Introduction to Use of Accounting Software for Small Qatari Businesses

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Introduction to Use of Accounting Software for Small Qatari Businesses

Introduction to Use of Accounting Software for Small Qatari Businesses

There are many reasons why SMEs are gradually moving from manual accounting and bookkeeping to accounting software. There are many inherit benefits of using it

Improved Business Financial Monitoring and Health

The aim of writing this blog post is to bring to you the top financial products and services. The process that we use is neutral and fair, with the concept of helping small businesses succeed more.

Small business owners can use accounting software in Qatar to get a lot of help when it comes to tracking accounts payable and accounts receivable. Software driven accounting and bookkeeping in Qatar helps SMEs get a better picture of the profitability and let them prepare for the tax season. The world of accounting software is full of many different options. Some small Qatari businesses use out of the box software and do not require any customizations. With the growth in the business account and bookkeeping needs, it may involve greater complexity and require to implement custom enterprise resource planning or ERP system.

There are various types of accounting software options available for small Qatari businesses with difference in capabilities and prices. The selection of the right type of software depends a lot on the industry type and the number of employees in a company. These are the two factors which determine which type of accounting software will be suitable for a particular type of small business operating in a given industry. For example, a retail store may not require the same accounting features in a software that a food business will require.

We have searched for a lot of different types of accounting software in Qatar. Our research compares may different types to give you the top choices of software that we suggest to different businesses. Some of the factors that we considered when selecting software included cost of implementation, features, integrations, and the ability to scale with business expansion.

QuickBooks Online

The top software that as top outsourced accounting services in Qatar we suggest is QuickBooks Online.

QuickBooks is one of the best when it comes to delivering value for money as an accounting software for small businesses reviewed. Majority of the small business accounting professionals rely on QuickBooks. There are countless training resources available online and its forum also provide a lot of support. The accounting features that you can access are varied and you can easily access them via dashboard, making it a lot easier to manage.

Advantages

  • It is scalable
  • A lot of accounting professionals use QuickBooks
  • It is easy to integrate with many other third-party applications
  • There is access to a cloud-based solution
  • You can use it on your smartphone via a mobile app

Limitations

  • When adding more users, you will need to upgrade it
  • Sometimes you may face syncing issues with credit cards and banks

QuickBooks offers Intuit as the most common accounting software that small businesses rely upon for tax returns and bookkeeping their books of accounts. You can use Intuit as a cloud-based option and access it using a web browser or via mobile application.

This is an accounting software in Qatar that you can use for free for the first 30 days. After the trial period of 30 days, you will have to opt for one of the different pricing plans as per your need.

Here is a look at the pricing plans.

Simple Start

It costs $25 per month.

Essentials

You will have to pay $40 per month

Plus

With more features, the monthly subscription is $70 per month

Advanced

The most feature-full option will cost you $150 per month

When you are initially subscribing, you will get a lot of discount during the first few months. Many accounting companies in Qatar also choose to go for wholesale pricing to provide small businesses more cost-effective software solution

As a small business owner using accounting software in Qatar, you can always upgrade the plan as per the growth of your business. A professional accountant in Qatar can select from the different customization options including using it on the mobile application for receiving payments. You can also review reports, great screenshots of receipts, and track business mileage. You can fully integrate QuickBooks Payroll with QuickBooks Online to use a comprehensive payroll solution.

Each of the plans discussed above comes with different advanced features. You can use these features to your business advantage for tracking users, budgeting, time tracking and inventory management. Simple Start is a package that meets basic needs of small businesses for accounts and maintaining of books of accounts. Small businesses that sale product-based items can use Essential or Plus to get more options for inventory management and customization.

Advanced subscription is a relatively newer offering by QuickBooks and offers more detailed financial reporting. Fathom powers its reporting as a robust financial reporting analysis tool that many large companies already use around the world.

You can use any of the above plans for integration with third-party applications like PayPal or Stripe. You can find QuickBooks Online app that offers complete detail by function and you can also use examples given to take the most of the mobile application.

Xero – Great Accounting Software in Qatar for Micro Businesses

When it comes to handling bookkeeping and accounting, you will find Xero as a great option.

Here is what one of the early users of Xero.com shared, “All bookkeeping services near me in Qatar recommended Xero.com for my micro business”.

The use of a clean interface for the software ensures a clear user interface and can easily integrate with the payroll services. Businesses can rely upon Xero.com for collection of online payments from customers by integrate it with GoCardLess or Stripe.

Advantages of Using Xero.com

  • It is a cloud-based accounting and bookkeeping solution
  • You can use it by integration with a mobile application
  • It also allows you to integrate payroll with Gusto
  • Use it for third-party app marketplace
  • Allows you to easily manage inventory

Limitations

  • Limited level of reporting available
  • Charges a fee for ACH payments
  • Limited customer support and service

Xero is a New Zealand based company having its roots going back to 2006 and growing to a subscriber base of 2.7 million users across the world. Some of the countries that readily use Xero include the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. It has a workforce of more than 3,500 employees and is gaining popularity with the US market too.

