Friday, July 27, 2012 - 10:11

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There has never been a more exciting time to be in the accounting profession. Cloud technology is literally transforming the way accounting firms and businesses operate today, allowing everyone to work smarter and more efficiently while creating new business opportunities. Leveraging the collaboration tools that come with the Cloud has enabled progressive firms to revitalize their accounting services enhancing their bill management, payroll, and cash flow offerings.

This is one reason why I am pleased to announce Bill.com has partnered with CPA2Biz to bring to you the first-ever Digital CPA: Cloud User Conference.  This workshop combines cloud and mobile technology with practice development strategies and hands-on Bill.com training.  Together it provides a springboard for obtaining the tools and training you need to create new profit centers at your firm, attract new clients, address your staffing needs and enhance your role as your clients’ most trusted business advisor.

Hear real-life success stories and lessons learned from dozens of practitioner’s who’ve evolved their client accounting services practice.  Also hear from key note speaker Geoffrey Moore (author of Crossing the Chasm), on how the ever changing technology world affects you and your practice.

Additionally, Bill.com will provide you with the training you need to enhance your skills and services. So whether you are new to Bill.com or have been with us for many years, you will be able to learn more with our Essentials and Expert Certification Programs.  Our customers who attended the certification programs this summer have found an increased ability to streamline back-office operations and maximize their return on investment.

It is our privilege to offer you this education and share with you the latest development strategies and tools that will grow your client accounting advisory services.

To show you our sincere customer appreciation, if you register by 8/3/12 you will receive the $100 Super Early Bird Discount and an additional $150 discount exclusively for Bill.com users. Be sure to enter the promo code: D12BIL during check out.

 

See you at the conference!

 

René Lacerte, CEO and Founder

 

 

Tuesday, July 24, 2012 - 14:38

How do I export Bill.com transactions using CSV files?

Bill.com integrates with popular accounting packages, such as QuickBooks, Sage 50, Intacct, Thomson Reuters, and Netsuite, so all your data is accurate and synchronized, and all your existing financial precesses and reports carry on as usual. However, if you don't use an accounting software that we integrate with, you will export your transactional data (bills and payments) from Bill.com into your accounting software, using CSV files.  

As a one-time setup, you will enter in these accounting preferences:

  1. In the upper right, mouse over Image. Then click Settings > Overview.
  2. On the Overview page, under Sync, click Import/Export.
  3. On the Sync page, click Setup account preferences.
  4. Click Edit.
  5. Select the proper account fields and click Save.

 

You'll use reports to export your payables transactions. These export reports can be downloaded in .csv format. You will then import them into your accounting software, and then will show up as Journal Entries in your GL.

  • In Bill.com, under the Export Reports section you will see the following reports, which are relevant:

    a. Accrual Summary Report
    b. Accrual Detail Report

    c. Cash Summary Report
    d. Cash Detail Report

    e. Unpaid Accrual Summary Report
    f. Unpaid Accrual Detail Report

  • The most popular option is to use the Cash Detail report, which gets details of all the payments for a certain period (e.g. Feb 2012), and then separately accrue for Unpaid Bills at the summary level, using the "Unpaid Accrual Summary Report".
  • You can also export your Accounts Receivables transactions, using the Open Invoices and Received Payments reports.

 

Have Questions? Visit answers.bill.com.

 

Wednesday, July 18, 2012 - 12:40

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Any business school student could write you pages on the difference between innovation and invention. An invention, or so we’ve been told, is a great idea whereas an innovation is something that changes a market, that alters the way we go about our everyday life. It is that great idea at work. Ben Franklin, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford were all not just inventors, they were innovators that brought change to their society and made life better for people. 

