Free Services to Help Clients Keep Financial Records

Matt Shelly
Posted by in Accounting, Auditing & Tax


If you are a financial service provider, consider introducing a financial record keeping service to your clients. These programs are not designed to replace your services. Rather, record keeping services simply track financial records, which makes your job easier and helps you improve your clients' finances. From tracking spending to managing income from a small business, there is a service to meet every client's needs.

Homebank is a free personal finance service. This service allows your clients to track expenses, credit card purchases, fees and cash flow. In addition, the program has several unique features that allow users to create charts and graphs to better understand cash flow. Charts can be created to analyze spending over one week or up to a year or more. If you provide accounting services, this is great program to suggest. With this financial data, you can quickly spot purchases that qualify for deductions.

Another excellent financial record keeping service is Microsoft Money. The free version of this personal finance service has many standard options, such as tracking purchases and importing banking activity, but there are also features for small business owners. For example, there are features to track assets and liabilities, and a tool used to monitor payments can also be used to track sales. In addition, Microsoft Money includes basic tax planning tools. Make sure to inform your clients that this feature does not provide full tax law information and cannot help with determining eligibility for the latest deductions and credits.

Mint is an online financial record keeping service that is great for clients who need to make financial goals and track purchases to stick to a budget. With Mint, clients can categorize expenses and purchases to see how their money is being spent. Mint also includes features to manage credit card debt and budget for upcoming expenses.

In addition to free services, there are many more top-rated financial record keeping services that have monthly fees; however, most services offer free trials. These popular services generally provide more in-depth features, which is great for clients who have complex financial situations. Aside from making your job easier, recommending a financial record keeping service is great for keeping in contact with your clients, which is one way to maintain your client base. Check in with your clients at least once each quarter and have them send over their records so you can keep their files up to date.

No matter which service you decide to recommend to your clients, make sure you familiarize yourself with the program. Being able to provide a quick overview of how to use your chosen financial record keeping service increases the odds that clients will use the programs correctly and on a regular basis. Check out each of these services to decide which one meets the needs of your clients.

 

(Photo courtesy of Stuart Miles / freedigitalphotos.net)

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