Conversations with Bill Taylor

Tax Incentive for Equipment Purchases

2011-03-23T15:00:57Z

So its been a while since our last post, I know you've missed our insightful banter. No worries we are back!

If you've been holding off on equipment purchases or leases for a while, now might be the time to finally pull the trigger. You can expense 100% of up to $500,000 worth of purchases for 2011 - meaning that instead of slowly depreciating that purchase over several years, you can deduct the entire expense for the whole tax year if your equipment is purchased and put into service by December 31st.

Who to thank? IRS Section 179, one of the more straightforward and beneficial tax incentives around for small business. Here's how it works: let's say you're thinking of buying $15,000 of phone equipment. If your business is taxed at 35%, then your new phone equipment will effectively cost only $9,750 if you purchase and install it before the end of the year. These purchases could include phone systems, routers, switches, servers and computers.

Tax laws change often, and particularly in the past several years, Congress has extended and amended various elements of the tax code to help stimulate business activity. We can't be sure what the tax code will look like at the end of the next year, but we're pretty sure that 2011 is a good year to make a big purchase.

At Taylored Systems, we're more than happy to make recommendations about how to add new equipment to your office and gain a tax write-off. But we aren't tax advisors, so be sure to consult with a professional who's familiar with your situation.

For more information about Section 179 and recent legislative changes and extensions to the tax code, visit www.section179.org.

Is technological efficiency important to you?

2010-09-29T14:13:55Z

I had lunch last week with a business contact. She mentioned that the owner of her company personally goes to the bank two times each day as part of his daily business activity. He enjoys the personal experience at the bank and he knows exactly where his money is. Peace of mind for people arrives in different ways.

Think of the conveniences we take for granted. When your email goes down or there is a delay getting messages on your cell phone, how irritating is it for you? How about food? How frustrated do you get when your burger and fries takes 5 minutes? When I used to spend the night with my grandparents, “fast food” was grandma’s 20 minute hot dish.

For many of us, online banking has become second nature and part of our fast paced, convenience driven life style. Anytime we want we can access our accounts via computer or phone. As technology has changed, the banking industry has had to evolve to adjust to the expectations of consumers. Have we forgotten how things used to be?

We are quickly reminded when the inevitable happens. You might have seen the article recently explaining that Chase.com was down in a lengthy system crash and customers were forced to conduct their banking business at a local bank branch, ATM or through the company’s phone service. For those who are used to the efficiencies of online banking this came as a surprise. And the ability to bank anytime, anywhere, easily and quickly was removed.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/09/14/technology/Chase_online_service/index.htm?source=yahoo_quote

In this case, it sounds like a regression was more painful than people anticipated, both for the customers and the bank. I have a feeling that upon reading this, my business contact’s business owner was laughing all the way to the bank…both times!

This was Amy Hershman’s last post.

The Laser is an Antique

2010-09-13T19:53:00Z

In the United States typically something is considered an antique after 50 years, if it has been subject to rigorous use. Well this year marks the 50th anniversary for the Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation or LASER to those of us who are normal. It’s funny to think of something that has always seemed so futuristic to be an antique.

Lasers were first conceptually developed in the Bell Laboratory in the late 1950s. In 1958 Bell Labs retained a patent on the MASER (the Lasers older brother). In 1960 the Laser was first constructed at Hughes Research Laboratory. Today lasers are used for everything from telecommunications to surgery to laser light shows. But I imagine when someone says the word laser thoughts go to a laser as a weapon. They have been imbedded in our mind through science fiction as the ultimate projectile. Though laser development has changed significantly over the last 50 years the weapons are still only in their beginning stages of development. Sorry to anyone who thinks they need a laser gun.

Lasers are closely related to our industry of technology and telecom. Without lasers we would not have fiber optic cable. Without fiber optic cable, we would not have networking at high speeds for long distances. If we could not transfer data at the speeds fiber allows us we would not have VoIP. So see it all comes back around. The moral of the story is that even the future becomes old.

