tips
MyCake features update ~ invoicing
Pay Online
If you have a merchant account set up (Settings -> Card Options), you can now put a “Pay Online” button on your invoices. When your customer clicks the button they’ll be taken to a payment page to enter their card details. This is then processed via your merchant account and the invoice is automatically marked as paid along with the last 4 digits of the card and the Auth Code.
You can choose from a number of different buttons, or you can use the “Custom” option to upload your own.
This is all configured in Settings-> Invoice Options -> Payments and Discounts
Invoice Filename
When you create an invoice as a PDF, it is named “invoice-123.pdf” (Assuming the invoice number is 123 and you haven’t renamed “Invoice” to something else). So if you click the button to save a PDF invoice , that’s the name it defaults to, and when you email an invoice that’s the name of the attachment. You can now re-configure this naming convention to pretty much anything you like. This is set in Settings -> Advanced Settings
Overdue Days
When you view the Sales tab and select to view just overdue invoices, you can now immediately see how many days overdue each invoice is, and sort the data on this field if you wish.
Date Field For Projects
The rename-able ”Projects” section (”Departmental accounting” to the accountants) is very flexible and configurable. I’m constantly amazed at what users manage to use this for – from tracking profitability of specific projects, to landlords using it for different properties, to measuring different parts of a business.
Anyway, something people have been asking for in this section is date boxes. Depending on how you use the Projects section the dates could have different meanings. So we’ve added two optional date fields that you can label whatever you like. If you set the label to be empty (as they are by default) then they wont show up on the page where you view/edit a Project. If you do enable these fields then they’ll show up on the view/edit page and also be sortable on the date field(s) on the main project listing page.
Configure this option by going to Settings -> Project Settings (if you have renamed Projects then this option will also have been renamed – ie “Job Settings” if you renamed them to Jobs)
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
What’s the difference between your ideal rate and the minimum you’ll accept?
In the last post on the subject of how you price time, we looked at what your ideal daily rate would be.
In this post we’ll look at how you might actually offer a range of rates (you might not publish this but you might negotiate it) depending on what the work is and how busy you are. We’ll also look at how you move this range upwards over a period of years.
Using the same example as before, where you want to:
- to charge £750 per day
- to sell 100 days of time in a year
- therefore to turn over £75,000
- assuming £25,000 of costs achieve a taxable income of some £50,000
In reality you may not be able to charge this top rate for every job. There are a number of reasons for this:
- the market rate for your skills and your level of experience may not be as high as this so if you charged it you’d price yourself out of the market
- you may take on work for which you are over-qualified, particularly if you’re not as busy as you’d like to be and need the income … but you may therefore not be able to charge top rate for the work
- you may choose to over-deliver. .. spending more days on a project than actually budgeted for
- you may have some clients whose budgets are simply smaller, yet they offer exciting work so you drop your rate in order for them to be able to afford you (in these cases the work had better be exciting!).
In practice you may well need to have a range of daily rates, and the rate you quote to the client depends on what the work is, what sector they are in, how much you need to the income etc.
So if £750 is at the top of your range what is at the bottom? Only you can answer this – what fee is so low that you’d rather spend that day having a lie-in or a holiday?
For the purposes of this post let’s say that the minimum rate you’ll accept is £250/day.
Now your range is from £250-750 per day.
How can you move this range upwards over time?
Well for a start always quote your top rate when you’re busy. If you’re not really earning enough consider what projects you might take on at lower rates … one of the keys here is not to burn your bridges with cheaper clients when you’re busy and to be humble enough to go asking for work when you need it 
Over the years move the range upwards so that both your top and bottom rates go up! This may require you to drop some of your least well paid work and perhaps the clients that offer it simply because they may not be prepared to pay more for that work and may prefer to hire someone else without changing the rate. Such is the price of success!
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Improved function: multiple items on invoices
We have improved the ‘Add Item’ function within MyCake invoice creation. Until now, after adding the first item, you had to return to the invoice screen and click the ‘Add Item to this Invoice’ button.
Now, once you create a new invoice and click ‘Add Item to this Invoice’, you will see an option to check ‘Add more items to Invoice’. This means that you will keep adding items to your invoice without returning to your invoice screen. Once you’re done with adding items just click cancel to return to your invoice screen.
A very good feature if you have lots of small items to enter on your invoices.
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Attaching files to purchase receipts
You can attach a file to your MyCake receipt. Once you’ve created a receipt look for “Attached files” which will appear under payment details.
This is useful if you create one MyCake receipt from multiple receipts or if you have to send original receipts to customers.
Also useful for keeping a record of online transactions such as flights, train tickets and all these online purchases.
You can attach most file format (jpegs, words, excel, etc).
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Repeat purchases
MyCake has a very useful function for all these regular payments that you make by direct debit or standing order. Here’s how to activate it:
- Set up or select your supplier and then go to Purchases > Repeat purchases > Add repeating purchases and follow the instructions.
