Starting a career in accounting? It’s a solid choice. You’re probably thinking it’s all about balancing numbers, and a major part of it is. However, the profession has evolved through the years, and technology is a significant part of this evolution.
As such, if you’re considering taking up accountancy as a career, you must not only work towards obtaining an Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) professional designation or becoming a certified public accountant (CPA). You must also get a handle on accounting software.
Why the Need to Master Accounting Software
Accounting software is essential to any accounting job now, whether you’re thinking of working for an accounting firm, applying for a post in a corporation somewhere, or venturing on your own. You’ll use it for pretty much everything – tracking transactions, managing budgets, preparing financial statements, you name it.
The better you are with accounting systems and tools, the more efficient and effective you’ll be in your work. More importantly, knowing your way around these programs is a great way to stand out when starting out.
What follows is a discussion of the top two accounting software you’ll do well to learn and master as you begin your accountancy journey.
FreshBooks
FreshBooks is a powerful and versatile accounting software with a broad range of features to address the diverse needs of freelancers, small businesses, and self-employed professionals. It makes accounting more manageable and less time-consuming, streamlining various accounting tasks while offering a user-friendly interface catering to both accounting novices and seasoned professionals.
The strength of FreshBooks lies in its comprehensive suite of features that cover a wide range of accounting needs. Its features include but are not limited to the following:
Invoicing
The following are FreshBooks’ notable invoicing features:
- Customizable templates: It allows you to tailor your invoices to match your brand, complete with your logo and preferred colors and fonts. This customization ensures that your invoices stand out and reflect your professional image.
- Automatic payment reminders and late fees: FreshBooks simplifies the process of nudging clients for payments with automated payment reminders and the ability to apply automatic late fees to overdue invoices, encouraging prompt payments.
- Credit card payments: FreshBooks lets you accept credit card payments directly on your invoices, which can significantly speed up the payment process.
- Recurring invoices: For businesses with regular billing cycles, FreshBooks offers recurring invoicing, making it easier to manage ongoing client relationships.
- Multi-currency and multi-language invoicing: Multi-currency and multi-language invoicing is a great asset if you have international clients.
Expense Tracking
FreshBooks simplifies expense tracking with the following features:
- Receipt attachments: Preserve the specific details of expenses by attaching digital images of receipts.
- Tax-friendly categories: Ready, tax-friendly categories make it easier to prepare for tax filing.
- Easy-to-read spending summary: The software summarizes spending according to category, providing a clear sense of your biggest expenditures. This makes it easier to manage your finances, as it can help you decide which expenses to trim down and cut.
- Vendors: FreshBooks remembers your commonly used vendors, speeding up the expense logging process.
Accounting Reporting
FreshBooks has robust accounting reporting features, including:
- General ledger: Get a comprehensive report on all accounts and transactions.
- Access delegation: Delegate access to specific features and reports.
- Profit and loss: Easily create a profit and loss report.
- Sales tax summary: Summarize the sales taxes paid and collected for a set period.
- Accounts aging: Generate a report that summarizes overdue invoices.
- Expense report: Get a detailed log of all expenses for a set period.
- Invoice details: Generate a customizable detailed report on all invoices created and sent.
- Chart of accounts: Create a report about all accounts and balances.
- Balance sheet: Easily create a financial statement balancing liabilities and equity.
- Bank reconciliation: Reconcile bank transactions with financial records.
- Cost of goods sold: Assign specific items to the cost-of-goods category to compute the cost of goods sold.
- Trial balance: Enumerate the balances for each account to verify the balance of accounts.
- Other income: Record all income items, including unique and one-time revenue.
- Full transaction capture: Account for manually logged entries corresponding to one-off transactions.
Other Features
FreshBooks also allows you to respond quicker to requests for quotes and proposals, significantly streamlining the process of starting new projects by:
- Providing rich, detailed templates
- Supporting e-signatures
- Enabling instant viewing of and responding to client feedback
For easier payroll calculations or to bill accurately for tracked hours, FreshBooks offers the following features:
- Daily breakdowns
- Billing for tracked hours
- Team time tracking
- Logging hours
- Timing work
- Track time against clients
- Track time against projects
Intuit QuickBooks
QuickBooks is an accounting solution catering to small startups and established enterprises. It’s designed to automate and simplify various accounting tasks, making financial management more efficient and less time-consuming.
Among its many features, the following are the most notable:
- Bookkeeping automation: QuickBooks can “learn” how you classify items and then auto-match and record transactions under the correct categories. This reduces the time you must spend on manual data entry.
- Job costing: QuickBooks offers robust job costing capabilities, enabling businesses to track the profitability of individual projects and make more informed financial decisions.
- Inventory tracking: For businesses with inventory, QuickBooks provides real-time monitoring of stock levels and orders, helping to manage inventory more effectively.
- Bills management: Managing bills is another area where QuickBooks shines, offering an organized way to handle and pay bills online, ensuring timely payments and better financial control.
- Expense tracking: Recording and tracking expenses is a breeze with QuickBooks. You can monitor costs across different accounts, helping you maintain a clear view of your financial outgoings.
- Tax deduction calculation: QuickBooks can help find and calculate tax deductions and uncover savings that might otherwise be missed.
- Invoicing and payments: You can send invoices and receive payments online with QuickBooks. This feature can significantly speed up the payment process, improving cash flow.
- Professional estimation: Create custom estimates that you can readily convert to invoices.
- Mileage tracking: The mileage tracking feature automatically records and sorts trips, which is particularly useful for expense reports and tax deductions.
- Filing withholding for contractors: For businesses working with contractors, QuickBooks simplifies creating and filing tax withheld forms, ensuring tax code compliance and ease of management.
- Reporting and reconciliation: QuickBooks doesn’t just keep track of financial transactions; it offers insights into where your money is going. The software automatically syncs bank and credit card transactions, providing a comprehensive view of income and expenses.
- Integration: QuickBooks allows for scalability and customization as needed, integrating with payroll management, time tracking and other systems for better, more efficient accounting workflows.
- Tracking on the go: QuickBooks has a mobile app that allows employees to snap receipts and track mileage on the go, making it easier to manage finances even when they’re away from the office.
Accountancy as a Career
Accountancy is an excellent career option. However, it’s a competitive field, so you need an edge to stand out. This can come in the form of an ACCA designation, knowledge about banking in your target territory, and mastery of accounting software like FreshBooks and Intuit QuickBooks.
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