lunch Lesley was on the phone saying she had spoken to a professor of Accountancy and he agreed with what Alan was saying about accounts production software. Could she interview Alan? Stunned silence at Alan’s end of the phone.

The result was the 3 page article was scrapped and replaced with a two page article of which over 40% was the interview with Alan. A month later Keith Jacobs of Visa Accounts software was on the phone saying I do not know how to thank you. We have had 50 enquiries in the last month. That was 2% of the accountancy practices in the UK with two or more partners. In a year Visa was one of if not the major player in statutory accounts software in the UK.