The tech industry is undoubtedly booming again and venture capitalists are out scouting for the next idea. Unfortunately, today, Silicon Valley seems to be more focused on Ford’s assembly line technique than the wonder of the first Model T. There seems to be just a few ideas out there, and they all start with that dreaded “s” word: “social”. Let’s face it, a person—even a tween—only needs so many social networks. And there can be only so many innovations in the same space. At some point, these great variations on the same idea are regulated back to inventions, destined to join the Pets.com Sock Puppet in the annals of good ideas with nothing more going for them than a pretty face or catchy slogan. 

Maybe I am too much of an optimist,  but I firmly believe that innovation is still out there, and that innovation is still what makes our country great.  It is what differentiates us.  It is why Apple products are “designed in Cupertino” but  “assembled in China”. 

Here at Bill.com, we’ve created our business around the idea of making it easier for accountants, business owners, and financial professionals alike. It’s a problem I’ve been trying to solve all my life as a fourth-generation finance industry entrepreneur. Making life easier for this market has driven me as strongly as Ben Franklin’s own frustration with his eyesight drove him to create bifocals. We are succeeding because we have built something we know and something we believe in.

So, my advice to today’s young Ben Franklins or the next Steve Jobs? Build what you know, not what the venture capitalists want to see. Don’t try to be the next Mark Zuckerberg. Strive to be the first you.

 

- René Lacerte, CEO and Founder

Tuesday, July 17, 2012 - 09:56

Continues Stream of Industry Accolades

for Game-Changing, Cloud-Based Financial Solution

 

PALO ALTO, CALIF. – July 17, 2012 - Bill.com, the leader in integrated bill payment, invoicing and cash management solutions for businesses, today announced that JMP Securities, a global securities firm, has chosen the company for its annual “Hot 100” best privately-held companies list for the third consecutive year. A research team at JMP Securities complied the “Hot 100”, choosing privately-held companies based on financial growth, products and services, quality of leadership, customers and market potential.

This recent award continues Bill.com’s steady stream of accolades in the first half of 2012, including: being named an OnDemand Top100 company by AlwaysOn; winning a Stevie® customer service award at the American Business Awards; Bill.com Receivables winning CPTA’s Technology Advisor’s Innovation Award; being chosen as “Best in Show” at the Barlow Research Client conference; and having Bill.com Receivables recognized as a Top New Product for 2012 by Accounting Today.

Bill.com delivers a complete web-based financial solution for businesses and accountants that provides the tools, information and collaboration required to better manage their financial tasks and optimize cash flow. Bill.com's game-changing technology digitizes a historically paper-based and time-consuming process, allowing users to access online bill payments, e-invoicing, document management and automated workflow through one easy system. In addition to seamlessly integrating with business' existing accounting software programs, Bill.com provides financial leaders with a comprehensive view of their cash forecast - making it the only solution that connects a user's banks, bookkeeping and business. The Bill.com system is also being embraced by the banking industry, bringing banks a first-of-its-kind platform that enables them to offer business customers powerful accounts payable and accounts receivable services, develop additional revenue streams and increase customer acquisition and retention.

“As all of our wonderful industry accolades show, Bill.com is solving a problem that was desperately in need of fixing,” said René Lacerte, founder and CEO of Bill.com. "We are pleased that we are helping businesses, finance professionals and accountants better manage their financials and grow their businesses. We are honored by this recognition from JMP Securities, and remain committed to making our solution—and our clients’ lives—better every day.”

The full JMP Securities 2012 Edition of the “Hot 100” report is available in hardcopy only by contacting JMP Securities at 415-835-8900. 

About Bill.com

Bill.com is a cash flow command and control system that manages accounts payable and receivable for businesses of all sizes. Offering online bill pay, custom invoicing services, unlimited document storage, collaboration tools, and mobile access, Bill.com's services easily sync to users' accounting software programs and online bank accounts to better control company financials. Bill.com guards against errors and employs enterprise-class fraud protections that current methods cannot match. More than 100,000 users are now getting paid and paying millions of bills, worth billions of dollars, using Bill.com. Financial institutions can now offer these benefits to their business customers by integrating Bill.com with their banking platform.

