Establishing Your Automated Accounting System
For any SOHO business, accounting and keeping track of financial data is important. Many of your financial accounting packages are easy to use because of Graphical Interface User (GUI) technology. In other words, point at the picture in the program and it will basically prompt you on what the module does.
There are two programs that are leaders in the small business technology industry that SOHO business owners need to be familiar with. Let’s do a review of QuickBooks and Peachtree Accounting.
QuickBooks is the most common package that SOHO’s use. There are many different configurations for QuickBooks. There are versions for non-profits, versions for small office networks and versions that come with software that integrates into cash registers but we’ll talk about the basic small business version.
QuickBooks has an easy company setup. It provides you a list of company templates to use to set your company up. For example, if you are a consulting company, just pick the consulting company setup in QuickBooks and as quick as you can cook two minute grits, it’s done! No problem!
You can create extra accounts in the general ledger, load customers and vendors into databases within QuickBooks. QuickBooks has automated numbering for invoice and purchase orders so it’s easy to go back into the history files and see what’s going on. The report functions are pre-made and you can basically create custom reports from drop down modules in the reporting function.
Where QuickBooks falls short in the basic small business version, is the inventory feature. The inventory feature is good in the other QuickBooks package that supports small business terminals and inventory control.
Peachtree is the opposite. It’s a little more involved to setup up than QuickBooks but it has a dynamic inventory feature that allows you to create stock numbers and sub-part numbers if you’re a business that operates in any type of stock or manufacturing. It’s good for handling more advanced features of inventory control.
When you pick an accountant or bookkeeper, they will probably ask what type of system that you are using. There are certified QuickBooks and Peachtree Accountants so the choice is yours.
I recommended that SOHO owners take a basic automated accounting class through their local business development office or chamber to get familiar with these packages and then decide, based on their operations, which is the best package to get.
