Collecting Paper Receipts Could Be Costing You Money

COLLECTING PAPER RECEIPTS COULD BE COSTING YOU MONEY

A study conducted by Xero shows that 77.6% of businesses still manually store at least some of their receipts and invoices in paper format, with more than half of those surveyed (57%) admitting their filing system isn’t organised.

The survey also showed:

• 3.7% of small businesses have no storage system in place for their receipts and invoices;
• Small businesses are spending a lot of money on paper administration, with 12.7% spending more than $1,000 a week on paper admin costs which   includes printing, paper, scanning, shredding, storage and a total 3% spending more than $5,000 per week;
• More than a third (38.8%) of small businesses spend many hours a week processing receipts and invoices, churning out up to 100 invoices per week on average – totalling 5,200 per year.

Of the small businesses still using a paper system, almost half (40.2%) had been running their business for more than 10 years. However, by contrast, small businesses that had been running for one to three years represented just 8.4% of businesses using paper systems.

“The data shows us there are still many Australian small business owners who aren’t using technology to find day-to-day efficiencies within their business and cut down on time-consuming manual processes,” said Trent Innes, managing director of Xero Australia.

“Aside from making it incredibly difficult to keep track of business expenses and cash flow, paper-based receipt/invoice systems become very costly and time consuming.”

We help clients transition into an organised and reliable accounting and expense tracking system through using Xero. So many businesses are wasting time on double handling and tracking down receipts and records. Contact your advisor today to find out more about Xero.