Benefits of Using A Virtual Assistant
Here’s 10 reasons you really need to hire a VA for your business:
- VAs offer flexibility – they are available outside of normal hours, have no minimum hour commitment and are only paid for the hours they work.
- VAs have a vested interest in the success of your business, so client confidentiality is paramount and they will treat your business as their own.
- VAs allow you to use the same highly skilled, professional every time you outsource work.
- You get more time to do what you do best, while leaving the admin to someone else.
- Your work will be completed to perfection and delivered on time – or ahead of time.
- No recruitment or agency fees incurred.
- Your VA will work closely with you to achieve seamless perfection of your projects – no one will ever know it wasn’t completed in-house!
- No HR headaches like tax, national insurance or employee benefits.
- Employees and temps are paid by you for coffee breaks, toilet visits and time taken for personal calls and issues.
- VAs work from their own offices so you won’t have to organise workspace or equipment for them.
- By using an SVA Approved virtual assistant you can be assured of the very best standard of customer service and professionalism.
- VAs come in all different guises – there will be one out there that suits you and your business perfectly!
What are the costs of employing staff versus using a virtual assistant?
Staff simply cannot work non-stop from the moment they enter the workplace until they leave (they are only human after all).
Assuming a fairly conservative list of distractions and life’s day-to-day aggravations employers could lose an average:
- 124 productive working hours per year
- OR 2½ hours per week!
On top of that if you factor in employers’ NI contributions (which currently stand at 12.8% in addition to the employees salary) it becomes apparent that staff are an incredibly expensive commodity that many businesses simply cannot afford.
There are also office space and equipment costs to include in the overall expense of employing just one member of staff. For those who don’t currently employ anyone there are other factors to consider such as employers liability insurance, supervision costs and whether you have the time, motivation or skills to get involved in processing payroll!
So what is the real cost of employing staff?
For Approved VAs click here: https://societyofvirtualassistants.co.uk/2011/04/06/find-an-approved-va/
We have found that more and more companies are using VA services for time consuming tasks such as expense filing, booking travel etc. and using the VA almost as an outsourced PA. We have also found that when a client books us for a project based piece of work, this often leads to a longer term contract, which covers your point 7. I have written a blog myself on the advantages of using VA services and truly believe that companies are seeing the benefit more and more .
Great article, some very valid points. A virtual assistant can take away the stress of running a business and handle your workload for a very low cost, compared to hiring employees. TOYO LTD are a virtual assistant based in Sussex / Kent and we offer a wide variety of services, from typing services, to call answering, appointment booking, data entry and a lot more!
Feel free to get in touch if you’re interested in our services
I own a Virtual Assistant company, and have done for the past 15 years, so, I probably have enough experience to comment on the benefits/downsides.
In recent years, being a VA has definitely reduced in benefits in terms of being a VA, due to the increased amount of “cheap labor” abroad.
However, because a native UK/US born VA is so much better in quality (generally), it now means we can charge even higher prices, and get away with it.
Which is great! haha