Fret not – for many business processes, you can find an app to track it.
We get it, running a business can oftentimes be overwhelming. For business owners who are trying to maximize efforts in growing their business, processes such as invoicing, bill and expense tracking, and collecting money from customers can limit how efficiently they use their time. Many will be happy to learn that there is a plethora of applications to help business owners become more productive, and in turn leave open more valuable time to build their business. Below are just a few examples of the time-saving wonders the digital age has brought to businesses.
Accounts Payable – Bill.com
For those who are not aware (though I am sure all business owners are), businesses receive a lot of bills. From rent and utilities, to repairs and legal services, bills come in from everywhere, and through different delivery methods. Bill.com is an online application that aims to help easily manage all of your bills. This application allows you to drag and drop PDFs or forward emailed bills right into bill.com’s inbox for bill.com to read and enter invoice data into the system for your review. You can enter bills yourself as well, if you so choose. Once the bills have been reviewed or entered, bill.com will track the Accounts Payable list, and bills can even be paid straight from the application with check payment, ACH, or wire. Owners can even set a workflow and different access levels for different employees assigned to different steps in the process – entering, reviewing, approving, and paying. To add more convenience, bill.com is available on devices from desktops to smartphones, allowing you to manage accounts payable and paying bills from anywhere.
Expense Tracking – Expensify
Business costs are not limited to just bills however, and those expenses paid for on a company credit card can oftentimes become hard to keep control over if not tracked correctly. Expensify presents itself as a method of tracking such expenses, and adding an extra level of accountability to company cards that are being used by numerous employees. From the application, an employee is able to take pictures of receipts with their phone and the Expensify app, which can auto-read for review, attaches these receipts to expense reports to be submitted to management for approval. Reimbursements become easier as well, as a receipt can be marked as paid personally by the employee. Expensify can also be linked to bill.com (above) to track reimbursements due within the AP. The application also offers GPS mileage tracking, which can be helpful for mileage reimbursements or tracking usage of company vehicles.
Client Management and Invoicing – Jobber
As your business grows, so will your customer list. Each customer brings with it new contact information, job requests, quotes, scheduling, and invoices to track, especially for service-based businesses. As a solution, Jobber is available to manage all of these details and more for each customer. From the application, a business can customize its own job request and invoice forms and create a link on your business’s website or Facebook for customers to submit work requests directly into the jobber interface. Detailed quotes for jobs can be created and sent to customers straight from the application as well. Employees assigned to each scheduled job can be tracked on the app and when the job is completed, employees can create an invoice for a customer on-site through their smartphone. An additional feature, Jobber Payments, is available as an add-in for employees to accept credit card payments on invoices as soon as the job is complete. If you are looking for the ability to track jobs and invoices, while limiting the amount of missed work requested from new customers, Jobber may be right up your alley.
Accounts Receivable – Chaser
One of the more painful parts of running a business can be following up with customers when an invoice becomes overdue. Instead of letting that invoice sit on your business’s Accounts Receivable list ignored, Chaser can help chase those payments down. In this app, a business is able to create custom email templates that Chaser is able to auto-fill with customer information for AR chaser emails. Timing schedules can be created for when emails should be sent to customers requesting payment, along with additional follow-up emails. The emails sent from Chaser will appear as if they came directly from someone within the business, right down to the email signature. Chaser can also be set to have follow-up emails sent from progressive levels of employee seniority for each additional email sent to a customer. Set-up is relatively painless as well, as it will sync with your accounting software to bring in customer and invoice information, and determine which invoices remain overdue. Automatic syncs make it so when an invoice is marked paid in the accounting software, thank you emails can be automatically sent from Chaser as well.
Employee Timesheets – Tsheets
Oftentimes, a business cannot operate with just the owner. When hourly employees are hired, it becomes necessary to accurately keep track of their time worked, so that you are able to compensate them appropriately. With Tsheets, employees can clock-in and out, track, and submit their individual time sheets. Once submitted, the timesheets are available for approval from the manager profile. The TSheets smartphone application also allows for tracking of employee locations (only when clocked-in of course, ensuring privacy outside of work) to make sure employees are where they need to be during the day. TSheets can also be synced directly with payroll software like ADP, for increased automation of payroll processing.
All of the apps discussed above can be utilized on their own, but can become even more helpful when paired and synced with your business’s accounting software, such as QuickBooks Online, Sage, or Xero. It is also important to note that these are only a select few of your options, and there are countless applications available for almost every business process. If you have any questions on any of the applications listed above, please do not hesitate to call our office. Our Outsourced Accounting Department here at Stephano Slack has several individuals who have experience with a number of different business application, and are available if you are interested in utilizing a new application with your business.
Anthony Fortescue
610-687-1600
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