 

###

 

For more information, please contact:

Eileen Conway

Scout PR

650-245-9015

Eileen@scoutprsf.com

 

Friday, July 13, 2012 - 15:56

Know how much cash you'll have in 3 months?

Eliminate surprises by seeing in advance when cash will be tight. Observe when it’s going to be coming in and going out. Pinpoint where you need to take action by looking over your Cash Forecast chart. See anything unexpected or out of the ordinary? Zoom in to the transaction details immediately below the chart for answers.

If you’ve been peering through a haze of spreadsheets to decipher your cash flow, we bring it all into focus. You get the picture. 

Cashforecast

We start with your bank balance, subtract bills you're scheduled to pay, and add payments you're scheduled to receive. Then we forecast a picture of your cash flow.

You're not limited to bills and invoices you handle with Bill.com. Add non-bill activity, such as payroll or new investment in your business. Don't worry: non-bill activity doesn't affect your books. We use it only to project your expected cash flow.

Sync with QuickBooks for Windows or Intacct? We automatically get your bank balance from them, so your CashForecast is always up-to-date.

Your accounting software shows where you've been, and where you are today. Cash Forecast shows where you'll be a few months in the future.

To see your upcoming cash flow:

  1. Click the Home tab.
  2. Beneath the calendar, click Try Cash Forecast.

Links to Cash Forecast and to Forecast Transactions will appear beneath the Home tab.

 

Have Questions? Visit answers.bill.com.

Monday, July 9, 2012 - 18:34


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“With Bill.com, we are now able to take the Finance Department to the next level, while enhancing our transparency and accountability...”

The Rose F. Kennedy Greenway Conservancy is the steward for the Rose Kennedy Greenway, a 1.5-mile downtown Boston park with multiple fountains, high-end horticulture, hundreds of free public programs, and relationships with dozens of vendors and other partners. When Director of Finance Lisa Schimmel joined this non-profit, she was given a mandate to enhance accountability and transparency. Despite the size and influence of her organization, Schimmel was able to easily streamline and move her organization’s finances to the cloud, using Bill.com.

Recently, Schimmel joined Bill.com for a complimentary webinar, to share her insight and experience with moving to the cloud. The webinar, Finance in the Cloud: How it Can Increase Transparency and Accountability for Non-Profits, brought in people from various organizations, each of whom had a personal interest in learning how to leverage the cloud for non-profits. She shared how she tamed a cumbersome and outdated payables system by moving to Bill.com, a more reliable and transparent cloud-based system.

Being a non-profit organization, one of the most important advantages of implementing Bill.com for the Rose Kennedy Conservancy was the accountability and transparency the system provided. It was important for the private donors, as well as the Mass Department of Transportation (Mass DOT), to be able to see what the Conservancy was doing with the money they were given. Schimmel hopes that the organization’s transparency will encourage donors to donate more to the Conservancy in the future. This transparency also dramatically decreases fraud, in addition to streamlining the organization’s annual audit.

All in all, the Conservancy saves over 25 hours of processing on more than 150 bills and invoices per month. They benefit from the reduced cost of bill payment, the reallocation of staff time – that was formerly spent sorting bills and chasing paper – and have greatly improved their efficiency with receivables and invoicing. Schimmel was able to achieve the transparency and accountability standards her organization required of her, and, in the process, save herself time, money, and stress.

 

Find out how she did it.  Click here to replay the webinar! Or sign up for a risk free trial of Bill.com today!

 

 

 

Tuesday, July 3, 2012 - 22:51

Photo (7)4th of July is as American a celebration as you can find: barbeques, kids in parades pedaling proudly on their brightly decorated bikes, flags on every corner, fireworks on hot summer nights. And underpinning all of these celebrations is the most important thing we treasure as Americans: our freedom.

