Will software replace computation of company accounts and the implications if yes ?

[3point14]

I was an accountant but not practicing as an accountant and I have a number of Ltd companies which require annual accounts and up until fairly recently I have been reasonably content with the notion of accounting fees which rise almost annually. However, my feelings have now changed.

I use Excel to record every transaction for each company and I have my own chart of accounts into which every inward and outbound payment is made. Using pivot tables, you can effectively get to a set of accounts, give or take but all the numbers are there for certain.

However, as we potentially move to accounting packages, which have their own costs, surely these produce a rudimentary set of annual accounts at the push of a button, if your chart of accounts is set up correctly etc. If so, now or in the near future, why on earth would we consider still paying thousands of pounds for the compilation of a set of numbers that we have already done ourselves ?

My gut feeling is that the fundamentals are driven by the machine and what we should be willing to pay for is oversight and specialist tax advice, none of which would come anywhere near the fees currently paid. For example, if we are paying £2000 for a company's accounts, if software computes it, then perhaps we're looking at £250/500 for oversight and submission unless specialist advice is needed.

For example, this year we might have 10 sets of company accounts, ranging from some with less than 100 entries and others with many thousands and we are probably looking at around £15k of fees. Even at £300 an hour, there is nowhere near 50 hours of work and my gut feeling is that we should be moving to an accounting package and paying the accountant around £5k for oversight, advice and submission.

Thoughts ?