Companies used to store their business’s bookkeeping records in filing cabinets. This took up lots of space with many paper documents linked to the company’s and clients’ financial details. These documents had all the details in an organized fashion, such as:
- Paid invoices of clients
- Unpaid invoices of clients
- Information regarding the payroll of every employee
- Payment records of business contractors
- Plenty of business-related files that are important yet of no specific use now.
These paper or cabinet files are never easy if you are looking for essential data, and viewing those records becomes troublesome. A company must review all files to collect the required data if it plans to prepare for the upcoming tax season.
However, today, we are lucky to have more technologically advanced management systems that have made the process much easier and more convenient for all accountants and bookkeepers. In this technological era, companies have a proper computerized system for entering all company records, including the employee management system, product management system, inventory system, and customer management system.
All these systems have made it easier for a business to locate any digital data and use it easily. Similarly, suppose companies adopt electronic filing methods for financial documentation. In that case, storing data, locating it within minutes, retrieving information, and sharing all bookkeeping records with other authorized employees digitally is much easier.
Getting Started with an Electronic Bookkeeping System
If your business uses the manual paper system for bookkeeping, this is the ideal time to turn towards digitalization. Digital bookkeeping has many benefits over the traditional bookkeeping system. It saves the employees’ time, retrieves the information much quicker, and even saves office storage space.
However, consider the shift towards the paperless filing of your financial data. In that case, you need to ensure that you properly backup all the information to a cloud to retrieve it in case of an accident or data loss.
Shifting from a manual to a digital system will require time and effort at an initial level. A company needs to train its current employees regarding its new document management system to get familiar with its outlook and technicalities. This tailored system should align with the company’s business needs, offering features like drag-and-drop storage, sub-folders for organized data management, and a scanning utility for efficient text search. Choosing an enterprise management system akin to a file cabinet ensures the security of sophisticated business data, avoiding reliance on online cloud services.
The system’s implementation involves creating a structured hierarchy of folders, including Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, Vendor Receipts, Banking, Payroll, Tax, and Loans. Once the folders are set, seamlessly transfer files and organize data in paperless filing cabinets to ensure a successful transition to digital bookkeeping. The designed system should keep the company’s business in mind.
The main idea is to avoid online cloud services such as Google Docs or Dropbox to maintain the security of the business’s sophisticated data. It is ideal to look for an enterprise management system for documentation, such as a file cabinet. The file cabinet has multiple packages with plenty of options for accountants, such as drag-and-drop storage systems, sub-folders for more organized data management, and a utility for scanning and searching text.
When you have finalized your document management system, you can begin by forming all the folders for your company. Designing a structure of your folders is the key to an organized management system.
Once you create a proper structure for the folders, you can put all the files into these folders and organize your data in paperless filing cabinets. Keeping your data safe and in the proper place will ensure your success.
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