Latest / The 3Bz Podcast - Building Better Business / EP155 - No Clients for a Year…Then This Happened with Mehul Dave

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EP155 - No Clients for a Year…Then This Happened with Mehul Dave · The 3Bz Podcast - Building Better Business

• 0:01
  Hi there business owner, and welcome to the Three BS Podcast,
• 0:04
  the place where we go beyond the numbers and dive into the
• 0:07
  strategies to help you build a Better Business one step at a
• 0:10
  time. I'm your host, Stephanie, a
• 0:12
  multi awarding entrepreneur with over a decade of experience in
• 0:15
  the bookkeeping and currency world.
• 0:17
  If you're a business owner looking to streamline, grow, and
• 0:19
  get back the time that you deserve, you're in the right
• 0:21
  place tackling real world problems, answering tough
• 0:24
  questions, and digging deep into business building secrets in
• 0:27
  just 15 minutes each week. So, Are you ready to build a
• 0:31
  Better Business with confidence and clarity?
• 0:33
  Then let's go. Hello and welcome back to
• 0:37
  another episode of the 3DS podcast, Your go to place for 15
• 0:40
  minutes of inspiration, education and motivation to help
• 0:44
  you build a Better Business. As always, I'm your host,
• 0:47
  Stephanie, a bookkeeper with over a decade of experience in
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  the bookkeeping accountancy world, helping businesses to
• 0:53
  build better businesses, streamline their systems and
• 0:55
  make more money. Now today's a really exciting
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  episode because I've got a guest me and he's a fellow bookkeeper
• 1:00
  from my industry. So I am so excited to have him.
• 1:03
  Hello Mahal. Would you like to introduce
• 1:05
  yourself? Yes, I am Mehul Dhave and I am a
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  qualified and licensed bookkeeper from the Institute of
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  Certified Bookkeepers where 78% of the workforce is from made of
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  women. But I am very excited to be part
• 1:24
  of this community which is always helping.
• 1:28
  And yes I started my study with ICB back in December 2017 but in
• 1:39
  between I just had a drop because the tuition provider I
• 1:47
  accept choose was not that great so I had to drop off.
• 1:52
  And again, I started my study back in during the COVID time
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  and within a month and a half, I think I achieved Level 3
• 2:04
  qualification. Level 2 was already done back in
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  May 2018. Then after I qualified on my
• 2:15
  own, everything with financial statements and corporation tax
• 2:23
  return exams as well. I just got help for training
• 2:29
  link for my payroll diploma course, which was brilliant and
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  I succeeded in just one go. And I started my practice in
• 2:41
  October 2020 but did not have any client until the end of
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  December 2021. Yeah, that is brief introduction
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  of myself, I would say. Amazing.
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  So what made you become a bookkeeper in the 1st place?
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  Obviously you've been doing it quite a long time, but what
• 3:00
  actually made you become a want to be a bookkeeper?
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  What did you fall into the profession or how did you join
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  our profession? Well, if I talk about my
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  profession, I had been in accounting for about 7 years
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  while I was in India where I started my career as an accounts
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  assistant and become a treasury manager afterwards.
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  So just to manage day-to-day funds operation and bank
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  reconciliations and so on. But my main target was to be a
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  professional rather than just being an accounts assistant or
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  anything. So I decided to come to the UK
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  for actually Chartered Accountancy qualification by
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  ACCA. After clearing couple of
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  subjects I could not pay attention because of some family
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  commitments as well. So I just dropped the course and
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  started looking for some more accountancy related roles, but I
• 4:16
  could not succeed for about 7-8 years.
• 4:18
  I would say 10 years, not 788 years, but ten years exactly.
• 4:24
  After coming into the UK, I got my first finance assistant job
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  in one of the leisure companies in London.
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  Actually, I was based at Heathrow airport for their
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  outlets to look after their outlets and it was just kind of
• 4:43
  clerical work. Then I decided to switch on some
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  professional courses. However, I searched a long time
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  back in I think 2009 about ICB, but I found that it would
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  require a software to study the qualification.
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  So back in those days I did not have that much funds available
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  to me. So I dropped the plan.
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  But again, sometime in 2017 in just total jobs pop up window,
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  it came about ICB and I again had a look at the qualification
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  and everything. So I just decided to switch on
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  for that course and I, that's how I started my book journey
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  for the bookkeeper. And I thought at that time,
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  because I, I was just part of clerical work, I, I thought I
• 5:47
  should be going more professional and helping the
• 5:51
  businesses on frequent basis. But that's how I started my
• 5:58
  journey for being a bookkeeper. Yeah, I think it's really funny,
• 6:02
  isn't it? There's something really special
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  about bookkeepers I often find is that we care that everything
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  that we do is because we want to help the businesses.
