Five super doable tips to make updating your financial records MUCH easier!

I know a lot of people really don’t like updating their financial records (bookkeeping etc). I’m not a huge fan either. It takes time and I’d rather be doing something else. But the information you get from it IS super-useful. Plus many of us just HAVE to do it, for tax reasons and the like.

If you’re not very organized the most painful part of the whole financial-records thing is finding the bloomin’ information. Especially info for stuff you’ve PAID for!

Here are some really simple things that I do to make THAT a bit easier.

1. Pay for as many things as possible by credit card, EFT or Paypal

I do this so that I have a record of all my purchases! That way I don’t forget anything! Plus if you use online accounting software like SAASU or Xero you can just import all your transactions with the push of a button or two.

2. Take a photo of cash payments

Sometimes you can’t avoid making a cash payment (‘tho I do try!). I’m still fearful of losing the invoice and forgetting the payment so I take a PHOTO  of it!

Here are some tips for doing the photo-thing:

A. As soon as you get your invoice/receipt give it a reference number. That way when you pop it in your financial records you’ll be able to trace back to the photo (and the original invoice – see later!). In an ideal world I’d just number my cash payments consecutively but I can never remember where I am up to so I use a system with dates in it. Today it’s 14 October 2013 so I’d number the first one 131014A and any more I do today would be 131014B etc. It’s a bit cumbersome but it works.

B. If I think I might forget what the invoice was for I also write that down on it too!

C. Once you’ve given the invoice a reference number take a photo of the it! I find it easiest to just store the photo in an album of “cash payments”. Though I sometimes get a little more organized and move them to an Evernote notebook.  Whatever you do with the photo my tip is to make it really easy! The more steps/logins etc you have the less likely you are to do it.

D. You can get an App to do this. I’ve tried a few but honestly I find my homemade little way easier.

3. Pop all your (referenced) cash receipts in a bag

Once a week I open my wallet and decant all my (referenced) cash receipts into a ziplock food bag. I usually have a bag for each month – just to save it from getting too full.

4. Credit card payments, paper invoice

You still need to keep the invoices for stuff you pay by credit card. So a housekeeping tip – you can use a ziplock bag for these too! Again I keep one for each month.

5. Electronic invoices

Any invoice that comes in an email I file in an email folder. I just call my folder FY14 (For financial year 2014). I start a new folder for each financial year. And that’s fine – you don’t need one for every month!

And that’s all the payment info I need, stored EASILY!

Yes, I could be more organized and store the invoices directly into neat A4 lever arch files. But you know what? I wouldn’t do it! I need super-simple! This way I have a record of all my payments and I have a simple way if storing my invoices ready for inputting into my accounting software.

When it comes to doing my monthly (or quarterly if I’m feeling lazy) accounts I know that I can just grab my photo album of cash Invoices and that will have all my cash payments in it. And  I can use my Credit Card/Bank Statements/Paypal for everything else. Nothing missing! If I need to go back to the original invoice to get some details I can, as they are all in my ziplock bags or email inbox!

This really SIMPLE , really DOABLE technique makes for a much calmer start to bookkeeping!

What are YOUR tips?!

♥ If you like practical doable business stuff you’ll LOVE our Healthy Income Program. It starts again on 4 November. Details here.♥

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