Bookkeeping is a general term for the recording of financial transactions such as all income and expenditure by an individual or a business. Bookkeeping is quite different from accounting and should the two should not be confused. Bookkeeping is the recording of the transactions that an accountant will use in order to form reports and accounts.

Bookkeeping is largely a data entry type task and can be quite labour intensive and often mistakes can be made. There are two main types of bookkeeping, single- entry bookkeeping and double-entry bookkeeping. Single-entry bookkeeping only uses income and expense accounts which is sufficient for most small businesses. Double-entry bookkeeping requires recording of each transaction twice using debits and credits which serves as a type of error protection system.

Accounting software can be used to improve a multitude of elements within a company including their bookkeeping processes. A key element of accounting software is the ability to streamline processes, this includes bookkeeping and by automating many of the elements that previously would have had to be manually imputed you can dramatically reduce the amount of time your staff spend of labour intensive tasks, freeing them up to do more revenue productive work.

With strict accounting restrictions and financial regulations the focus on compliancy is now more important than ever. By automating as much of the bookkeeping process as possible you can dramatically reduce the number of errors and in turn improve compliancy.

One fantastic feature of accounting software is the ability to reduce paper flow within your business, expenses typically are submitted via a line of authorisers usually accompanied by supporting paper documents and with new accounting software this process can be automated which speeds up the process, means less work and also enables records to be available for bookkeeping.

It is important to choose the right accounting software for your business as many off the shelf software packages that you can purchase in your local computer shop may not have the relevant and necessary in depth functionality that you require and would benefit from. In some instances the best software package could be a bespoke solution tailored to your individual business needs. iSoft Business Solutions are software experts and can help you with every step of your selection and integration.

Take a look at the range of accounting software, eProcurement solutions or bespoke options available from iSoft Business Solutions or contact a business solutions for more information.