Inefficiency In Book-keeping

NZ Truth, Issue 1206, 10 January 1929, Page 6

Inefficiency In Book-keeping

♦ WITH all our short-cut, mechanized industries, whether commercial or scientific, we should be a highly ' organized people, with efficiency; as the touchstone of our day-to-day existence. The intricate processes of accounting have, become, acutely specialized, ""assuming an importance which demands wide commercial training, instead of the cursory significance with which it was' invested m the time of oneman trading establishments. • ' Yet, m face of the bitter lessons learned by many' farmers, small shopkeepers and others, who failed because they believed that indeterminate systems of book-keeping were "good enough for them," the number of bankruptcies among this class of trader is disquieting. . : It is difficult to persuade casehardened members of the old school to change their habits; to prove to them that accountancy has developed into a commercial science, whose very heart is efficiency, whose strongest element is accuracy, unflagging m its' scrutiny of . the veriest penny piece, whether m material or currency. They still b elieve that any old thing will do ; " that so long as they scratch a few figures into a scrap book which looks like a ledger, which tells, them at the end of the year thai they've spent money and received a certain amount, there is ho need for what they would call ' ' those high-f alutin ' stunt's of those accountant chaps." , This is true more particularly of farmers, who believe that theirs is a calling entirely different from any other,, and their pass books will tell them what is their true position, anyway. Pass books do not disclose depreciation, loss or gain on any particular shipment of stock or < produce, true value of ' implements, or gradual diminution or appreciation of property assess-, ments over a period .of years, arid it would not be .'arbitrary to suggest that apart from a slump or some other exterior influence, a large percentage of farmers owe their bankruptcies to inaccurate methods of keeping accounts. The majority of ' farmers^— not unlike many other units of the population— are riot business men m the general interpretation of the phrase. Therefore, they should entrust, the oversight of their affairs to men who for years have helped towards the development of accountancy as an- exact science. This article is not an overwhelming brief j: or the professional accountant m the narrow sense. Rather is it intended as a finger-post pointing- in the direction of national prudence — a sign which the. trading community, agricultural or .commercial, will do well to follow.