We may not be fighting the Red Coats anymore, but we are still writing our own declarations of independence every time we continue our innate drive towards innovation. For us at Bill.com, our fight for freedom is about helping financial professionals, SMBs and accountants finally break free of the shackles of Excel spreadsheets and piles of invoices that have kept them constrained—and almost literally chained—to their desks for decades.

In honor of the 4th, I thought I would take liberty with the holiday theme and jot down a few of the freedoms we hold dear at Bill.com:

The Freedom to Make Business Decisions Based on Actuals, Not Hypotheticals: With the Bill.com cash flow system, businesses can get a reality check of their financial situation at any given point in time since payables and receivables information is updated automatically, instantaneously transforming into live and actionable data. With up-to-date data at their fingertips, users cannot just better manage their businesses, they can dream big (the American way after all) and make aggressive, effective growth plans based on real knowledge.

The Freedom to Work From Anywhere, Anytime: We’ve created Bill.com to provide a complete web-based financial office to control your day-to-day finances and cash flow. Everything you need is at your fingertips: the documents, workflow, payment processing, and invoicing. And it's all available no matter where you are and what you are doing, thanks to one of the greatest inventions of modern-day times, the Cloud (surely even Benjamin Franklin would be impressed). No longer are you chained to your desk, now you can work from anywhere, anytime, and even make those kids’ soccer games or swim meets that always seemed to get pushed off your calendar before

The Freedom to Break Free from Excel: Bill.com’s cash flow system is the only solution that connects user’s banks, books and business, enabling companies of all sizes to finally rid themselves of the cumbersome, error-prone and highly manual spreadsheets that have plagued finance for decades. Sure, there is a time and a place for Excel. But it’s not with you when you are trying to get ahead, build a business and still enjoy a bit of a personal life.    

The Freedom to Do More With Less: No more costly systems. No more homegrown, complicated solutions that lock you in for the next ten years simply because you have no idea how to ever replicate, let alone improve on, this system someone long gone put in place ten years before you joined. We’ve made Bill.com simple, approachable and accessible from anywhere. And you don’t have to download a bunch of software to clutter up your desktop. American ingenuity has always said you can build anything with a stick, some chewing gum and a paper clip. Or maybe that was from MacGuyver—another American hero nonetheless.

So, we may not be throwing tea in Boston Harbor, but we are doing what we can to help make a difference for our fellow Americans today.

Have a wonderful 4th of July with your family and friends. Relax, enjoy, eat too many hot dogs—and know that your business is secure, your data is up to date and your future is limitless when you get back.

 

-  René Lacerte, CEO and Founder

 

 

 

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Monday, July 2, 2012 - 12:23

 

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There were many eager participants at the Guru Certification Workshops.

 In June, Bill.com hosted a series of sold out Guru Certification Workshops at the Scaling New Heights Conference, in Nashville. The Guru Workshops are designed to assist accounting firms in re-engineering their processes to gain more efficiency across their practice.

The hands-on sessions, led by Bill.com’s resident Guru Judie McCarthy, walked participants through how to maximize the benefits of Bill.com, how to increase automation in their practice, and how to increase adoption of Bill.com among their clients. We discussed pricing models, how to set-up clients, and migrate existing accounts payable and accounts receivable to Bill.com. We also discussed how firms could price their Bill.com-related services to make their practice more profitable.

Throughout the day, participants completed their own Bill.com Action Planning Worksheet. With the worksheet, participants reviewed their current processes and then compared those processes to what they learned in the workshop to see where to gain efficiencies. By documenting goals for their firm and sharing them with the group and the facilitators, participants left the sessions with a plan on how to achieve specific goals and receive their Guru certification. Oh, and each participant also left with a goodie bag and customized Bill.com Guru t-shirt!

The sessions contained lively conversation, interactive learning games, and group discussion about the future of accounting and how best to implement Bill.com’s platform. All in all, the Guru Certification program was a success, both from the viewpoint of the newly certified Gurus, as well as the Bill.com representatives.

 

- Brandon Carson, Director of Training

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