Thanks to the three leading staffing agencies who participated during the consultation months. This helped AXLR8 to build and improve the new AXLR8 Sales Invoicing function for staffing companies using all the foundations built in AXLR8 Job Tracking applications over a decade.
- Wise Security, Bexleyheath, UK.
- The Hospitality Company, Putney, UK.
- Brand Embassy, Graz, Austria.
The system knows where all the staff were, what they did, where and for whom. It knows the client charge rates. Therefore, it can print out timesheets for clients to sign.
It can also work out what should be on the bills. But this is just useful management information!
To take the big step up to automatic invoice generation, much careful consultation was needed in order to ensure that these important client documents were:
- easy to create – for example selecting which activities go on the invoice in the case of repeat buyers
- not invoiced twice (so making sure that those processed could not be charged again – and no more missed invoices for work.
- reportable and providing useful MI
- exportable ( so aggreate or detailed data could be exported to various accounting systems
- adjustable within acceptable business rules so that maximum flexibiliy to change a bill to get it paid did not compromise basic accounting principles.
- able to handle deposits and part payments
- compatible with AXLR8 Debt Chaser (dunning letter automation using Trigaware) to reduce their collections admin and costs.
And along the journey, we have solved many standard issues such as:
- issuing credit notes
- emailing invoices and making invoices available on the client portal (no excuses about not receiveing them!!!)
- matching account numbers for clients established over the years.
- matching nominal codes, etc.
- configuring invoice numbers to fit with those already used. If you have ever done this, you will be aware, it is not just a matter of taking the last used number!
- training the booking staff to enter the data correctly and training the accounting people so they are confident.
Comments include:
“Now the invoicing has been up and running for a few months, I can tell you it has transformed my life!”
A business owner manager saving at least day per week on sales invoicing
“Well, that was easy! So, importing the sales invoice data into Sage 50 is just as simple as importing the payroll into Sage Payroll when we started that three years ago.”
This, or something like it, has been said by several accounting admin people.
And our favourite:
“[We] finally no longer need our debt collection agency. This saves us about £1000 per month in debt collections fees. The automation of invoicing has speeded up billing and collections. It has reduced our days outstanding. Our bad debt write offs – once painful – are virtually zero now. It is all about speed and accuracy – staff timesheet to billing is instant.”
A business owner