Shanes Garden Tools & Accessories is a wholesale supplier of garden tools and also has a small shopfront that sells household ornaments. Jane Helm has been the bookkeeper for over ten years, and because the company is small Jane performs all daily accounting tasks manually including invoicing and receipting of all monies. Shane, the owner of the company, supervises Jim, the stock manager and Trish, the shopfront manager, but he also spends a lot of his time managing his other business. The wholesale side of the business has a complicated paper trail as many refunds are put through. Garden tools are sold to large warehouses, and they are then sold to the public. If these items are faulty and returned by the warehouse customer, the warehouse then makes a claim to Shanes Garden Tools & Accessories, and this then needs to be claimed by Jane from the manufacturer. The warehouses were pressuring Shane to computerize as there was always a lengthy delay in refunds being processed. With a little guidance from a friend and with no mention to Jane, Shane bought a new computer system and some accounting software. Only one day was required to set up the hardware, install the software, and convert the files. The morning the vendor installed the computer system, Janes job performance changed dramatically. Although the software company provided two full days of training, Jane constantly complained about the new system. As a result, Shane decided she should run both the manual and computer systems for a month to verify the new systems accuracy. Jane then complained that she lacked the time and expertise to update both systems by herself, and that she did not understand how to use the new computer system. To keep accounts up to date, Shane spent two to three hours a day running the new system himself. Shane found that much of the time spent running the system was spent identifying discrepancies between the computer and manual results. When the error was located, it was usually in the manual system. This significantly increased Shanes confidence in the new system. At the end of the month, Shane was ready to stop using the manual system, but Jane said she was not ready. Shane went back to his other business, and Jane went on with the manual system. When the computer system fell behind, Shane again spent time catching it up. He also worked with Jane to try to help her understand how to operate the computer system. Months later, Shane was very frustrated because he was still keeping the computer system up to date and training Jane.

You work for a professional accounting firm as Shanes accountant, and Shane has asked for your advice with the following questions.

What do you believe is the real cause of Janes resistance to computers, and how should Shane have handled the accounting system computerization? What events may have contributed to the new systems failure? What would you recommend Shane do at this point (please justify your answers)?