Accounting Software 101: Explain Why a Computerized Financial Management System is Important
While all sorts of businesses are moving towards the use of technology, many businesses are calculating their profits with calculators and fingertips. Computerized accounting software is now a trend in the business society and still, we have to explain why a computerized financial management system is important.
“There was a time when people used to say “Don’t talk to strangers or don’t go out with people you don’t know” but right now all of us are making friends on FACEBOOK and riding to places using UBER. Technology allows us to solve problems and make things easier. All we need to do is adapt to the change and join the revolution. But are we all on the same page?“
Table of Contents
-
Computerized Financial Management System
-
Features of Computerized Financial Management System
-
Budget and Forecast Management
-
Inventory Management
-
Banking Management
-
Invoice Management
-
Payroll Management
-
Fund Accounting Management
-
Report Management
-
Syncing Accounts
-
Diverse functionalities
-
Importance of Computerized Financial Management System
-
Advantages
-
Disadvantages
-
Types of Computerized Financial Management Systems
-
Ever Accounting
-
Why Choose Ever Accounting over Other software?
Computerized Financial Management System
Businesses are all about making profits and earning sales and to keep them on track what do we do? We maintain large notebooks and if we are smarter we use excel sheets, right? But what if I say that there are smarter ways to manage financial data?
A computerized financial management system will help you to store, manage and evaluate all sorts of financial information of your company. Adding numbers and generating profits will become a kid’s game then.
This software is an all-in-one solution to create all types of financial reports, statements, and sheets. Moreover, it is also accessible using smartphones or any mobile device using an internet connection.
While traditional companies are still under the shade of manual accounting, smart and fast-growing businesses are adapting to computerized accounting software to level up their productivity. As the conversion grows, the demand for a better accounting system is always on the wanted list.
A computerized financial management system can help you to solve complex problems in a smart way without a single error. Remember back in high school when we had to do a 3-4 page math to solve a single equation, accounting software can solve that in a single click.
This is a great tool for small and medium-sized businesses, they can easily maintain account histories, do bookkeeping, make financial arrangements, manage payments, practice records, and a lot more. Generating invoices and maintaining common payroll withholding taxes will be easier than before.
Computerized management practice systems can help you in many ways and I can go on and on with how it will solve your problems, but now let’s jump into its features and other details so you can understand how it can be of use to you.
Recommended Reading: 5 Best WordPress Accounting Plugins for Small Businesses
Features of Computerized Financial Management System
Companies that grow fast know how to utilize time, when you spend too much time on tasks that can be done within minutes is a very big loss. Why do businesses rely so much on technology? It is because technology saves time.
Computerized accounting systems are capable of taking your business to the next stage. Financials are just a waste of time, Bursting all the frustrations on the calculator and adding up numbers will take all of your time at work. After that, there won’t be any time to work on innovative solutions.
Be a smart businessman and know what’s important. To get a little more grip on the financial management accounting systems check out the detailed features below.
Budget and Forecast Management
In terms of financial management, accounting systems are considered a perfect solution that breaks down your financial transactions for the current and past years to predict a feasible upcoming fiscal year budget summary.
The summaries and balance sheets will allow you to understand how you should approach your company expenses in the following year. You might think that a computerized system might not understand your needs and plans properly but when you start inputting the previous and current numbers, the software programs will detect all the operational tasks and summarize everything perfectly. Besides, they have manual bookkeeping systems, this way you can bring custom changes.
Once you go through the easily accessible computerized system, you can set up sales targets and other KPIs for yourself and your team.
Inventory Management
Computerized practice management systems can help you to keep track of all your available products using tabs. So as soon as you run out of products, your computer program will notify you that your product is out of stock. This record-keeping feature is very crucial for your inventory management.
Further, you can take proper action to minimize any upcoming issues regarding your products. Also, you can update your general ledger using accounting software to fill up the gaps.
Banking Management
A business can have multiple bank accounts. Some for the business itself, and others for the management committee. But all of it is internally connected.
Manually maintaining everyone’s bank accounts and doing financial arrangements can be very very tough. But using a smart tool can help you to minimize your hassle. Though many businesses don’t understand that and so we have to explain why a computerized financial management system is important.
Accounting systems will easily keep track of your bank accounts and import all the data into the software itself. After that, it will analyze all the information and will show you payment records, and schedule upcoming bank payments and deposits. This way you will always get reminded about your financial responsibility.
The best part is, the software will completely automate your banking process and you won’t need to roll over diaries anymore since everything will stay recorded in the computerized financial management system.
Invoice Management
All the computerized accounting systems are equipped with invoicing software. Why wouldn’t they? It is a basic accounting procedure that every bookkeeping system should have.
