On shore shared-service centers have taken the lead in performing finance and accounting processes, according to a recent study published by the Hackett Group, a strategic advisory firm, with 58 percent of the companies surveyed using the shared services model, globalservicesmedia.com reports. Only seven percent of companies relied on offshore shared-services centers. Twenty-seven percent of financial processes are still performed in-house or in some decentralized manner, according to the study.

Small businesses, whether public companies gearing up for Sarbanes Oxley (SOX) compliance, or privately held companies responding to customers’ demands for secure storage of personal data, are hiring internal Information Technology (IT) auditors in record numbers, according to networkworld.com. Also, internal and external auditors and IT personnel focused on security are working together to meet their goals.

The Telework Coalition (TelCoa), a telework advocacy group headquartered in Washington, D.C., has denounced revisions New York State recently made to its telework tax policy as “misleading” and “useless.” Both TelCoa and another telework advocacy group, The Association for Commuter Transportation (ACT), have reaffirmed their call to Congress to protect Americans who telecommute to out-of-state employers by passing the Telecommuter Tax Fairness Act (S. 1097, H.R.

Spectrum Human Resource Systems Corp. plans to release iVantage(R) 3.6 on June 25, 2006, at the Society for Human Resource Management Conference in Washington D.C..

Business intelligence technology systems developer Seagate Software has dubbed June as Backup Awareness Month, but the accounting profession needs no such marketing gimmick.

1st Global is sharing the eight critical questions tax practitioners need to answer about their practice and wealth management in an hour-long webconference on Wednesday, June 21, beginning at 10:30 a.m. Central Time.

Sage Software announced Peachtree by Sage Quantum – Accountants’ Edition, available exclusively to members of the Sage Software Accountants Network, on Monday at the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) Tech 2006, in Austin, Texas.

Companies are not doing away with stock options. Jonathan Miller, President of Plan Management Corp. of Ardmore, Penn., recently sat down with AccountingWEB to discuss the present and future of options regulations and their impact on financial planning and reporting. Plan Management Corp. helps companies account for all forms of equity incentives, including stock options, restricted stock, stock appreciation rights (SARs) and stock purchase plans. “There was an initial impression that stock options were going to disappear, but we haven’t noticed that," Miller told AccountingWEB.com.

Many of the demands that Sarbanes-Oxley compliance has placed on accounting firms have developed into commercial opportunities for other industries.