Accounting is the next profession to fall to AI bots

There are probably few things that small businesses hate more than accounting. It’s tedious, time consuming and totally vital to ensure that businesses can remain in business and don’t run afoul of authorities. Well, to make the process of bookkeeping a little bit less painful, a number of investors have joined together to finance botkeeper, which pitches itself as the chatbot for your bookkeeping needs. It’s a long, long list of investors backing the company including Ignition Partners; former Microsoft chief financial officer John Connors; 500 Startups partner Matthew Johnson, Trevor Kienzle of Correlation Ventures; and finally, Talla founder Rob May. The tool can replace a lot of the oversight required by accountants by automating the process using machine learning and human assistance. After signing up for botkeeper, customers receive a dedicated virtual bookkeeper that provides accounting services. Integrating financial information like credit cards, bank accounts and accounting software, companies can make entries, track and schedule revenue and deferred expenses, account for payroll, reconcile bank accounts and send invoices, the company claims.