It’s likely that when your company was started that your executive team went with the easiest, quickest, and most cost-friendly solution for its accounting needs. But the truth is that start-ups outgrow the tools that launched the company. Not only can your old system be outdated, but ability to handle higher volumes of work might even be inhibiting your ability to grow.
When you’re spending more time trying to get your old system to fit your current needs than you are actually invoicing and bookkeeping, it’s likely time for a new system in place to do the work for you. Regardless of your company’s size, plenty of options exist for accounting systems in software.
If it’s fallen to you to make the case to management for an accounting platform update, there are key arguments to make that will help overcome sticker shock and resistance to change you may encounter along the way.
Manual invoicing consumes a significant amount of time. By some estimates, 77% of invoices are received by the payor via mail, fax, or emailed PDFs.
If you are spending a lot of time running your accounting department on spreadsheets, it is likely your time could be better spent elsewhere. Software exists to automate most of the handwork. Take the time to put some actual numbers to the costs of a given function like monthly invoicing. You and your co-workers will need to do some time tracking, but your findings will be surprising. Bringing your executive team an objective view of the current workload and the tangible results they can expect to see if they bring new accounting software online will go far in getting a “Yes.”
“Time is money.” We keep saying it because it’s true. Perhaps nowhere is this clearer in presenting bills and receiving payment. When it’s taking weeks to gather expenses, receipts, and other backup needed to run an invoice or close out the month’s billing cycle, something’s got to change.
Accounting solutions are more capable than simply being number crunchers and organizers. Through powerful automations, modern accounting systems can automate handling of receipts and expenses, collect and organize time sheets, make sure work order itemizations are assigned correctly, and more.
Having done your research on how long your processes take, you’ll be able to make a convincing case that updating the system will allow your department to spend less time on important but repetitive tasks that can be more accurately handled automatically.
Additionally, newer accounting solutions are built from the ground up to seamlessly integrate with most standard customer relationship management systems. Integrating your accounting and CRM can eliminate many of the disconnects that can occur when your finance and sales or customer service operations can’t frictionlessly communicate with each other.
Your executive team is likely trying to secure new funding, a new credit line, new investors, or attention from investors. When your company is out looking for the large dollars, you need to be able produce an accurate financial picture. Additionally, you may need to meet very strict audit requirements.
A newer, more powerful accounting solution can deliver an accurate picture of cash position, account aging, and more with just a few clicks. It’s a far quicker, and more accurate way to share the numbers than running endless spreadsheets.
By some estimates, up to 80 percent of data loss is due to hardware failure and human error. Depending on the size and age of your company, your accounting history could be massive. Modern accounting platforms protect the financial data of your company and your customers through a comprehensive approach to both security and data backup to eliminate as many points of failure as possible. Increasingly, mission critical systems like accounting solutions are delivered as cloud-based software as a service solutions for precisely this reason.
Upgrading your system won’t just help your accounting operations. It will help increase communication across all levels of your organization. In most organizations, accounting touches the job responsibilities of everyone in some capacity. Investing in a top-quality system that caters to your unique needs is not only important, but vital for growing and established companies alike.
Content originally from Sage Intacct.
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