Breaking Your Paper Habit

If you’ve been in business for a while, you’re probably paper-addicted. If you’ve considered breaking your paper habit but just couldn’t do it, you should know that there is always hope.

Paper-addicted business owners rely on paper… everything! You send paper bills and issue paper invoices. You pay using paper checks (possibly from a giant-sized, old school, business check-binder.) Paper-addicted people still have giant metal file cabinets with room enough to store all that paper.

Why Go Paperless?

If you’re like most businesses, you get a stack of paper in the mail each day. You can’t simply throw it away, so it piles up on your desk, in your snail-mail inbox, and inside your briefcase. By the time you handle one pile of documents and store them in your file cabinet stash, more paper arrives to take its place.

Here are just a few reasons to break your paper habit.

• You’ll have more space and require less storage.
• Your workspaces will be less messy.
• You’ll save on the cost of stationery, envelopes, and postage.
• You’ll work faster and more efficiently.
• You’ll save the time and manpower you usually spend handling incoming and outgoing mail.

Start With Paperless Bookkeeping

Digital bookkeeping apps and programs allow you to set up accounts, sync records and perform endless financial tasks…paperlessly. If you’re tech-savvy, you can customize your bookkeeping software to meet your company’s specific needs. Even if you are, consider working with a professional bookkeeper. They can customize your setup and do your bookkeeping more efficiently than you ever imagined.

Digitize and Upload your Documents

Digitizing your financial documents allows you to do paperless bookkeeping. You accomplish this by scanning your regularly-accessed documents. Scan your invoices, bills, purchase orders, payroll records, and other critical bookkeeping documents.

• You can scan documents using a scanner or a smartphone scanner app.
• Upload them to your bookkeeping app or to your bookkeeping professional.

Once you scan and upload your documents, you or your bookkeeper can integrate them into your bookkeeping system. You can also update your bookkeeping records from any digital device.

Use Secure Cloud Storage for Document Security

When you set your digital bookkeeping system to store documents in a secure cloud environment, you get several benefits:

• Automated cloud backups
• Secure storage environment
• Offsite document storage for simple disaster recovery
• Easy access from any digital device

Let Your Customers and Suppliers Know You’ve Gone Digital

Once you make your paperless transition, be sure to notify the people who usually rely on your paper trail. Then try to avoid all things paper.

• Send digital invoices only. If someone wants paper, let them print out the invoice themselves.
• Receive and send digital payments: Banks can send and receive payments digitally. Some businesses use online banking services only.
• Issue receipts via email or text: If you sell directly to customers, you might find that they didn’t really want the receipt anyway.
• File your taxes digitally: You don’t have to notify the IRS. They already acknowledge that most businesses maintain digital records.
• If you must issue a check, do it digitally.

Once you break your paper habit, you might find out that many of the businesses and customers you deal with were already paperless. It’s possible they were sending out paper invoices solely to accommodate paper-addicted businesses like yours.

Let Us Help You Go Paperless

At Goode Bookkeeping and Consulting, we make your paperless journey easier. We customize bookkeeping software to accommodate your business. We do day-to-day updates and provide custom financial reports on request. We store your document on a secure cloud platform and we work remotely. And, of course, we do bookkeeping better than you.

For more information about going paperless, call us at (860) 968-2345 or complete our consultation form to arrange a free appointment.