Any business – whether you’re an accountant, retailer, or contractor – needs to get paid fast. Intuit® has long been a leader in supporting faster invoicing payments, and helps businesses send more than 400 million invoices amounting to over $1 trillion each year. Today, we’re excited to share details on a host of innovations we’ve added to the QuickBooks® Invoices solution to deliver an even more intuitive, powerful, and fast payment experience. As we continue to listen to all of our customers and expand the benefits QuickBooks Payments provides, we look forward to these enhancements helping our accounting partners evaluate their clients’ books in real time, and empowering you as strategic, impactful advisors.
From the initial client conversation, to making the sale, and to reconciling your books, a holistic invoicing solution is critical in navigating that journey successfully. QuickBooks Invoicing is there with you from the get-go, starting with the newly rebuilt estimate feature. Easy to craft at a desk or on the go, you can create a professional looking estimate in a few minutes. With the ability to save templates, build a library of favorites, and copy existing estimates and invoices seamlessly, you can save time starting new projects for your clients.
Estimate
After sending an estimate, you’ll have complete visibility into when the estimate was viewed, when it’s accepted and you’ve landed the job, and when you’ve been paid through the estimates list & activity tracker.
For those on the receiving end of the estimate, we are also introducing new tools that simplify their experience and help them take action. Through QuickBooks Estimates, your potential clients can now easily accept the estimate online in one click. And, in the coming weeks, clients will also have the ability to pay a deposit if you require one to seal the deal and free up cash flow for any upfront expenses.
Estimate & Deposit
Since introducing the new estimates feature to a small group of small businesses already using estimates, we’ve seen an 8x increase in weekly estimates sent. We’re also seeing adoption among new estimate customers increase, with a 6x increase in weekly unique customers sending estimates.
All of these enhancements support the early stages of the client conversation and work seamlessly with the final step: getting the invoice paid when work is completed. Simply convert the estimate into an invoice – removing hassle and taking work off your plate.
Invoice from converted estimate
With the invoice ready, you can send it from your Gmail address or by text message as a shareable link, keeping the conversation going naturally, in the way your clients want to communicate. QuickBooks will also offer smart suggestions to accelerate payment. These smart suggestions are based on an assessment of your profession and recommend things like email subject lines or invoicing terms that can help get a client’s attention and get you paid faster.
Send from Gmail
Client receiving an invoice via text message
Sharing a link
Smart suggestions
We’re also adding tips or gratuities, giving you the opportunity to earn even more. If you enable the feature, your clients will be able to add a tip to their invoices to recognize you for a job well done!
Client view when making payment with tips enabled
For businesses that have recurring relationships, such as monthly fees for accounting services or other types of ongoing payments, QuickBooks has also introduced the benefit of subscription payments for invoices. This feature requires your clients to set up automatic payments for recurring invoices, ensuring your business gets paid on time, every time.
Clients who receive a QuickBooks Invoice also now have a host of new features that help meet their payment needs. They can now schedule payment for their invoice on a future date or set up automatic payments (available on recurring invoices only) and have access to see all of their outstanding invoices with you, making payment simple. These convenient features – along with automated email reminders for unpaid invoices – help ensure a client won’t miss a payment and you get your money faster while eliminating time spent chasing down outstanding invoices.
Initial data shows recurring Invoices with autopay enabled get paid at 3x higher rate compared to recurring Invoices without this feature turned on.
Autopay
Schedule pay
We’re excited to deliver these powerful new invoicing features to eligible businesses over the next few weeks and make getting paid even more seamless and simple.
Originally published in Firm of the Future Blog by Gagan Shah
To learn more about QuickBooks Payments Schedule Time with Jonathan, or call (617) 332-8522