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  We want to help them grow, scale, streamline, whatever it
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  may be, but we want to help them.
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  And I think that's really common across most bookkeepers in our
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  industry. You were, you said earlier on
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  that I think it's now 78% of ICB members.
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  I'm also the Institute of Certified Bookkeepers is also my
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  professional body are female and bookkeeping is quite a female
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  dominated industry. How do you make an impact being
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  one of the minorities rather than the majority?
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  As with many industries, the females are usually the
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  minority. Yeah, because the with this
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  profession, I can see that being a bookkeeper, women can look
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  after the kids as well as their home and everything.
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  But being a minority in as a male, I would say it has
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  impacted me a lot because by attending most of the events
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  since started back in 2022 as first ICB event in person, I
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  realized that whoever is the owner of any bookkeeping
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  industry, it doesn't matter. It should be a good connection
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  to start with. And that's how I feel.
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  I mean there should be always women at first place because
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  they look after everything like businesses, their house, kids
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  and everything. So I sell it most of the women
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  who are in our industry. So that's it doesn't affect me
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  because all of them are very supportive.
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  So and at first place I would put my wife and daughter, they
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  are always supporting me being and most of it in my family,
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  most of female members are there because my brother is having two
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  daughters, I am having one daughter and so on.
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  Yeah. So no one, no one son, no son is
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  there in our family. So that's fine.
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  That makes sense. That makes perfect sense.
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  What type of client is it that you look to work with?
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  Now this is an important question that I think business
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  owners need to know because not every bookkeeper will be the
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  right fit for their business. So what type of clients do you
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  look for and who do you enjoy working with?
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  Is there any software specific? Is there a type of business that
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  you enjoy working with? Well I to be fair I have only
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  three clients one of them is property management company
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  Limited company, another one is CIC and one another is online
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  selling. So I do just once a year work
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  for them just filing the accounts and tax returns.
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  But on other side, I would love to help small businesses like
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  sole traders or corner shops who are facing more struggle in
• 9:30
  their day-to-day bookkeeping and not clear about their finances.
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  So my passion is to teach them what does it involve.
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  It's not just the books we do for you, but we also add the
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  value we can show you where you are in current position.
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  So yeah, that is my and software wise I would say I'm currently
• 9:57
  using 0 for my all three clients to file the accounts.
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  My second choice is Sage for the software because I have used
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  software Sage quite a while in at my workplace as well so I'm
• 10:17
  very familiar and my payroll qualification was also based on
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  Sage so I prefer Sage over 0 as well, but both are equivalent I
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  would say. Yeah, I love that because I
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  don't use sage and I probably should.
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  I this is the whole point of this, is that actually
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  bookkeepers, we're all very different.
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  We work with different types of people.
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  We're a better fit for some than others.
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  I have a question I ask every guest on the podcast.
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  What one word would you use to describe your business and why?
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  My one word will be to help those who are struggling because
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  they don't know where they are coming from and where they are
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  standing at the moment, so to help them is my main goal and it
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  should be achieved. I love that so much.
• 11:16
  We are at the end of this episode already.
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  They go so fast these episodes. Where can people get hold of
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  you? I will pop all the links in the
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  show notes but tell people how to connect with you, how to get
• 11:25
  hold of you if they want to explore your bookkeeping
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  services further. Well, I'm well active on
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  LinkedIn and my profile is Mehul Dave MICB PMDP and on Instagram
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  it's Sami under score, the under score bookkeeper.
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  So I'm I'm always active on LinkedIn.
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  You can reach me on LinkedIn. Anyone can link reach me on
• 11:59
  LinkedIn? Perfect.
• 12:02
  Well, thank you so much for joining me.
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  This has been another episode of the Three BS podcast.
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  I hope that's provided some inspiration, motivation and
• 12:09
  education to help you build a Better Business.
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  If you found this episode useful, please do like rate and
• 12:14
  review, subscribe and hit that notification bell on YouTube so
• 12:17
  you know when the next episode goes live.
• 12:19
  I've been Stephanie, this is a Three BS podcast and I'll see
• 12:22
  you next week for the next episode.
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  Bye. Thank you very much for having
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  me. And that brings us to the end of
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  another episode of the Three Bees podcast.
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  I hope you found it useful and that you're walking away with
• 12:33
  some motivation, inspiration, or education to help you build a
• 12:37
  Better Business. Don't forget to subscribe, leave
• 12:40
  a review, and of course, connect with us on social media for more
• 12:43
  insights, tips, and behind the scenes content.
• 12:45
  Your next step in building a Better Business is just a click
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  away. I can't wait to connect with you
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  and I'll see you on the next episode.
• 12:51
  Bye.