How a Solo Practitioner in Namibia Processes Bank Statements in Under 5 Minutes

A 15-year accountant builds her dream practice with AI doing the typing

Elizabeth Simon has been in accounting for 15 years. She spent the last three focused on climate adaptation and sustainability work, speaking at summits locally and internationally. Now she's pivoting back to build her own accounting practice in Namibia, starting with one client and a clear vision: use technology to serve micro, small, and medium enterprises across the country.

She registered Zattus Accounting in 2021 but only started actively taking clients in December 2025. As a solo practitioner working from the outskirts of town with unreliable internet, every tool needs to be simple, fast, and browser-based.

"I've been really looking for ways to make bookkeeping faster and accurate."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

Before Tofu: Data Snipper and manual reconciliation

Elizabeth had been using Data Snipper for bank statement processing. It worked sometimes. The tool would extract data, but she still had to manually consolidate line items, merge rows, and clean up the output before anything was usable in Xero.

When it didn't extract at all, she was back to square one: typing everything by hand.

"Data Snipper sometimes doesn't even extract."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

The switch to Tofu

When Elizabeth saw Tofu in a demo, the decision was immediate. No installation required, just a browser. Upload a bank statement, and the data comes back structured and ready in minutes. No consolidation step. No manual cleanup.

"Data Snipper, you still have to conclude and put two lines in one. But with Tofu you just go straightforward. You upload your bank statement and it takes even less than five minutes. My God, I feel like I can do so many things."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

The simplicity sealed it. Elizabeth describes the platform as not rocket science, something even someone who isn't an accountant could pick up and use effectively.

"It's user friendly, extremely user friendly. Even someone who is not really an accountant and wants to pursue in that direction, this is a very good start for them."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

More than a tool: a feeling

What stands out most in Elizabeth's story isn't a time-saved metric or a feature comparison. It's the emotional shift. After years of manual work and tools that half-worked, finding something that just does the job brought genuine relief.

"You have no idea the joy that Tofu gave me."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

When her subscription was briefly suspended due to a billing issue, she was anxious to get it back, not because of a deadline, but because she couldn't imagine going back to the old way.

A bigger vision: 600+ firms across Namibia

Elizabeth isn't just using Tofu for her own practice. She's planning to introduce it to the wider Namibian accounting community. As a former country coordinator for the Chartered Institute of Business Accountants, she has direct contacts with over 600 accounting offices across the country.

Her plan: run workshops, demonstrate Tofu to fellow practitioners, and help modernize how Namibian MSMEs handle their financial documentation. She's already preparing a presentation for her client — a board member of the Financial Intelligence Centre — to get regulatory endorsement.

"I want to give it as a presentation to our regulatory authorities so that they can use this system for micro, small, medium enterprises. This could really be a lifesaver."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

Solving a national problem

Elizabeth shared examples of invoices from Namibian businesses that lack basic standards which have no invoice numbers, no dates, no VAT indication. She sees Tofu as part of the solution, because the platform flags these issues rather than silently processing bad data.

"We have a problem with people who don't know just the normal standards. With Tofu, I feel like it can really, really help the Namibian micro, small, medium enterprises."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting

What she tells other firms

When asked what she'd say to another solo practitioner in Namibia considering Tofu, Elizabeth didn't hesitate.

"I will definitely tell them to give it a try because it's really worth giving it a try. It will help them with their adapters, age analysis and credit — just to be in order. Because that's the one aspect that is lacking. Big time."
— Elizabeth Simon, Founder, Zattus Accounting