You can use Xero accounting software in Qatar with different monthly subscription models and get access to full-service payroll add on.

The cost of payroll would be $11 per month for Early, $32 per month for Growing, and $62 for Established each month. The full-service payroll option comes via Gusto and the additional payment for it is $39 per month and $6 additional for each employee. Get a free 30-day trial and promotion for 50% off for two months for accounting and bookkeeping in Qatar.

When you use the Early plan, it limits usage to only five quotes, invoices, five bills and also you only get to do 20 bank transactions each month. A micro business can benefit of this limited plan, particularly if this involves high-ticket transactions. Mostly consulting or small business service providers with handful of options can use this option when considering an accounting software in Qatar.

The Growing and Established plans give you access to unlimited number of bills, invoices and transactions. Established plan is different in the sense that you can get some additional features including expense management, support for multiple currencies and cost of projects. All the plans come standard with Hubdoc, bill and receipt capturing solution. The outsourced accounting services in Qatar thus suggest the use of this software accounting solution for such micro businesses.

FreshBooks – Accounting Software in Qatar for Service-Based Businesses

Invoicing is one of the most critical aspects of a service-based businesses. FreshBooks provides you with more customized invoicing when compared to the other different accounting software packages. The use of FreshBooks lets you send, receive print and also pay for invoices. Accounting companies in Qatar suggest that you use it to take care of the basic accounting needs of your business.

FreshBooks is prepared to make bookkeeping and accounting a lot of easier for the service businesses. You can use it to perform different aspects of your service business including sending of proposals and invoices, requesting of deposits, collection of client retainers, time tracking projects and receipt of payments.

Advantages

  • It is a cloud-based solution
  • Provides a user-friendly interface
  • You can integrate it with third-party apps
  • An affordable option for maintaining books of accounts
  • Comes with many advanced invoicing features

Limitations

  • No option for managing inventory
  • No requirement for payroll service
  • The mobile application comes with limitations

The history of FreshBooks goes back to 2003, emerging from Toronto Canada as an invoicing software. The company has added more features and has 500+ employees. You can choose from four different pricing plans and also get a 10% discount for your business if they select a yearly instead of a monthly plan.

You can use FreshBooks accounting software in Qatar to get 60% discount per month for the first 6 months.

Plans of FreshBooks include

Lite

$6 per month

Plus

$10 per month

Premium

$20 per month

Select

For choosing “Select”, get in touch with the customer service to get custom pricing

One of the reasons for many businesses to select this software is its option of letting you bill various clients individually. The Lite plan supports billing of up to 5 clients each month. The Plus plan gives you the option to bill up to 50 clients individual. You can use Premium Plan to bill unlimited number of clients each month.

When you do not want to have a limit on the total number of clients that you can bill individually, then you need to go for the Select plan. You will have to pay $10 per month additionally for multiple team members for using this accounting software package. If you want to opt for advanced payment feature, you can pay $20 per month, letting users charge a credit card in real-time. Users can also set a recurring credit card charge for a client.

An accounting software in Qatar that integrates well with third-party apps like G Suite, Stripe, Shopify and others is highly desirable. Here is what one of the users of such services said, “I wanted freedom with accounting software. Thanks to my bookkeeping services near me in Qatar, the accounting software they suggest integrates well with third-party applications.”

FreshBooks offers a unique feature letting you stylize the invoice and customize them to give a proper look and a professional feel. FreshBooks also comes in handy as an accounting software in Qatar for budgeting of projects, sharing proposals and estimates, and collecting payments due towards customers.

Accounting Software in Qatar for Part-Time Freelancers

When it comes to using software for accounting and bookkeeping in Qatar, QuickBooks is very suitable for self-employed individuals. Part-time freelancers and independent contracts will find it pretty useful when it comes to measuring income and expenditures for VAT tax returns (in future). QuickBooks is a software specifically tailored for business owners who are looking to submit individual tax returns.

When freelancers and part-time self-employed Qatari individuals are managing their books of accounts without a software, they have to go through a lot to handle bank and credit card statements. They also have to make a lot of effort to consolidate year-end income and expenses, which can be a challenging tasks. QuickBooks Self-Employed focuses on all such individuals and helps them automatically manage many of the business transactions.

Advantages

  • A cloud-based solution
  • Usable via a mobile application
  • Let’s you track mileage
  • Makes it easy for you to bifurcate personal expenses from business costs
  • Synch option with TurboTax

Limitations

  • It is not easy for you to transfer the data to any other accounting software
  • Provides with limited reporting features
  • Limited in invoicing functionality and options for further customization

Intuit is behind the launch of QuickBooks Self-Employed feature, offering a cloud-based online interface and a mobile application. Freelancers can use this accounting software in Qatar to stay organized every year during tax season. Some of the features that you will get with QuickBooks Self-Employed include easy separating of expenses, tracking of mileage, better organized receipts, ability to send invoices, estimations and preparation of taxes for filing using TurboTax.

