About

Flexibooks Bookkeeping Solutions is operated by me, Mary-anne Rapson MICB, a sole trader based at the Staffordshire University Business Village in Stoke-on-Trent.

Needing the flexibility to be able to take care of my son's special needs, and looking to being able to provide for his future, I felt that self-employment was the most viable solution available.

Inspired by Simon Woodroofe of Yo! Sushi and Dragon's Den fame at the Staffordshire University Enterprise Fest I began to explore business ideas.  I entered a competition called 'Let's Do Enterprise' run by Business Brokers in Stoke-on-Trent in May 2007.  I put together a PowerPoint slideshow and nervously presented it to a panel of 4 local business people.  Apparently they liked my idea as I won 4th place in the competition.  

I sought the help of local business advisors 'Business Initiative' and enrolled on the 3 day Business Enterprise Programme (BEP) and NVQ 3 in business start-up that they were offering.  Having done considerable market research, and made numerous enquiries I realised that, despite my enthusiasm for my idea, there was no way that I could raise the large amount of capital that it would require.  

However whilst on the BEP course amongst other business start-ups I soon realised that I was well equipped with many valuable business skills that I could offer at affordable prices to business start-ups, sole traders, partnerships, small businesses and various other groups of individuals.  I also realised that there are a number of couples running small businesses whom, given personalised help and support, they would be in a position to manage their own accounts, without having to enrol on long-winded and expensive bookkeeping courses learning a large amount of information that they would never use as it isn't relevant to their business.  

Thus I embarked on gaining The Institute of Certified Bookkeepers accreditation, and Flexibooks was born.  I hope to be able help small businesses understand and take care of the daunting task of record keeping, bookkeeping and accounting, whilst meeting my family’s needs.