The One Man Business - Administration

You need to take time to work on your business, not just in your business. Your are in business to earn money to allow you to live a better life. Money, that is the main reason for you being in business. Sure there are other reasons for you owning your own business, but with no money - well you are wasting your time.

Money has to be managed. From the time you write out an invoice to the time that you are paid and the money bank, you need to manage your money.

A business needs things, from a pencil to a delivery vehicle and these have to bought and paid for. So now you also need to track what you are spending your money on.

Add the Tax man into the mix, and he is going to insist that you keep proper records.And to make it even more difficult, customers could abscond without paying and just as bad, may have to refunded.

You could employ someone to do this or do it yourself, quickly and easily. You need a Bank Account and a Spread Sheet. A printer and a scanner are also handy but not essential.

All South African Banks offer a variety of accounts. Look at costs, what you get and can you use electronic and phone banking. They also have special offers for Small Business, for example FNB gives it clients a first class account package free!

Capitec offer an non business savings account that will cost you R5.00 a month and includes 5 separate accounts, lets you use a Debit Card free of charge to make purchases. Ideal if you are a sole trader.

I prefer to use a Spread Sheet and here is another free solution - almost everybody has a Gmail account - Google also offer Google Docs through their Google Drive, which also include up to 15 GB free on-line storage.

Bank

• Check your balance once a day
• Ask the Bank to e Mail your statements
• or, go on-line to download them

Income & Purchases

Set up columns in order to differentiate

• List invoices issued for the month
• Mark them as outstanding or paid (use colours)
• List Income and cross reference to the Invoice
• List Expenses (use cash slips & receipts

Once you have listed your nonsenses, either file the receipts or scan them 

Reconcile your bank statement against your spread sheet. Here you will find that printing out the statement and spreadsheet makes reconsiling easier thet do it on your PC and having to switch screens.

Whilst you are still small, this is the quickest and easiest way but when you start to grow you will need to get a business manage or an account.

The One Man Business:- Administration.

Time, there is just enough in the day. You arrive at work start working. You are running late and clients are complaining. The e-Mails are piling up and your tax return is due tomorrow.

Sound familiar, there are many small business owners in this position. Competition is tough and you have to work harder just to make ends meet.

Business fails when systems are not in place, the most important one is your administration. If you cannot afford to outsource your admin and must do it yourself, you need to keep it up to date or you could find yourself in trouble.

if you get into the habit of doing small tasks at regular intervals, for example, when you switch on your computer in the morning, connect to you bank and check what money came in overnight and what went out. You then know if that overdue payment needs chasing up or if money is missing from your account. A 5 minute task done daily, will save you grief.

When you buy something for cash or using a credit (debit) card, you tend to walk around with a wallet of receipts that eventually get lost. So, a ten minute task this time, take the receipts out of your wallet and scan them, save them and when you do get round to doing your accounts, you  have them handy.

If you set aside one morning every fortnight, you can check that you have invoiced out work, that outstanding money is collected and that expenses are tracked. And you do not need any fancy software, everything can be tracked using a spreadsheet.

And here is a cost saving hint, you do not have to buy Office Software to get a spreadsheet, Google will let you use Google Docs Free!

Administration, sorted!