HSA June 2023

Perks Streamlines
Success for The Cumby
& The Gallery
BY PERKS ACCOUNTANTS & WEALTH ADVISORS
In the heart of Adelaide’s CBD
lies the vibrant Waymouth Street.
Home to a healthy ecosystem
of businesses and cafés during
the day, it also boasts some of
Adelaide’s best bars, restaurants,
function spaces and pubs.
Among the most popular venues
along this strip are the heritage
listed Cumberland Arms Hotel
and the chic entertainmentcum-art
hub The Gallery. Both
establishments are owned
by John Waltham, a 20-year
industry veteran who entered
hospitality straight out of school
and rose through the ranks to
become a publican. He now
works alongside his business
partner Alex Taylor, and his
brother Tom who also has a
small share in both businesses.
For more than 10 years, John
and Alex have been drawing
on the expertise of the team at
Perks to help manage the
businesses, with the relationship
now encompassing a full-suite of
taxation , payroll, bookkeeping
and accounting services.
John says this relationship has
delivered several innovations
to the management of the
businesses and, notably, in recent
years, Perks has implemented
full integration between their
point-of-sale software and cloud
accounting platform, Xero – a
pioneering capability in the
hospitality space.
“Everything we do at our two
venues come through the till
system, whether that be sales,
stock control or reporting, it’s
essentially the management
centre for our businesses,” he said.
“Perks identified a need to
integrate this system with our
accounting platform, to ensure
that all the data being received
at the till flowed through to
Perks to ensure we can access
an accurate snapshot of all
our sales, debtor and creditor
records in real-time.”
A D V E R T O R I A L
Led by Accounting Director
Tom Paine , Perks worked
closely with John’s point-of-sale
software provider to deliver a
solution that would provide the
integrated capability that was
desired by both parties.
“Tom has been with us
throughout our time at Perks
and he’s been really proactive in
bringing ideas to the table about
how we can be smarter
in managing financial aspects of
the business.”
“Importantly, for us as owners,
this has meant that we can
focus on customer service and
the frontline management of the
business.”
“I come to work everyday with
the confidence that the financial
side of the business is taken
care of and the knowledge that
if any issues do arise, they will
be flagged before they become a
big problem.”
However, John says the
management of finances hasn’t
always been so worry-free.
When he first started working
with Perks, the relationship
was focused on accounting
and compliance only, while his
bookkeeping requirements were
being taken care of by a smaller
practice that used outdated
methods.
“When I first branched out into
ownership of pubs, everything
was being done by hand and we
were still writing cheques each
week to send to suppliers; there
was a lot of manual processes
involved that were really clunky
and inefficient,” he said.
“Instead of having access
to real-time data, we were
having to estimate our weekly
expenses which is difficult to do
in hospitality because no two
weeks are the same.
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