6 Ways to Help Your Clients Increase and Manage Their Cash Flow
Practically overnight, social distancing has forced us to change everything about how we live and work. As an accountant or bookkeeper, two of your primary concerns right now are probably how to keep your employees accountable while they work from home, and how to make sure your clients’ data – and your company’s data – stays safe. Many firms are moving to a cloud based systems such as QuickBooks enterprise cloud hosting, however, that alone will not resolve the situation, and there are specific practices that need to be followed in order to stay competitive and relevant in the industry. Even the most focused and dedicated employees will appreciate some accountability to help them navigate through changes. Implementing these suggestions for accountability will also help you feel more confident that client work is being handled effectively and efficiently. Here are some practices you can follow in your accounting firm while working remotely Set up a collaborated environment Some employees work better when they're alone; others work better when they're around other people. Schedule a virtual meeting using any video conferencing software and encourage employees to join the meeting with their team members. This way, everyone can continue to collaborate and keep the office morale high, even though you're all working from different locations. Use a Dashboard The purpose of the dashboard is to provide a space for your employees to update you on the status of each project they're working on, without you being bombarded with multiple emails throughout the day. By making the dashboard visible to all employees - and letting them know that you're able to see it too - a sense of healthy competition can develop. This helps keep everyone productive and accountable, which is vital for the success of any company. Virtual Desktops A better solution for remote workers is to either implement a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) or, at the very least, have a remote access tool like QuickBooks enterprise hosting that'll allow them to connect to on-premise computers at their place of business. VDI essentially entails hosting virtual desktops on servers in a secure location - like a data center or public cloud - so users can connect from anywhere and work. The advantage of this is that they can be at the office or at home during the shutdown. Granted, VDI does take more planning and offers better security overall (seeing as the data will be in a datacenter as opposed to on-premise) but remote access software such as QuickBooks hosting is far easier to implement and deploy in contrast. Ensuring data security While having things like firewalls and antivirus installed are both essential and necessary, they unfortunately are not enough to provide sufficient protection for most businesses - especially not on their own. The single best security protection that a business can put in place is Multi-factor Authentication (MFA). In fact, Microsoft claims that nearly 99% of all attacks on accounts could be stopped simply by having MFA enabled. Most cloud software providers will offer a way to enable MFA either through a text message or an app on your phone and this is something you everyone should look to implement as soon as possible. Take daily meetings before starting the day Having a daily meeting helps keep everyone connected and accountable, even when you’re all working from home. Schedule a virtual meeting platform at the start of each day, at the same time your employees would report to the office. It should be like everyone reporting to the office. This way, you can keep everyone on track and moving forward with your company goals! Keeping your team up-to-date on the big picture of your business is important for keeping them motivated and focused. This can include sharing deadlines that are approaching, new initiatives you want to launch, or anything else that would be beneficial for your team to know on a daily basis. Final Words In any other circumstance, your employees would be thrilled at the opportunity to avoid the daily commute and work remotely. Right now, however, they might be overwhelmed by the prospect of turning a part of their homes into office space. This means that accountants are challenged not only with handling increased demand for their services, but also with managing remote working environments. With more businesses than ever working remotely, accountants have to be adaptable in order to provide the best possible service to their clients but the state of our healthcare system and economy can be distracting, to say the least.
What does it take to be successful in today's business world? To start you have a product that's wanted or needed and it has to be properly priced and that's just the beginning. In order to have a successful business practice having an accessible cash flow plays an important part.
What is cash flow and how it can help a business? This is the common query that will keep coming in your mind. Cash flow refers to the total sum of money that comes in and out of a business. Having a consistent positive cash flow can help you to pay expenses, and provide resources to grow your business. With the economy being as uncertain as it is today, it’s no wonder that a lot of business owners are looking for ways to improve their companies. If your business strategy is lacking in a particular area, it is time to fix it. These are the 5 tips to help your clients to increase and manage their cash flow.
