Follow one sale and one bill
Follow a sale all the way through: the order, the payment provider, the payout, the bank, VAT and the monthly report. Do the same with a supplier bill, from sign-off to payment. Note every spreadsheet, every time something is typed in twice and every balance that won’t match. It quickly shows whether the problem is the software, the link between systems or the way the work gets done.
Check how things are coded
If you want results by site, project or sales channel, that detail has to go in when the invoice or payroll is first entered. A dashboard can’t reliably rebuild it later if everything has gone into one general cost heading. Often a tidier chart of accounts, or a few tracking categories in Xero or whatever system you use, is all it takes.
Weigh the cost of staying against moving
Add up the hours spent on manual fixes each month, the risk of mistakes, the subscription fees and the reports you can’t get. Then compare that with the cost of moving: the switch-over itself, training, new connections and the extra work in the first month end. Changing software can be the right call, but it should follow what the business needs, not the other way round.
Make a clear decision
There are three options: keep the system and improve it, add a connection to another app, or move. Write down why, what it costs, what it depends on and when you’ll look at it again. A new system won’t help if nobody is clearly looking after the monthly reconciliations. Those still need doing, whatever software you use.
Example: a property business can’t see profit by building. Its system already supports tracking categories, but purchase invoices and payroll go in without them. A new system wouldn’t fix that, because the missing detail was never entered. The first step is agreeing the list of buildings, simple coding rules, a prompt for whoever approves bills and a monthly check for anything uncoded. Then see whether the current system gives the view you need.
When moving does make sense
Sometimes the system really is the limit. It can’t cope with the number of transactions, the currencies you trade in, your stock or the way your teams need to approve spending. If that’s where you land, plan the move properly, with a switch-over date, checked opening balances and real test transactions well before the first deadline.
What to check
- Which reports fail, and what they hold up
- Where information is first entered, and retyped
- Whether gaps come from software, setup or data
- What would change if you improved today’s system
Where to start
Bring one month of transactions and the report you wish you had. That’s a better starting point than any list of software features.