If anyone is interested in antique lasers you’re not going to find them in Indianapolis, but Silicon Valley’s Bob Hess has a huge selection. You can see them here: http://holography.ning.com/profile/BobHess

This was Michael Martin’s latest conversation with Bill Taylor

Change

2010-08-25T12:13:00Z

It’s time to head back to school. As I watch kids climb onto the busses and see college students stock up on back to school supplies, I think about how things change. Not to get all philosophical, but let’s face it, whether the change for students going back to school, in climate from season to season, in technology or business methodology, or any number of things – one fact you can count on is that change is a constant.

There are many quotes on the topic. “The only people who like change are babies with dirty diapers – and note even them all the time.” (As a mother who had three little ones in diapers at the same time I can see the humor in that). I also like the famous, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result”…moral of the story, get with change.

Successful businesses must embrace change to keep moving forward. That’s why it continues to surprise me to engage with companies that are resistant to exploring new options for their business. The bigger surprise is those who have a compelling reason to make a change and aren’t able/willing/ready to take the leap.

When was the last time you evaluated your insurance needs and looked at your policy then shopped around to see how you could get a better rate, more coverage etc.? Most of us don’t do it without a nudge or suggestion from someone who knows the insurance industry and can make recommendations for us. If we did explore options and found significant savings or added value – would we go through the hassle of signing new paperwork and the necessary actions for a new policy? Probably only if we really trusted the person who was helping us and believed that change was best for the long term.

The same holds true for dial tone, internet, and business technology. When was the last time you looked at your phone bill – really looked at your phone bill and started to question the fees and rates? When was the last time that you asked for help to better understand if there was a better option? Are you ready to do that? Or the better question to ask is – what will you do with the information you learn? Are you in the mindset that “things are working just fine – why rock the boat?” or afraid to make changes? I ask this because I continue to see scenarios where there is a clear ROI or long term business benefit for changing service or product but the prospect is not comfortable making a change.

Thinking about change? Here is what I think…price is one thing, but it is important to evaluate total COST of the change. Ask for help:

1. Do you know who to call to facilitate an analysis?

2. Do you know who to trust to implement a solution?

3. Are you in the mindset to make a change or are you thinking, “it’s working and even though I’m paying more we’re afraid to make changes.”

Most importantly – once you’ve done your homework and are ready to make a change, work with a trusted source to ensure you’ve considered total cost, transition time, and ongoing support.

This was one of Amy Hershman's conversations with Bill Taylor.

PURE CENTREX 1985 TO HOSTED IP 2010

2010-08-11T13:20:00Z

While talking with Bill Taylor the other day, he reminisced about how in 1985 they had a customer who used an AT&T Dimension PBX phone system at their main location and expensive OPX circuits from Indiana Bell for their remote locations. Taylored Systems replaced this with a Pure Centrex Solution with lines run from Indiana Bell to each location with direct dial numbers, three/four digit dialing between locations, and one central live switchboard operator. This saved the customer quite a sum of money on a monthly basis, and removed the need to maintain the PBX phone system and only maintain the telephone instruments. Of course at that time the lines didn’t have voicemail, it was not very flexible to make any changes to your service. You had to have the providing carrier make any changes (which took several days) and if you didn’t like the changes it took several more days to correct them.

The Hosted IP Solutions of today are similar to the old Pure Centrex although today’s solutions are extremely flexible, more convenient, and have a variety of capabilities. You can add data to your plan and you have the availability to make instant changes from your browser, or web-enabled cell phone instead of waiting several days. Also you can have your phone set to follow you wherever you go with a “follow me” call forward to your cell phone.

Technology does not change; rather it advances and molds itself into newer and more useful creations.

Compared to the age of television when you only had three channels, technology has morphed into a five hundred channel mega creation. The same goes for telephony solutions from the simple Pure Centrex Solution to the more advanced Hosted IP of today. Who knows what the future will bring us?

