Managing invoice payments and finances can get difficult if you are not clear on how to manage them in one place. But, as a small business owner, you need to develop a hold on your finances and streamline your cash flow Zintego.com
Luckily, online payment processing software can help you create the right invoicing strategy, generating invoices in just a few clicks, and keeping track of them to manage your business operations with ease.
Good invoice management will boost cash flow, save you time, and say goodbye to accounting woes. Here is how you can handle invoice payments with ease. Also, you can prefer PDQ Machine that makes your payment method easy.
1. Choose the Right Invoice and Streamline Payments
Let’s be honest, there are no perfect invoice templates. Different payment plans will work for projects with different requirements. Make sure you talk to your client about payment schedules. This will help you agree on a plan and sort things for the future.
Multi-instalment Invoices
Instead of paying a big amount, your client will be willing to follow a milestone-based payment schedule. This could include an initial deposit and equal payments over the project lifecycle. You could also choose to follow a different schedule that fits both you and your customers. Make sure the schedule you set, you will need to send a final invoice and give project details at the end. Once you have a clear demarcation, you can analyze what’s been completed and what are you expecting payments for.
Recurring Invoices
If you are having ongoing projects you can send regular invoices at intervals weekly and monthly. So, get on a schedule and make invoices part of your routine. Slowly, your clients will follow the same suit and develop the habit of making payments on time.
Final Invoices
Once you have completed your projects, you will need to send a final invoice and even all the interim invoices that has been sent. Also, mention the invoice that has been paid and then states the final amount that is outstanding. Even if you received an advance payment in full and make sure it is clear for your client.
2. Manage Invoices with Ease
One of the ways to reduce headaches and streamline invoice payments is to use online invoicing software. Making the right use of these tools will help you say goodbye to the equation.
Paper invoices can get lost and you can easily check if an invoice has been paid or not. With online payment processing software, you will be able to generate professional invoices and track the real-time status of every client from your system or mobile device. You can also use it to send invoices from your app and your customers will not be charged a single dime for the same.
3. Eliminate Delays
Another thing that needs to be done to manage invoice payments with ease is to send your invoices as early as possible. Even if you are using online invoicing software, make sure you check your service descriptions, prices, and taxes and send it after project completion. At the same time, don’t be in a hurry as a series of errors await you and if not addressed can lead to issues with payments.
Please remember that your point of contact may not be dealing with the accounts department. Thus, to avoid back and forth and unnecessary delays, make it clear to whom you should send your invoice.
Another issue is ambiguity related to payment terms. To avoid uncomfortable situations, you will need to make the client agrees to your terms before you start work. You can choose to use custom text and logos, state your payments, refund policies, and cancellation.
Another thing is that if you send invoices on a wrong day, then also your payments will be delayed. Luckily, invoice automation can be used to pre-schedule invoices and send them at a time they will receive them.
When a client will see an invoice, during work hours and surely not when they are having dinner. Thus, consider sending invoices after your project is completed.
4. Manage Sent Invoices
We are all humans and falter from time to time. Sometimes you need to edit sent invoices. Luckily, most online invoicing software lets you edit past invoices.
The best thing is you can do it from your mobile app and save the changes right away.
Here is the common procedure followed by most invoicing tools:
- Search for invoices in the dashboard.
- Select the invoice you want to edit.
- Make the required edits and update the invoice.
- Triple-check your invoice and then share it with your client.
If you want to cancel recurring invoices that can also be done in a few clicks.
All you need to do is select the series of invoices and end them. But, please remember if an invoice has been paid, it cannot be deleted from the payment history.
But, you can always choose to issue a refund and then balance your books.
5. Invoice Customization
Your customers receive 100s of invoices every month. Thus, having a clear differentiation is a must. Make sure you add your logos and design your invoice such that your customers can easily figure out who has made the invoice.
You can offer multiple payment gateways and share the links for the same in your invoice. A trend that has been observed is that if you let your customers pay with credit cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay, you are likely to receive faster payments.
Thus, it will be easier to manage invoice payments in one place and also maintain your cash flow.
Is Online Invoicing Software Worth The Expense?
Be it a freelancer, small business owner, or enterprise, online invoicing solutions are a must. Not only will they help you take care of all your payments, but they will also help you keep other aspects in check. These include customer satisfaction, overall finance management, and receipt making. Manual methods may be cheap in the short run. But, they will cost you big time when you need to scale your business and deal with multiple clients.
Streamlining Communication
Have you ever felt bad as you received a bill approva but could not find the proof for the same. The worse case scenario is that you received an invoice that looked dicey, but you could not find any related documentation to prove the same. Searching for emails, voicemails, and texts can be a frustrating experience and is also not a fool-proof method.
So, if you need to have conversations on an invoice, you will need to have communications streamlined and a centralized database should be there to keep records clean.
You can choose to stay notified about all information related to invoices and address any queries that arise. This will not only make communications easy and also help your team stay on track. So, the first thing that can be done to streamline invoice payments is to get your communication strong and keep your team members on the same page.
Wrapping Up
These steps can help you manage invoice payments from a single place and make finance handling super easy. So, it is time you said goodbye to manual invoices and make online payment processing software a part of your business. Streamlined payments is one thing but you will also get access to detailed reports that will help you forecast trends and stay miles ahead of competitors. If you are still not sure of which solution to pick, let us help you find one!!