Users can rely on this accounting software in Qatar with the following pricing options.

Self-Employed

Costs $15 per month

Self-Employed Bundle

You would pay $25 per month

Self-Employed Live Tax Bundle

This plan comes at a cost of $35 per month

The company offers a discount of 50% during the first three months of using QuickBooks Self-Employed.

Please check with your provider of outsourced accounting services in Qatar for more details on discounts.

Two of the tax bundles also come with the subscription for TurboTax during income tax filing. The use of Self-Employed Live Tax Bundle provides you access to a CPA to get all your questions answered throughout the year during the entire tax season. A CAP can also give a final review of your tax return before you file your tax (VAT) return in TurboTax.

The use of mobile application also adds to your ease of tracking mileage when driving and it allows you to capture images of receipts for your business expenses. It is not easy to find accounting software in Qatar that separates business and personal transactions. Accounting companies in Qatar recommend QuickBooks Self-Employed to freelancers because of the option that it provides, letting you mark each transaction as personal or business. Freelancers find this feature pretty useful and it makes life easy for them separating business and personal activity.

How can Accounting Software Help Small Qatari Businesses?

One of the benefits is reduction in the amount of time that is spent entering data, letting the users sync their bank accounts and also credit cards with the software. Once they sync them, the transactions will accordingly flow within the accounting software, easily categorized into different accounts. Professional accounting software is easy to use and usually follows fully the general accounting principles to ensure accuracy of financial reports prepared.

For these reasons, a lot of businesses and entrepreneurs rely on the services of Qatari bookkeepers and accountants for maintaining and reviewing their books of accounts. Many businesses are now preferring online accounting software that runs on cloud and makes it easy for them to access their books simultaneously while their bookkeepers and accountants are recording transactions.

Some of the basic functions that SME entrepreneurs adore include

  • Collection of online payment from customers
  • Better management of accounts payable and accounts receivable
  • Syncing of bank and credit card information
  • Preparing invoices to send to customers, particularly service-based businesses need this feature
  • The ability to easily prepare basic financial statements, income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements
  • To give access to accountants and tax professionals

What Value Accounting Software in Qatar Add for Businesses?

When your accountant in Qatar syncs your business’s bank accounts and credit cards via software, the transactions come in a queue. These transactions can then be categorized into business chart of accounts. Once the right category is selected, the transactions start getting populated into the financial statements.

This syncing allows entrepreneurs to run a financial report within seconds to accordingly review revenues & costs, check bank & balance of loans and also project tax liabilities. They can also access the financial information quickly to make well-informed business decisions.

The use of accounting software in Qatar by businesses lets them integrate third-party applications. One example is the use of POS (Point of Sale) system that retail businesses use on the cash counter to capture each transaction’s details. This software allows you to integrate the POS with the accounting software.

Here is what one retail owner in Qatar had to tell their experience about such integration, “I run a retail and always struggled to separately add POS transactions to the accounting software. Then my bookkeeping services near me in Qatar integrated that and we don’t have to manually perform all the data entry. It is easy and super quick to review sales on daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly business reviews.”

How Much Does Accounting Software in Qatar Cost for Small Businesses?

Software for accounting and bookkeeping in Qatar ranges from zero cost to $160 per month. You can get a basic plan for free to anywhere up to $40 per month for getting started. A basic plan for a Qatari business is categorized into income and expenses besides covering preparation of financial reports. You can also use it to send invoices and send categorize expenses and income.

The growth of a small business can result in more stringent requirements and you can easily upgrade to more advanced plans as per the need. A more advanced pricing plan covers more items like preparation of customized financial reports, running payroll, tracking inventory and selecting from different invoicing options.

How to select the right accounting software in Qatar for small businesses?

There are many factors that go into selection of the right accounting software for small Qatari businesses. Outsourced accounting services in Qatar consider many aspects including scalability, ease of use, cost, reputation and the features that it offers. If you are looking for top accounting software consultancy service in Qatar, then look no further as there are a handful companies offering these services.

Reputation of the company behind the accounting software is also important since it needs continuous development in light of the SME owners’ feedback. Sometimes, the company behind it needs to hire additional development resources to fix glitches to help small businesses accurately report their financial information.

Scalability is an aspect that many small businesses initially underestimate. Every well running small businesses with a hard working team can quickly balloon up in size. At such growing stage, it is not easy to consider another software because what software you are using does not offer scalability. It is also not easy to transfer data from one accounting software to another and then using it with a different user interface. Consider the additional training that you may need to give to your staff members to give them hands on experience on a new accounting software package. Therefore, as a small Qatari business owner always choose accounting software that can be scaled with expansion in your business.

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