Mary Couch’s Conversation with Bill Taylor

iPhone 4, Droid, Evo, but where is Blackberry????

2010-07-06T15:12:00Z

Ok, so I am the guy with two cell phones. Granted I do not wear them on my hip, nor do I have “California Gurls” as a ring tone on one and “OMG” on the other. Like our founding fathers I like separation, but mine is of business and personal. Although the way I communicate it seems as though my separation is mostly between one phone with my Taylored Systems supplied taylored.com email, and my phone with my personal gmail.com account and text messages. With all the hype of the new phones hitting the market I have done a lot of research lately. I have always been loyal to Verizon, why I do not know. So my loyalty had always stopped me even caring about the iPhone. However with the release of the Droid phones hitting the Verizon network, I was forced to do some research and make some decisions. I chose the Droid Incredible because I could not wait for the “possible” introduction of the iPhone on the Verizon network. So my two phones are the Blackberry Storm, and the Droid Incredible. Through my research I kept asking myself what is better, and where is Blackberry in all of this???

The first question was to figure out what phone, or phones most peaked my interest. iPhone had its upsides. The video chat looks nice and their app store is the best, and the battery life seemed to be better on this phone than any of the others. My concern was that the only Apple product I use is iTunes, and how will this iPhone sync with my Exchange, or my gmail?

My next step was to move on to the Android platform. I looked at the Incredible and the Nexus One. Well once released the Nexus One would only be available on T-Mobile, so I decided against looking any further into it. I focused my attention to the Incredible. It had everything I needed and wanted. Better camera than the iPhone, it had a flash and 8megapixles. It had full html that supported Java, unlike the iPhone. The display was much crisper than the other phones available. It just seemed like the best phone and I could keep my Verizon service.

I then looked at the Evo from Sprint. It appeared to be the same as the Incredible, but on the Sprint network. The HDMI out was a cool feature, but then I thought I’d have to download any movies from my computer to the phone, so why would I not just use my computer’s HDMI out to connect to my TV? I suppose it would be nice for videos, or photos taken on the phone, but I would want to back those up on my computer anyway so I can still just use the computer’s HDMI out.

The next step was finding the network I wanted to choose. T-Mobile is a joke, Sprint’s “4G” is laughable, AT&T is well AT&T, but Verizon has been the lesser of the evils and so I stayed with the Verizon network. I went with the Incredible, and now within a month of having the phone there is a new one on the verge of release, so there is no WIN-WIN-WIN ever in the world of cell phone choosing.

So now I have my personal phone for apps, gmail, text messages, phone calls etc., but I still did not answer my question of where was Blackberry in all of this trying to woo me with their latest and greatest?

To be honest I have not been overly happy with the Blackberry Storm. It definitely is not the iPhone killer it was billed to be when it was released. I dislike the “Optimized Web Browser” and the fact I can’t obtain HTML emails in the form they are designed like I can on my Incredible. When I did research into items of concern that matter in the business world, i.e. security, reliability, synchronization, I realized that Blackberry is still the trusted work horse it has been for many many years. So what if you cannot get an app that will tell you where the nearest possible speed trap might be, or an app that turns my phone into a Schwartz light saber, the Blackberry might just resort to being what it started as…as a secure email device. This was Bill’s comment to me, why do I need any of the other phones? Other than the full HTML and JAVA I did not have an answer for him. The synchronization between Blackberry with their Enterprise Server, or without, is by far the most reliable and best synchronization between Exchange (the dominate email source in the business world). On the Android you have to buy a $20 app to do what the Blackberry does out of the box. Also recently I ran a battery test of my Storm vs. my Incredible. The Incredible lasted 18 hours before needing a charge. My Storm lasted from Saturday mid-afternoon to Tuesday after work. So fear not Blackberry you are still relevant in this ball of confusion.

