Friday, January 4, 2013

Billing Software


Every company, regardless of size, relies on some type of income in order to meet its expenses. If you don’t have a proper Billing System in place, how can you expect to ensure that you are collecting all monies owed to you in a timely manner, in order to stay in business.

I have several friends who have gone into business for themselves. Some are crafters, others are working with direct sales companies. Some of the direct sales companies handle the transaction side of things, while others are distributors who purchase product in bulk, and make their profit when they sell to others. One of my friends was selling in this manner, not to make money for herself, but to pass on the discount she was getting to her close friends and family. She didn’t think she needed a system, that it was just easy math. Then she started noticing that it seemed like she was losing money.

She hadn’t accounted for needing to pay taxes on the sales, she thought since she was breaking even, that wouldn’t be a factor, but it was. She also did not account for other fees and shipping she was incurring. She searched the internet and found a software system that would work for her needs, at a reasonable price. Once she had it all set up, it allowed her to enter the price she was paying for the product, all fees, taxes, and shipping, and show what her net cost of each item really was.

Now, she is able to still sell at a significant discount to her friends and family, and have all of her costs covered too. While the amount she collects is slightly more than the listed “cost” price, it actually covers all of her costs and she really is breaking even.  It’s also really great for friends selling homemade crafts. They are able to input the cost of each item, how much of it they used (i.e. yards of fabric, buttons, zippers, etc. that may have been purchased in bulk), the time it took to make the item (they can set an hourly rate and it will calculate it), shipping costs, taxes, etc. and they can see how much profit they are really making. Without a system in place, it can be really easy to overlook something here or there, and end up losing money on what is supposed to be a business.

This is a sponsored post however, all the points and views are my own.

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