Invoice like a Boss
When you are self-employed, you need to perform many activities to keep your business running smoothly. This includes invoicing clients and receiving payments. Managing invoices manually is long past. Today, there are many invoicing software options available that can automate invoice generation. Using invoicing software can help you minimize errors, stay organized and save time. How do you find the best invoicing software for self-employed individuals?
What to Look For in Invoicing Software
- Ease of use: As a self-employed individual, you don’t have much time, so invoicing software with a steep learning curve is unlikely to be right for you. You need to go for invoicing software with an intuitive interface.
- Estimates provide a way for you to let a client know how much a project will cost and get approval. Once a client approves an estimate, you should be able to convert it to an invoice.
- Customizable invoice designs: When you can customize your invoices, they become recognizable to a client. This increases your chances of being paid on time. Invoicing software should allow you to add your logo and brand colors.
- Easy payment options: When you send the invoice to your customer, it helps if you can add a payment link so they can pay immediately. You should be able to track payments from a central dashboard whether clients pay by credit card, debit card, e-wallets, etc.
- Automatic payment reminders: Following up on overdue invoices is time-consuming. Your invoicing solution should be able to send automatic payment reminders.
- Support for recurring transactions: You may offer ongoing services to some clients. This means configuring and scheduling recurring invoices is necessary.
- Reports: Reports can offer insights that help you to make the right business decisions. They help you to monitor outstanding payments, bad debts, expenses, etc.
- Integrations: It helps invoicing software to integrate with other software you use for your business. For example, if you use a CRM, it should be able to automatically pull billing information stored in the CRM to populate invoices.
- Cross-platform functionality: If you are self-employed, you may need to access your software from different locations and on various devices. Your invoicing software should allow you to perform functions even when you’re on the go and using a mobile phone.
- Security: Invoices contain sensitive information. It is important to consider security and data privacy features.
- Pricing: when considering prices, look for accounting software that offers a free trial so you can test it out before you commit. Consider the cost against the features and check for hidden fees. The software should have scalability so it can grow with your business.
Best invoicing software for self-employed individuals
Finding out more about the different invoicing software options can help you make an informed decision about which one to use.
Fresh Books
Fresh Books is one of the most popular invoicing software options. It has an intuitive app that makes finding your way around easy. Links to the knowledge base are readily available if you get stuck. Time-tracking is one of the useful features. At the end of a week, you can see how much time you spent on projects in the calendar view. You can add tracked time and expenses on invoices.
- Easily create invoices and have the option of requesting a deposit.
- Keep track of expenses. Optical character recognition (OCR) extracts data from receipts you upload, so you don’t have to enter them manually.
- Stay in touch with clients via the mobile app and get notified when invoices are overdue.
- Integrate an online payment portal to help clients pay easily.
- There isn’t a free tier, but there is a 30-day free trial, and paid plans start at $17 per month.
Zoho Books
Zoho Books helps you to keep track of cash flow, monitor spending and keep tabs on projects. It also helps you stay tax-compliant. There are customizable invoice templates that make invoicing easy.
- Autoscan receipts, manage expenses and track billable hours.
- Automate payment reminders.
- Send recurring invoices.
- Get insightful reports using any mobile device.
- Easily collaborate with clients.
The app is simple and secure, and there is a free plan, along with a 14-day free trial of paid plans.
Square Invoices
Square Invoices has a user-friendly design and a built-in payment processing solution. This makes it a great option if you don’t want to choose a separate payment gateway.
- The app is intuitive and streamlined.
- Unlimited estimates, invoices, users and clients.
- Send recurring invoices.
- Automate payment reminders.
- Process all kinds of payments seamlessly.
There is a free plan, but it doesn’t include custom invoicing or the ability to auto-convert estimates into invoices.
QuickBooks Self-Employed
QuickBooks online is one of the best options for doing your taxes when you’re self-employed. Doing taxes is often daunting for business owners. Setting up is easy with the help of dashboard messages.
QuickBooks helps with everything regarding taxation, including transactions, time tracking and mileage. It integrates with TurboTax to help you file your taxes, and you can access information on write-offs and deductions.
This software isn’t as good when it comes to invoicing as the other software mentioned above. You have to turn invoicing on, and there are a few others, but nothing that you can’t get around. You can upload receipts, and QuickBooks extracts the data using OCR. There is a free trial of QuickBooks, and subscriptions start at $20 per month.
Conclusion
The best invoicing software must support the invoicing needs of your small business, fit within your budget and offer scalability. It should be easy to use and offer customizable invoices and safe payment options. Automation of processes such as sending out payment reminders helps to save time. Integrations and cross-platform functionality can simplify your workflows. You should also be able to access insightful reports to help you make sound business decisions. Security is another important consideration, as you have to protect sensitive private information.