This was Michael Martin's latest conversation with Bill Taylor

Business Cyber Security

2010-06-03T15:28:00Z

You might have seen the recent news article about Marco’s Restaurant and Lounge’s experience with outside hackers tapping credit card machines and stealing card numbers from customers. Customers have had accounts wiped out and there is question around how firewalls and encryption software were breached.

They aren’t alone. It seems as though there are countless stories of laptops stolen with critical and confidential customer information on them, credit card machines being hacked and personal information being compromised.

While speaking with someone who works in company security, I learned that one of the easiest ways hackers are getting beyond firewalls, hacking networks and sharing viruses, is by dropping a thumb drive outside the entrance to a business. Some nice and unsuspecting employee will pick up it up, plug it in his/her computer in an effort to find out who it belongs to and bam…they’ve loaded the contents of the thumb drive onto the network.

I’ve been told that this is 75% successful so it’s a good reminder to educate employees on this type of hacking.

I, along with my colleague Steve McDonald, attended the Indiana Cyber Security Conference this year. One speaker, Dr. Eugene Spafford - Purdue University Professor and CERIAS (Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security) Executive Director, shared that next year marks the 25th anniversary of the first general computer virus that gained traction. Then, 120 viruses in 1990 and today - a whopping 40-50 THOUSAND viruses are reported daily (hundreds per minute), and the situation is getting worse. We try to stop damage once the virus is identified but we need to find ways to act proactively.

Several of the conference speakers talked about the importance of processes and policies to support a business cyber security strategy but everything came back to a common point – people are the most important part of the strategy. It is people that mess things up typically, not the process or the technology.

As an employer, it is important to remember that the most important piece of your security strategy is your people. Pre screening, compliance monitoring and performance reviews, training, and ongoing education will help keep your team alert to potential cyber security threats.

This was Amy Hershman's last conversation with Bill Taylor.

National Broadband. Can we afford it? Can we afford not to?

2010-05-12T13:44:00Z

Talking with Bill the other day, I was reminded of my old rotary dial phone, and the hand-cranked phone that my Uncle had at his farm before the more modern touch-tone phone appeared which has since been replaced by cell phones and VoIP phones. Those were in the days when the big carrier services promoted universal service with a phone in every home. Now those same service providers are promoting Broadband for every home so you could switch from your landline phone to a cell phone or a VoIP phone through your computer.

We have seen access change from old fashion dial-up which merely streamed minute amounts of bandwidth, and would sometimes be busy because too many people were trying to use it at the same time. With Broadband you are continually connected, and can network your computer, phone, television, music system, or other compatible items together. Bandwidth would depend on your carrier service connection through cooper, fiber or coax cable from 20 Mbps to 100Mbps. Are only problem is that not everyone has access to these services, or can afford this technology.

In a recent newsletter article Bill and I read that the FCC was trying to develop a National Broadband Plan to ensure that all Americans have access to broadband capabilities. This plan was recently delivered to Congress with an ambitious broadband vision for the county to connect 100 million households to broadband service of 100 Mbps (at least 20 times faster than most current home connections) by 2020.

An ambitious and visionary plan but how realistic is it and with a price tag of $350 billion is it worth doing?

If we want our future generations to have more capability of working from home, their children to have access to the internet for homework assignments and classroom lessons via video conferencing for higher learning, or merely to have the advantage of networking our phone, computer, and other systems all together, then perhaps this broadband service of 100 Mbps seems like a great idea. Broadband is probably the technology that will take us further into the future, so that one day we may stand in a room and have a video chat with someone while on the split screen we watch a movie and at the desk our children search the internet for their homework lessons. This is a far cry from when we only had hand-crank or rotary dial phones and no computers.

Mary Couch’s latest conversation with Bill Taylor

We really are only a few seconds away from anywhere in the world!

