Do you feel like your employees are continually working on invoicing and payroll? Is there ever any time for anything else in the office? Do manual processes frustrate and overwhelm staff as well as yourself? If so, you need to make a change to your accounting system.
An older or entry-level accounting system can be a significant drain on the finances within your business. Instead of making your job more comfortable, they are creating chaos and a lack of organisation.
Keep reading for the top six signs that your accounting system may be costing your company.
1- Loss of Time
When you are manually preparing spreadsheets for invoicing rather than setting up the accounting software to perform this task automatically, you are not only losing time, but also money. The time that is taken away from the employee, who has to do this manual work, as well as the money that you are paying this individual to perform the task, can hamper the bottom line of your business.
2- Limited Access
If you have your accounting system on one personal computer in your business, this is very limiting to personnel. If you have more than one business location, employees who work from home, or if you need to check into the payroll or receivables from home, you are not able to access the files. You have to drive to the business location with the accounting system installed on the computer to do the work. It makes access challenging to all involved as well as user access.
3- Inefficient Payroll Handling
When you are using a generic entry accounting system, you are not processing your credits and debits efficiently. As a company grows and expands, it hires more and more people to take on the new tasks and growth. This is a good thing, right?
Most of the time, yes, except when it comes to payroll. When your business is experiencing growth, the payroll process can be affected and the reports that are generated from an entry-level accounting system can miss multi-state deductions, prevailing wage, and the ability to compensate for multiple jobs.
4- Manual Processes
Manual processes are just as they sound, slow! When you need a report generated immediately for a spur of the moment meeting, it cannot be accomplished. This is due to ineffective working processes in the accounting system. A real-life person has to pour over the numbers and use a spreadsheet in which they enter the data you need. This takes time and effort and is a slow process. There is no spontaneity when dealing with an out of date accounting system as you have to plan for the time it will take to get the numbers.
5- Growth
When businesses experience growth, they increase their services, bring new services to the table, and develop more complex products and services. When these services grow, so do the invoicing requirements as well as the ability to manage the revenue stream efficiently.
Most entry-level accounting systems are not designed to handle the growth succeeding business encounters. Because of this, they have to add in particular spreadsheets and other workarounds to manage the growth.
6- Overuse of Spreadsheet
Are you creating one worksheet after another for labour production analysis, job costing, or work in progress? If so, then your accounting system is due for a change. It may be costing your business quite a lot of time and financing to keep creating individual invoices. What accounting software can do those spreadsheets cannot, is automation. The software can prepare and send invoices on a specific date as well as monitor accounts receivable.
You Need Automation in Your Business
If you own a company, you know how challenging it can be to stay on top of everything from insurance to payroll to maintenance. If you are still using an entry-level accounting system that is not automated, you need to upgrade as soon as you can.
You are not only losing time and money, but you are most likely feeling the stress and strain of having day-to-day processes. Make sure you are upgrading to a new accounting system, as it will change your life and the growth of your business!