Accounting software will never forget to send an invoice even if you do. One copy of the invoice will stay with you and in your database, and the other copy will be sent to the customer as it consists of all the customer information in detail.
The software will also differentiate outstanding accounts from all the customers. Moreover, it will also suggest effective billing practices to implement. For small businesses, it is important to adapt to industry standards.
Payroll Management
For any financial manager, maintaining the payroll process of each employee is a bitter responsibility. Computerized systems make it easier to maintain payrolls, and will update you about the paycheck collection time.
Computerized accounting systems will analyze your company’s terms and conditions and will add up all the bonuses and commissions carefully. This accounting procedure is hard to maintain manually but the software programs will adjust everyone’s payroll perfectly including their benefits.
Also, if you add taxes and any penalties to any employee, you can also add that up in the software so the system can generate results and update payroll.
Fund Accounting Management
Computerized accounting systems are designed for businesses of all sizes. It can be an agency, government organization, giant multinational company, or even an NGO. Computerized systems are equipped with all sorts of modules that’ll manage grant management, donation management, and equity management.
In terms of a government business organization, the accounting software will maintain GASB regulations to produce income statements and balance sheets.
Most companies are using various methods to keep everything on track but smart business owners are equipping a computerized financial management system.
Report Management
Accounting software was made keeping the core focus on report making. What is a business without its income statement, cash flow statement, and balance sheets? Business is all about measurements. Measurements are done through financial reports. Producing the proper report of your business is the task of accounting software.
Financial management systems can produce custom reports according to your preference. Moreover, it will convert all the numbers into visual data to portray where all the money is going.
Syncing Accounts
Often times we want to add our bank account to our different service accounts so that every time there is a transaction, the money can flow directly through my account without me having to dial in all the information all over again. The same happens in businesses as well.
Computerized financial management systems allow you to sync official accounts with your personal bank account to add and cut data. When all the accounts are synchronized it will take a few clicks to update all the account data at once.
Diverse functionalities
This feature is for all the businesses that have branches all over the country. For example, if you have a business in multiple places, it can be across countries or across divisions. Keeping track of all the data from different places in a single Computerized accounting system have multi-channel invoicing solutions that can convert values in currencies and accumulate accurate data without a single hassle.
This way you can easily determine business dealings despite the difference in currencies because the software is guiding you to success. Additionally, once you input all the information from different channels, branches, and other countries, your accounting software will record all the data, make charts, and measure the values of each branch.
This way if you ever set KPIs for a single branch and if it doesn’t meet, the software will notify you with that information as well. So overall you do understand how the diversified functionalities would work.
Importance of Computerized Financial Management System
We have already browsed through the features and I have shown you how much easier your work will be once you equip the accounting system in your workstation but still if I need to explain why a computerized financial management system is important then be it.
Accounting software will automate all your accounting procedures. It is a result-driven software that will give you reports, data, visuals, and future assumptions. All you need to do is input all the data from your end.
Now let’s go through a list of advantages and disadvantages of computerized accounting software.
Advantages
Here are a few key strengths of accounting software that are very crucial for your business.
- Versatility
Accounting software is a cloud-based solution that can be accessed from anywhere at any time. Some software allows you to download a client but all of them can be accessed online.
They also come with mobile support, which means you can access all the reports using your mobile to make any emergency changes. You can view your invoices, track the expenses of the company, send billing recipes, and many more.
Anything that you do will stay recorded and will get updated for every client. This way anyone who is accessing the software will know that someone made a few changes in the statements. So in one phrase, “Everything is Connected”
- Fast response rate
Computerized financial management systems are fast and smooth. It doesn’t take time to make changes in data, making internal calculations can take some time but when it comes to storing or maintaining data, the software does instant action.
- Cost-effective
If you think that computerized accounting software will be expensive then think about an accountant. Your accountant will delay most of the work, has a greater chance to make mistakes, will take multiple bonuses every year, might not even meet your expectations, and will ask for training sessions multiple times.
Software on the other hand is fully equipped with all the modules that you need. It also has all calculation methods pre-installed which helps it to do maths immediately. Moreover, it is less costly than your accountant and won’t take any extra money for its high-end performance.
Software gets multiple updates and bug fixes every month so in addition, you are getting benefits in multiple ways in a cost-effective way.
- Time Management
If I compare the automated accounting process with the manual accounting process then this debate is over before it even begins.
Computerized financial management systems are faster and will increase your productivity in many ways. The software will do calculations in minutes which might take hours for an accountant to do. This way you can do multiple works within your working hours instead of wasting time on calculations.
Think about the financial aspects of your company. It’s better to set all your financial tasks to this one software rather than having to do them manually for hours.
- Reliability
Accounting software generates accurate results for all financial statements and reports. Unlike humans, the software doesn’t make errors and neither do we have to check them manually to rectify them. So as a business owner, you can fully rely on the software and its actions.
