Tracking transactions and financials is an important part of keeping a business going, and as a future accounting professional, part of your responsibility will be to maintain accurate records of these data. By implementing a good system of retaining information and storing it in an easily accessible and understood manner, you can ensure greater accuracy and legibility of financial information, both for yourself and for your employer.
Curious about the best ways to manage a business’s records? Here are a few tips that will help you stay organized when dealing with all the financial data you’re likely to come across.
Professionals With Accounting Careers Know Which Data to Gather
According to the Canada Revenue Agency, any “persons carrying on a business or engaged in commercial activity” or “payroll service providers” must keep business records. This includes things like sales invoices, statements of accounts, and delivery slips, among many other types of records. Essentially, if a business spends or receives money, a record of the transaction should be kept.
When you begin working as a payroll professional, a good first step will be to identify which financial records are meant to be handled by you. Depending on your specific position, this may just be payroll data, or it may be all the records of the various transactions the business engages in. Ensuring that these transactions are collected and delivered to you is an important part of effective record keeping.
You Can Make Use of Software Options to Manage All Kinds of Records
Graduates of accounting schools and accounting college programs will be experienced in the use of a number of apps that can help with managing financial data. From industry-standard software programs like Microsoft Excel to accounting applications like Sage 50, there is a range of software options that can facilitate collecting and storing the information you work with on a daily basis. However, that’s not the only way that you can store digital information on the financials of your company.
It is worth noting that digitized records stored in the proper format are considered to be as valid as paper copies, meaning you are free to scan and store digital copies of the receipts and records your business receives or sends out. While some businesses may prefer to retain the physical copies as well, some might opt to only keep electronic records on hand. Make sure to consult your employer to determine their preference for how to deal with physical copies of records.
Professionals with Careers in Accounting Remember to Back Up Digital Records
Though digitizing records can be a great way to save space and make it easier to find documents, it also leaves crucial data vulnerable to unexpected hardware failures. For that reason, whatever careers in accounting you intend to take on, it is vital that you ensure that all the data you manage is backed up to a secondary separate service or hard drive.
External hard drives offer high-capacity storage at a fairly low price and are good choices for those companies that want to keep their data secure and on-location. There are also cloud services like OneDrive, Dropbox, and Google Drive, which offer online storage, and can integrate well with the computer systems you use at work. This will help you to keep information safe and well-organized.
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