2010-04-19T13:19:00Z

“Check out this sweet early ‘70s van I’ll be buying next week in New Zealand,” my friend Jordan told me while in Chile. You see, my friend Jordan is traveling around the world. Seeing a window of opportunity to accomplish one of his many life goals Jordan decided to leave his job at Google in London, where he had been transferred six months prior from New York. He and his girlfriend had decided to book an Around the World ticket taking them from Florida to China by route of Latin and South America, over to New Zealand and Australia, up through Southeast Asia into China then?????? Who knows? With the Around the World program you purchase travel destinations, not travel dates, and have one year to travel to these destinations. So when Jordan called me from London to tell me his latest adventure I figured, “well I’ll talk to you in a year. You have my info get a hold of me when you’re at a stopping point.” However I believe I have corresponded and been updated with Jordan more since he has traveled through Latin and South America as I have when he was living in New York and London combined.

Ironically enough it is Google that has been primarily keeping us in contact. Through Gmail and Google’s chat feature we can talk and share files no matter where he is as long as he has an internet connection or cell coverage. In the instance of the van, Jordan sent me the link to the ad where he found the van in New Zealand. I was updated the next day when he was robbed by the police, chatted with him while hiking in Patagonia, and received pictures from the top of Machu Picchu. I can also send him updates from what is going on here; music, pictures, stories, etc. I believe that helps with any of the home sickness that might be felt. But we all know how this works, the internet connects everyone to everyone no matter where in the world, it might be the only thing constant around the world. But my inquisitive mind had some other questions for Jordan and those questions also sparked interest for my own research.

I noticed that I was talking with Jordan not just in large cities like Buenos Ares, but also in small towns throughout his trip. When I asked if his hostels all had computers he was using he said yes, but most of these areas, even the small towns, have internet cafes. Internet cafes are nothing new, but in the last five to ten years bandwidth costs, even in rural areas have decreased so dramatically it allows for areas to establish connection to the Interweb for the citizens. When I asked Jordan if it was only tourists and business people in these cafes, he responded “I wish.” Apparently bandwidth is inexpensive however cost of the computer to access the world is still an issue in most of the areas he has been. So the cafes are filled with locals downloading music, movies, watching viral videos, etc. Jordan has said it can be a bit distracting when he is trying to write his blog and update everyone and the 13 yr old kid next to him is loudly singing Miley Cyrus (can’t escape it anywhere). While none of this is breaking news of what is available I found it interesting that someone can backpack around the world and not have a day go by where he is not updated from home and is not updating people at home of what is going on. We really are only a few seconds away from anywhere in the world.

If you would like to catch up on Jordan's travels and follow the rest of the trip visit his blog....
http://ilivevicariouslythrume.blogspot.com/

This was Michael Martin's latest conversation with Bill

DEDICATED PC for Online Banking

2010-04-01T19:50:00Z

Bill and I often pass newsletters and articles back and forth. We recently shared one with our Vice President of Finance, Amy Hart Ramey. It was about the alerts issued by the FBI and the American Banking Association suggesting that businesses use a dedicated PC for any online banking.

There are several articles and blogs on the topic. We discussed the “areas of exposure”. Most businesses are concerned about viruses, so they have protection. The bigger percent of exposure is linked to how secure your business surf controls are. If an employee is surfing the internet they may inadvertently download a worm or virus or may open the door for hackers to install keystroke loggers that your anti-virus may not pick up.

As a business owner, it is important to understand your bank’s position on the topic. Many banks will not accept any liability for fraudulent transfers if they determine that you were negligent in your online banking security measures including but not limited to a well-configured firewall and current anti-virus programs, or dedicated PC.

The core requirements to keep in mind are:

1. The PC should be dedicated and should only be used to link to the banking website

2. The PC should have no email access

We had a situation in our office where an employee visited a church website not knowing that it had a virus and it was showing up as a “malicious site” because of the virus. Thankfully we had our current anti-virus software running. And, we’ve instated a dedicated PC for online banking.

This was Amy Hershman’s last conversation with Bill Taylor and Amy Hart Ramey.