10 Best Practices for Improving your Finance & Billing Process
Overwhelmed with the growth invoice processing? An effective invoice processing harnesses its reputability only with touchless processing & regulatory compliance, skyrocketing businesses towards their optimum growth potential. Confidence over invoice automation comes with proven benefits of reduced cycle times and increased process visibility. Businesses that aim at garnering efficiency in their Finance and Billing processes can get benefited from this article. Finding a proper understanding of the invoice processing steps will enable businesses in solving inherent inefficiencies and risks they create. With this understanding, businesses can develop total efficiency and ensure the implementation of best practices from an appropriate service provider. With steps required for receiving an invoice, businesses can also use effective steps respective to the size of their business. While invoices come as emails, PDFs, paper, and other variations, businesses are required to file, record, and approve them much before payment. With billing operations directly influence the business’s revenue, incorporating efficient systems for quicker payments will ensure better liquidity for eliminating financial crunches that may disturb day-to-day core business operations. OURS GLOBAL’s Finance and Accounting Services helps small business owners with effective finance and accounting decisions by garnering efficiency and transparency throughout their finance and billing operations.
Following are the Ten Best practices for Improving your Finance & Billing Process:
1. Clear & Upfront Payment Terms
With clear payment terms and policies, businesses can ensure prompt and quicker payment of clients. Explaining or acknowledging them with all terms and policies will smoothen deals and doesn’t surprise them with invoices out of anywhere. Clear communication of payment terms and policies will help businesses getting paid in a timely manner. Keeping themselves informed of the time and method of payment of their client’s preference fosters comfortable client experiences. Businesses must not hate sharing with clients the consequences of late payment and appreciate sharing everything beforehand.
2. Impressive Invoices
The invoices designs do matter and approach for showing off the professionalism with intuitive invoice templates. Well-designed invoices are critical for impressing clients and experts recommend customization and personalization of invoices for different clients. Attractive designs for making invoices, simple & easier to understand without too many logos proves each business to maintain standards.
3. Complete and Information-rich Invoices
Not just focusing on invoice designs, businesses must also attend to whatever information should be included in invoices such as product/ service description, order number, GST amount, any shipping costs, total amount, invoice number, due date, payment options, clearly defined payment terms, late payment charges, contact information, etc.
4. Quick Invoicing
Businesses must be capable of delivering invoices to the clients at the time of delivering the product or service to them. Prompt invoicing basically drives quicker payment, helps businesses to display their professionalism towards their customers. Businesses must strive in expressing their consistency by forwarding errorless invoices faster in the event of recurring invoices.
5. Prompt Client Follow-ups
Immediate payments for invoices are not possible at least for some clients. But businesses must not show hesitation in forwarding them with reminders related to due dates for upcoming payments. With this approach, businesses are in turn helping businesses for getting paid on time. Sending reminders also benefits clients, as they don’t have to spend extra capital on penalties over late payments. maintaining professionalism and courteousness in reminders fosters the whole formal face of the brand.
6. Utilization of Digital Tools
Going paperless with digital invoices derived from appropriate online payment solutions will maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of business operations. Clients nowadays are also aware of email communication and would prefer payment methods that allow them to pay for their bills irrespective of time and place.
7. Automation of Invoicing Process
Automation of invoicing process empowers businesses in creating invoices at all times. Generations of recurring invoices for multiple clients is a time-intensive task. Businesses must manually check client payment statuses and ensure the maintenance of accurate invoice details. With automation, businesses don’t need to go through much hassle in remembering unpaid invoices and not show much effort in informing clients of their late payments. Automation of the billing process helps businesses to focus more on other core competitive tasks. With efficient invoicing software, businesses can generate customized recurring invoices, maintain accurate client data, schedule and send reminders, track invoice results, etc. With appropriate cloud-based invoicing software, businesses can easily create and send invoices irrespective of time and place.
8. Clear Communication
Businesses and managers must acknowledge that the invoicing and billing process initiates much before the creation of invoices. To start with businesses must have clear communication about the specific details to the clients. With terms of service being integral is critical for the development of smooth and efficient account receivable department operations. Businesses must foster ideal client relationships right from their initial meeting. Awareness of suitable systems that help businesses in the preparation of new clients for their business processes will prove to be fruitful. Small and Medium service providers whether they are B2C or B2B must always get a deposit at the initial stage of the new contracts. With deposits, businesses can kick-start in the right manner. Initial deposits help clients to realize that the respective business is taking their work seriously. Late payment clients and the ones who show difficulty in payments are of course a clear insight for future payments. Deposits can prove to be beneficial as it improves security and reliability of cash flows with proper mitigation of potential non-payment. Maintaining smooth non-verbal communications also makes sure the same results.
9. Organization of Invoicing and Billing Process
Skillful organization of invoicing and billing process in a much organized and consistent way helps businesses to have maximum control over the billing operation. Effective accounts receivable setup helps businesses effectively manage the whole process with just a simple spreadsheet and payment platforms. Of course, complex automated software does the same. Accounts Receivable department operations are completely independent of business size and nature even if the businesses require simplicity and detailed accountants receivable department. Management of the billing process remains the same, even if the businesses have more clients or fewer. Documenting and accounting the whole process and ensures uniformity across the billing process flow. Maintaining consistency and careful documentation of everything will ensure no loss and unpaid invoices. This will also make better reconciliation of accounts for a much simpler task.
10. Consistency
For ensuring maintaining higher levels of consistency, businesses require a simple, fast, and effective client billing process. Allowing faster actual work with repetition also helps businesses in skillful identification of client problems, billing issues, and approaches that improve system efficiency. The consistent billing process is the effective businesses can show clients the overall health of their businesses with clear, well-organized detailed, and branded invoices. Any event of unclear documentation proves the unethical business perspectives and the requirement for representation at the highest level of professionalism. Thus effective invoicing and billing process requires businesses to put forward appropriate time, effort, and knowledge.
Thus businesses must come to know the invoice billing process to be the heartbeat of business operation and must initiate the above said best practices for the best results. Thus with effective and streamlined billing processes, businesses can improve, streamline or ensure the efficacy of account receivable department operations. With simple billing, invoicing and collection procedures businesses can maintain careful attention towards the billing process flow. Businesses can eliminate hiring excess employees or not choose in buying sophisticated software for the smooth operation of the customer invoicing process. Forwarding your invoicing and billing process service requirements to OURS GLOBAL’s Finance and Accounting Services helps businesses to attain stability in their invoicing & billing process. Ping us right now and get to know where your businesses must begin in your invoicing and billing strategy preparation.