- Generating Real-Time Data
If you synchronize your accounting software with online bank accounts then it will receive all the updated information in its database. If they stay connected, every time there will be a change in a statement, the software will update it in its database and show you real-time data 24/7.
- Application Security
The moment you realize that accounting software can be of great use to you and will contain all your business insights and reports then the stress comes down to its security system. Is it secure enough? Will my data be stolen? All these questions will come down to your mind.
Don’t worry, computerized accounting software comes with advanced and dedicated security systems along with pins, passwords, 2-step verification systems, and many more. If anyone ever tries to access your data you will get a notification, moreover, no one is allowed to access your data without your permission.
So you can relax and rely on your personalized accounting software.
- Your personal guide
If you think that accounting software will just be keen on doing calculations, then you’re wrong. The software will guide you to use your reports wisely. I will show you ways to increase your financial performance, where you should invest money, and where you should cut the budget.
Moreover, it will help you to make fast decisions as it shows you real-time data. With proper guidelines, you can become a data-driven decision-maker.
- Simplified Tax Management
If you get disrupted by all the tax management issues and where all your money is going, don’t worry. Accounting software will keep track of all the taxes and notify you before the submission deadline with a proper explanation of the payment.
Disadvantages
Here are some issues that can be caused by accounting software. Let’s have a look.
- Technical difficulties
Since it is a computerized program, there will be bugs, glitches, and other errors that might slow down the software occasionally. Or if you operate the software incorrectly, there might be some internal errors.
But there will always be bug fixes and updates to solve the issue over time but no one can guarantee a permanent solution.
- Calculation Errors
If you input all the information correctly then the program will operate correctly. But by any chance, if you mislead a data or keep a box unfilled then the outcome will be full of errors.
The outcome of the software entirely depends on your input. If you carefully input all the data then everything will be fine, or there will be errors.
- Time-Consuming
Sadly inputting all the data into the accounting software takes way too much time. But this hassle is a one-time issue only. Once you input all the data in all the sections then you’ll only need to make a few changes from time to time but at the very beginning, it will be a lot of hassle.
Once you are done inputting data, all the other processes will be smooth and fast.
- Security Issues
Amongst all the accounting software, a few of them are liable to cyber attacks. Not all software gives you full protection. Any powerful cyber-attack can breach and steal all your data.
Cyber attacks are unpredictable, even the most secured accounting software can be breached by massive DDOS attacks. But don’t lose hope. Just pick a good software that will resist all the small breaches.
Now that you know all the goods and bad of accounting software you probably have decided that you’re going to go for accounting software to upskill your business. Because I can not explain why a computerized financial management system is important to you anymore. Everything is right here.
Before you start browsing the software, let’s take a look at the types of accounting software.
Types of Computerized Financial Management Systems
Every accounting software is equipped with different sets of modules to help you in various ways. If you search for basic accounting software you’ll find many, if you look for result-driven accounting software then there are also a lot of options.
So you see, the market has a lot of options but before you pick one, you need to understand your needs.
- Commercial accounting system
This type of software is suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises. They will track and generate reports for your business and prepare visual representations of data for you to make fast decisions for your business growth.
- Ready to Use an accounting system
For all small businesses, this ready-to-use accounting software is the perfect billing application. This software is easy to use at a reasonable price. But unfortunately, you can’t add or integrate other systems of your organization.
- Customized accounting system
Customized accounting systems focus on solving specific accounting issues. If you own a medium or large business then you should go for a customized financial management system.
Custom software is more powerful and secure than the other two types of software but the complex part is that you’ll need to go through training in order to use this software.
Ever Accounting
Ever Accounting is a free WordPress plugin that provides a one-stop accounting solution. Ever Accounting can be used by small, medium, and large size businesses. But by any chance, if you are a small business owner, you will get a boost from every accounting.
Ever accounting helps small businesses to complete their accounting tasks faster so they can take control over other problems. Business owners aren’t accountants, ever accounting will never let you feel that you are an accountant.
With a smooth interface and fast response, every accounting will make your day a lot easier with all its features.
Why Choose Ever Accounting over Other software?
If you are looking for a user-friendly interface with a smooth flow of accounting then choose Ever accounting. Moreover, every accounting will manage your cash flow and manage multiple accounts at the same time.
Ever accounting is full of customer-oriented features and will provide you with real-time data to manage everything from its home interface.
So start making your financial arrangements with Ever Accounting.
If we go through all the key points from above we will find a handful of reasons to shift to a computerized financial management system from manual accounting. In this 21st century, it is important for businesses to adapt to technology and do work faster in order to expand and grow faster.
Accounting software will strengthen your business internally and guide you to a prosperous way of doing business.