Tax Guru – Ker$tetter Letter

Beware of Trusting the Web

With the long overdue shakeout of online companies and the daily demise of one dot-com after another, it reinforces a concept I have always believed in, self sufficiency.

There has been a growing trend for what are called ASPs (application service providers) on the net. On the face, they seem to be very convenient, providing services for a growing number of tasks, such as bookkeeping (e.g. NetLedger), timekeeping (e.g. Timeslips), scheduling (too many to list). The weak link in relying on these companies, besides the occasional inability to use their services due to temporary outages (such as has been the case with this Blogger service), the larger risk is that the company will just fold up, leaving you high & dry. That’s why I am still recommending that you use a program that runs on your own computer for bookkeeping, such as Quicken or QuickBooks.

I don’t mean to rain on anyone’s parade in regard to new and creative usaes of the Internet. I have always applauded that. However, I have to be honest in assessing the risk inherent in entrusting one’s financial and other critical data to someone that may or may not be around in the future.

KMK