- If you choose to include a payment, the invoice will be marked as paid when it’s processed.
- If you don’t tick the “include payment” box you will get an email reminder in your inbox to go and enter payment details manually.
Don’t forget to write the KF code on the receipt hard copy for your records.
You can only set up repeat purchases for future transactions and they will only be created as time goes, not in advance.
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Don’t forget to look after yourself and your team
It may be true that ‘when the going gets tough, the tough get going’ but this all the more reason to look after yourself and your team. After all there’s no point putting the hours in if you end up too tired to come up with good ideas. Here are a few things to remember to do even during the toughest times (indeed perhaps especially!):
- Plan for a holiday … you’ll need it. If you’re self employed remember that this means that you’re spending but not earning for the duration of the holiday. You’ll also feel more comfortable taking a holiday if you have work to come back to. Taking a holiday is also a great sign of confidence to your clients. It gives the message that it is business as usual.
- Nurture your staff … this is true at all times but particularly in a tough climate. It’s an employers market at the moment and staff don’t tend to want to move jobs if they don’t have to but this is different to cultivating loyalty. The bonuses may not be what they have been in the boom years but finding ways to demonstrate that your appreciate their commitment is all the more important. The small gestures get noticed … we particularly like Biscuiteers … the biscuit cards are a brilliant way to say thankyou.
- Nurture your clients … the same applies here really, find ways to thank them for their business. The good news is that in this climate clients no longer expect lavish dinners so it’s easier to find ways to say thankyou without eating all your profit.
Not only do the above actions make good business sense in both the short and the long term but they set a more pleasant working environment and counter some of the stresses of the current conditions.
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
In need of a bit of help? (MyCake training)
MyCake monthly training (London)
Wednesday 24 June 2009
1800 – 2000
Institute of Directors, 123 Pall Mall, London, SW1Y
- Ever wondered how you can seize control of your pile of receipts?
- Do you want a quick and easy picture of the money in your business … who owes you what, when it’s due and where your main areas of expenditure are (you might be surprised).
- Do you need some help getting your free trial started?
- Are thinking that all this book-keeping data should MEAN something?
Book yourself a place at our next training session in the cool, calm, collected environment of the Institute of Directors.
£10 a place, to book email info@mycake.org
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
What do you do with your receipts?
As we’re doing some ‘back to basics’ training tonight and I’m making mental lists of stuff to cover I thought I’d run through one of the basics here.
Folks do all sorts of things with receipts and we’ve all mislaid them or forgotten about all the small things like bus fares. Here’s a basic process to help you get better at accounting for all these costs:
- keep every receipt for costs incurred related to your business (even if some cannot be used for tax purposes you need to know what you are spending … all those coffee meetings add up)
- put them somewhere so that you can see them piling up (and thus needing your attention) … personally i put all my receipts in a pile on my desk and when the pile falls over I know it’s time to enter them into MyCake. Other people put them in an envelope and when the envelope is full they put them into their book-keeping system/spreadsheet.
- as you enter your receipts into your book-keeping process you should number them (most book-keeping software will allocate the number automatically, write this number on the receipt) .. this is so that you or your accountant can find it again easily.
- staple the receipts onto sheets of A4 paper and file them. This means that the numbers will be sequential and the pages roughly chronological … again helps you finding things later.
The process above means that you’ll keep on top of your book-keeping more regularly than the once a year panic to file a tax return. After all, this is your financial data and it can help you run your business better … why only dance to the tune of the tax man?
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Welcome to the MyCake Blog
Hi and welcome to the MyCake blog where we prod, provoke and support creative entrepreneurs (both MyCake users and a wider community) into becoming better at managing their business finances.
The MyCake blog will provide hints and tips on ways to improve your financial management and pointers on how to make the most of the money coming and spend the money going out wisely. If you subscribe to our RSS feed (top right) you can receive these updates automatically.
how about the following food for thought:
- do you charge your clients in installments? if you charge a chunk up front, a chunk part way through and a chunk at the end of a project not only does it reduce the risk of not getting paid but it too improves your cashflow
- do you know where the majority of your business comes from? either in terms of clients or in terms of sources such as trade fairs … as a general rule 80% of your business will come from 20% of your clients so it is worth knowing which 20%! To find out the answer to this run the ‘Income by Customer’ report in the book-keeping half of MyCake.
- if you have credit with your suppliers which is longer (ie more days between invoice issued and when you pay it) than the time taken for your clients to pay you this immediately gives you better cashflow
we’ve received some great comment about MyCake from writers in the financial world – take a look at
accmanpro and accountingweb
last but not least … are there questions around financial management
that you’d like us to answer or comment on? if so drop us a line and
we’ll do our best to contribute something useful 
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
Subscribe
Search
Popular Posts
The MyCake twitter feed
- MyCake Founder Sarah is in the business of teaching and supporting creative startups schoolforcreativestartups.com/teachers/sarah… 15 hours ago