1. Pays Bills Strategically
Always try to pay the necessary bill first. Paying all the business bills at the same time can lead to financial problems. Instead review bills, sort according to priority, and stagger payment dates so the most important bills — such as rent and payroll must be paid first. Also, check if discounts are available for paying bills early, and then prioritise the rest.
2. Choose the Right Payroll Cycle
Businesses that can generate daily revenue, such as restaurants and retailers, can more easily cover the cash needed for weekly payroll. But this can be a challenge for businesses with slower revenue streams, such as manufacturing or wholesalers because cash doesn’t come in as frequently.
You can contact your state department of labour on any requirement for payroll frequency. Here we have provided you with the five most common payroll schedules that might work — or not work — for your business.
• Weekly payroll schedule
• Biweekly payroll schedule
• Semi-monthly payroll schedule
• Monthly payroll schedule
3. Negotiate your Payments With the Suppliers
Using low-cost suppliers may seem like the best way to improve cash flow, but having flexible payment options can be more important than rock bottom pricing.
Important Points To Keep In Mind While Negotiating Payment Terms With Your Vendors:
• Must have to make a plan even before you reach out to your vendors and must know what queries you're going to ask.
• Must have dynamics in your communication. Making a good impression while having early communication is always more welcome than suddenly reaching out in an emergency.
• Always try to go for a Win-Win situation.
• Never ask or quote for the least.
4. Collect Receivable Quickly
Improve your business cash flow by encouraging quick payments of receivables. The main reason to collect receivables quickly— is too much-uncollected revenue. No one feels happy while calling the person who owes the money. But if multiple customers have blocked your payment, whether you are feeling unpleasant or unfortunate. To run a successful business, owners must have to find some ways to speed up their account receivables.
• Secure prepayment
• Set payment policies in writing
• Invoice promptly
• Shorten payment terms
• Penalize late payers
5. Manage your credit policy properly
It helps to send the invoices promptly, verify they’ve been received, and down right away on late payment. You can also monitor your accounts to identify late-paying customers and implement a cash-on-delivery policy for chronic offenders.
You must have to lay out the philosophy and start collecting overdue accounts. If you are not ready now to execute this plan, there’s no hope for survival. A good policy helps to do these three things:
• Which customers have overdue credit and billing.
• Set the payment terms for customers whose credit is extended.
• You also have to set the time limit to set the outstanding credit accounts
6. Using cloud based accounting systems
Modern day accounting requires a lot more than basic accounting tasks; to manage day to day accounting operations is a demanding task. It is quite essentials to provide accounting team with technologies/skills and training to keep up with the pace to manage the accounting for your business. That is why modern day businesses prefer cloud based accounting systems like QuickBooks enterprise cloud hosting that helps you reduce manual tasks and automate your daily accounting stuff.
Final Words
Having a healthy cash flow is important for any business - large or small. There are several steps you can take to improve your business's cash flow, but it's also important to be mindful of the decisions you make in regards to marketing, customer service, product or service development, and acquiring new customers. If you're not careful with your marketing budget, you could end up spending more money than you're bringing in. Likewise, if you're not providing excellent customer service, you could lose customers and see a decline in revenue. It's important to be mindful of all aspects of your business in order to maintain a healthy cash flow.
About the Creator
samuel john
I enjoy writing everything from blogs and scripts to fiction and press releases. At Quick Cloud Hosting,
I provide technical content for the company. I am fond of listening to music, and I like to keep up on the latest
marketing trends.
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Best work from home practices accountants can follow in 2023
Practically overnight, social distancing has forced us to change everything about how we live and work. As an accountant or bookkeeper, two of your primary concerns right now are probably how to keep your employees accountable while they work from home, and how to make sure your clients’ data – and your company’s data – stays safe. Many firms are moving to a cloud based systems such as QuickBooks enterprise cloud hosting, however, that alone will not resolve the situation, and there are specific practices that need to be followed in order to stay competitive and relevant in the industry.
By samuel john3 years ago in Journal
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