Accounting Pros: Here’s Why Mobile Accounting Matters to Your Clients

How far away is your cell phone from you right now? I’ll bet it’s within arm’s reach. Maybe you’re even reading this on your phone.

If you’re like most people, you use your smartphone for a lot more than just making calls. In fact, with 90% of mobile time spent on mobile apps, there’s a really good chance your clients do, too.

Your clients—particularly your business owner clients—are used to doing a lot on the go. Running their business likely isn’t static, and their accounting processes shouldn’t be, either.

With mobile apps that support their business, your clients have all the necessary information to keep their business running at their fingertips without being tied down to one location.

Read on to learn more about the benefits of recommending mobile accounting apps to your business owner clients.

What Is Mobile Accounting?

Mobile accounting solutions enable users to access and manage their financial data remotely from anywhere. The best mobile accounting apps offer the advantage of using features of a mobile device, such as a camera, contact list, GPS, phone calls, and more. They’re also connected to their cloud-based accounting software, so their data is synced across devices.

Mobile apps for accounting software are becoming increasingly popular among business owners due to their convenience and flexibility. With an accounting software mobile app, users can easily handle their business accounting and access financial data from any device with an internet connection or cellular plan.

What Types of Clients Benefit From Using a Mobile Accounting App?

A mobile accounting system is helpful for any business owner that wants to handle accounting tasks and track their financial data, no matter where they are. For example, clients with remote employees can easily monitor employee timesheets or approve payroll on the go. And business owners who travel frequently can easily monitor their bank account balances, track their expenses, and stay on top of cash flow and financial performance.

Mobile accounting apps are helpful for business owners who need to collaborate with their accountants or bookkeepers regularly. When their data syncs across the desktop and mobile app, they always have up-to-date numbers at hand for making business decisions or estimating tax liabilities.

Overall, any business owner who wants more flexibility and control over their accounting information will find mobile features beneficial.

5 Benefits of Mobile Accounting Systems for Business Owners (And Their Accounting Pros)

Here are five of the major advantages of using mobile accounting apps for your clients to monitor business performance or handle transactions.

1. Accessibility

With a mobile accounting app, business owners can access financial reports and monitor financial transactions from anywhere at any time, regardless of what device they’re using.

2. Efficiency

Mobile accounting apps help improve workflow efficiency by eliminating the need for cumbersome manual processes such as filing and organizing paper records. Users can quickly and easily send invoices or scan receipts on the go. (That’s good news for you as an accounting pro, since it also means these day-to-day tasks are more likely to get done!)

3. Collaboration

Mobile accounting makes it easy for multiple users to collaborate and work together on financial information, regardless of their physical location or device. This makes collaboration easier among all accounting team members—including outsourced accountants or bookkeepers.

4. Security

When business owners manage their accounting in paper records, spreadsheets, or desktop computers, they’re responsible for security. A fire or break-in at the office can mean losing all those records and possibly putting sensitive data at risk.

A mobile accounting app that’s connected to cloud-based software offers enhanced security due to the numerous layers of protection that come with it. Security isn’t the small business owner’s responsibility—it’s on the software companies to prevent unauthorized access to private information, encrypt transactions, and ensure that client data is protected and secure.

5. Cost-Effectiveness

By reducing the need for manual processes, paper files, and onsite storage space, mobile accounting can reduce costs for small businesses and their accountants. This makes it a more affordable option for businesses of all sizes looking to streamline their financial processes.

6 FreshBooks Features That Support Mobile Accounting

FreshBooks is accounting software with a user-friendly mobile app that helps business owners and their accounting professionals manage their finances. With the FreshBooks app, users can access data quickly, securely, and collaboratively from any device. The mobile accounting app offers a range of features specifically designed to support businesses:

1. Mileage Tracking

Mileage tracking is an essential task for many business owners. It helps them accurately track business-related travel expenses and ensure that employees are reimbursed correctly. It also ensures that the business can deduct those miles on their federal tax returns.

FreshBooks Mileage Tracking offers an efficient way for companies to track all business-related miles. The app automatically logs each trip every time the car moves and saves the user’s travel history, hands-free. Then drivers can easily swipe their screen to classify trips as business or personal.

This information is stored in a secure database for easy access and reporting. Users can email mileage reports or download them from FreshBooks.

2. Expense Tracker

FreshBooks’ Receipt Scanner is an innovative mobile accounting feature that helps clients manage their expenses on the go.
This feature allows users to quickly and easily scan receipts using their mobile device’s camera. The software automatically captures details, including the merchant name, line item totals, and taxes, eliminating the need to manually enter expenses.

Your clients can code transactions and add notes if needed. Then, when it’s time to prepare bank reconciliations or process tax returns, all of the information is there.

3. Time Tracking

For businesses that track billable hours, FreshBooks Time Tracking makes it easy to see how much time employees spend on clients and projects.

Business owners and their employees can easily track their time on the mobile app or on the web. Then those hours can be used to generate an Invoice and billed directly to clients.

4. Invoicing on the Go

Sending Invoices on the go is easy for your clients with the FreshBooks mobile app. Users can quickly and conveniently generate and send Invoices from any device without having to print out paper documents or worry about postage. The clear user interface also means your clients can send professional-looking Invoices—whether they’re using their mobile device or desktop.

FreshBooks also offers convenient payment options for your clients’ customers, including MasterCard, Visa, American Express, Apple Pay, and ACH. As a result, your clients won’t have to waste time chasing down payments to get paid, which helps maintain the cash flow necessary to keep their operations running.

5. Collaboration

Your clients know that a happy customer is key to having money in the bank! With the FreshBooks app, your clients can quickly and efficiently respond to customer questions and feedback right in the mobile app. (That means no more lengthy email chains with multiple invoices flying around!) They can answer customer queries in real-time and keep everyone on the same page, whether in the office or on the job.

6. Real-Time Information

Because FreshBooks stays in sync across the desktop and mobile app, your clients can further unlock the potential of mobile accounting by accessing their financial information from anywhere. Any updates they make on the mobile app will be reflected on desktop, and vice versa. They’ll always have a clean and accurate set of data on which to make financial decisions.

Answering the Call of Mobile Accounting

When you’re giving software advice to your clients, consider how important it is for them to have access to their accounting data from their smartphones. The best mobile accounting apps make it easy for them to do accounting operations on the go, too.

FreshBooks’ powerful mobile accounting features make it easy for users and their accountants to retrieve and manage client data from anywhere at any time. Whether you’re trying to streamline your own processes or help your clients stay organized and on top of their finances, FreshBooks is the perfect tool to help achieve your goals.