Freshbooks & Outright | Simple Bookkeeping for Small Business
I am often asked what bookkeeping software I use for my business. You’d think I’d be using one of the big dogs such as Quickbooks or Peachtree. Well, I may be forced to do this down the road, but at my size, I decided to try a more simple route. I’ved tried a number of programs online from Quickbooks, Clarity, and IAC-EZ but settled upon Freshbooks. You may have heard me rant and rave about how easy Freshbooks is to use, so I won’t continue in this post. I will admit, there is NO invoicing software I’ve seen that is as cool and easy to use as Freshbooks. I wish it was a full accounting system for contractors to use. Freshbooks manages your client’s estimates, invoicing and your company expenses. It also will produce a few simple reports such as a P&L and Expense Report. Contractors really need to have more features to track their Gross Profit, do Pay Roll and Job Costing, which is why I have not been recommending this program too much for my clients. But if you want to use it just for invoicing and basic expense reporting, give it a try! For a full accounting system, I’m still recommending Quickbooks Onlines. For job costing, use an advanced Excel spreadsheet!
I use to use a program called Outright to track my expenses and tax information. Outright is completely free, and I’m still not sure why. I’m sure they are building a fan base that will absolutely love it and then start charging. It is similar to Freshbooks: easy to use: period. I heard that Outright just released automatic bank syncing with my bank, so I went back to my Outright account to test drive it. Wow! After some updating of my accounts, I’m now able to do almost NO data entry in Freshbooks or Outright. The two programs are linked and update automatically. My invoices are automatic and all my expenses from my bank and credit cards are downloaded automatically. All I have to do now is make sure I categorize my expenses, which takes just a few minutes.
So for the small company with 1-3 employees, give Freshbooks and Outright a try. For the larger company who needs an easy invoiving system, try Freshbooks.
Great to have you back on Outright.com! And I’m grateful to hear that the ability to import from your bank was our missing “must have” feature. We have known for some time that the connection to banks was critical; our heads were down on development to make sure we do it right!
Why free? Fundamental accounting shouldn’t cost an arm and a leg because every business needs to do it right and too many neglect it entirely. If we can make it simple to work for yourself by taking care of the bookkeeping, if we can free you from accounting, then you can spend more time on your business and we can offer other innovations for a fee.
Check out our 1099 e-Filing service, for example. Outright.com will take care of the record keeping for any contractors on your team – the fundamental bookkeeping. For only $5, we can save you even more time by filing the tax forms.
Paul, Thanks for responding! I’m glad to be back, and I never disliked your product! So thanks for working hard for your customers. I’ll take a look at your other services too.
Hi David, I would be interested in what you thought about this invoicing software.
http://bee-software.net/invoice-software/
Thank you for the email. I did look over this software. It seems real simple and easy to use. The price, you can’t beat! This might be a good option if a small contractor/service business does not use an accounting software like Quickbooks. Most businesses should be using a good accounting software, and if they are, invoicing is typically included as a feature. The reason I’ve endorsed Freshbooks is because how easy it is to use. There is NO attaching of invoices to emails. It is all automated. You pay for this service, but it does save time, a lot of time. Basically Freshbooks manages your invoicing department. If one is looking for a cost effective way to send invoices and does not need the online or mobile capabilities, you have a nice product.