With tax season kicking in, accounting departments can be seen busy computing profit loss, tracking income expenses and sales tax received per month, checking cash flow, updating double entry and financial reports and the list is endless! As much as it is a tedious and challenging task, it is also the most crucial one, after all, finance is the lifeline of any business. And business owners cannot afford any mistake here. And this is why all kinds of businesses whether a small business or a large, need an accounting solution.

An online accounting software assists business owners or accounting professionals like CA to manage and automating accounting transactions. In simple words, it helps track income expenses and records them simultaneously. For instance, when you make a payment or receive payment via a bank account, the cloud accounting solution will automatically create a double entry.

1. Because your time is precious- Manual recording of every single transaction from business loans , business credit to payments made via credit card or bank accounts and more can be tough and time consuming. A cloud based accounting solution helps you to automate all accounting transactions. Apart from online bookkeeping , It allows small business owners to prepare financial reports in a click.

2. Accuracy-
One thing business owners cannot and should not compromise on is accuracy. Now you need not to spend hours trying to balance the assets and liabilities in your financial reports like the old bookkeeping accounting . The online accounting tools will spot the potential error in case of any discrepancy. And you can correct it accordingly.
In addition, the best accounting software will keep the entire accounting process automated right from accepting online payments to bank reconciliation and expense tracking . Thus, minimizing the scope of error when compared to traditional bookkeeping accounting.

3. Better Invoicing-
Every business needs invoicing regardless of size and nature. Earlier, people would create invoices on MS Office, which clashed with uniformity and lead to not-so-good format. One of the best accounting features of small business accounting software's built-in features is that it allows you to create as many invoices as you require, with guaranteed uniformity in recurring invoices.

You can then send invoices directly to the customer or third party concerned.
The best small business accounting system also helps you send payment reminders in case you are yet to accept payments.


4. Integration-
The accounting software best for growing businesses is the one that allows integration. For instance, when an accounting solution is integrated with inventory management software, it will track inventory and auto-update the accounts in real-time. In case you received online payments in the bank account for sales, the cloud-based accounting software will record the revised inventory and amount receivable.
Some accounting solutions like Zoho books are by default integrated with the Zoho inventory system.

While other online accounting solutions from Intuit Quickbooks like Quickbooks Online or Quickbooks Self Employed or Quickbooks Desktop can be integrated with other inventory management systems for inventory tracking.

Similarly, Sage business cloud accounting system, or in simple words Sage Accounting can be integrated with inventory management software for comprehensive and easy use business solutions.

Keeping track of cash flow, offline and online payments, business credit, accounts payable, accounts receivable, income expenses, etc is a time-consuming task. Whatever little time is left goes into spotting errors in financial reports and double-entry accounting.

The best accounting software can save you hundreds of hours that you wasted in doing repetitive tasks like preparing financial reports and or fixing double entry. You can use this time for other productive tasks like project management and more.

Also, these cloud-based accounting solutions are pocket-friendly. There is quite some free accounting software available out there. While most accounting solutions offer free plans for trial, so you can use and pick the best for your small business.

Most of the cloud-based bookkeeping software even have mobile apps that make it more user-friendly.

The best business accounting software should be able to allow-
1. Syncing between bank accounts and credit card
2. Create and send invoices
3. Accept payments of all kinds credit cards , online payments
4. Prepare basic financial reports like Profit and Loss statement , Cash Flow
5. Access to unlimited users or atleast multiple users
6. Payment reminders
The market offers variety of bookkeeping software options . However, we have shortlisted three best cloud accounting software that allows most of the above-listed accounting features .

• Wave Accounting is one of the best online accounting software for small business and startups.
• It provides free accounting , receipt scanning and allows to create and send invoices without any cost . Most of the basic online accounting features are free .
• Wave Accounting only charges for premium services like customer payment processing and payroll plans . Pricing plan for payrolls start from $ 20 per month .
• Wave Accounting provides access to unlimited users , but allows limited third party app integrations
• Wave accounting has user friendly mobile app
• Read full privacy policy before investing in the best business accounting software

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