Business Expense Tracker: What You Should Know!!!

Business expense trackers are one of the most popular trends in recent times because a lot of businesses use these apps and software to track their business expenses. Although the tracker is mostly used by small businesses, other business categories can also use it. Currently, there are a lot of these trackers online ready to use. While some are free, others are not. However, you can typically get the best business expense tracker app, for your business just like Excel. Let’s find out more!!! 

Business Expense Tracker

Before we dive into details, a business expense tracker is a program that allows employers to keep track of financial records as well as for their employees to report business expenses with ease. Operating a business, in general, is a task. And also, the financial accounting of the business is another stress for business owners, so, they usually dive into any easy way to better their businesses. A business expense tracker is one of the easiest ways for business owners to just upload their receipts or get reimbursed in an orderly manner without stressing themselves out.

In recent times, everyone agrees that business owners, especially small businesses, need a tracker that is simple. So that they can scan their business receipts easily and as well as approve expenses without hustle. Furthermore, your small business typically needs expense tracking software that will not conflict with your already existing accounting software because your team’s accountant will find it difficult to track your business tax complaint if it contrasts.

Understanding Business Expense Tracker

Purchasing an expense tracking software depends on the size of your business. It also Varys in price depending on other factors like the complexity of reports, department structure, categories, and functionality. We would list in this post our top recommendations for an expense tracker for your business. After a series of research, this software ranked high in recent times. However, there are quite a few of them that offer free trials so you can typically test them out before purchasing them. 

Generally, a business expense goes beyond just-drinks and weekends to conventions. Because in a situation whereby your small business is on a thin budget. It’s only tracking and approving your expenses that will be able to turn around the value of tens of thousands of dollars in your annual budget. A business expense tracker can also reduce the time wasted on paperwork and as well as, reduce employee stress by not having them go through so much stress to get reimbursed. 

Small Business Expense Tracker

Expense tracker best suits small businesses for proper bookkeeping because every expenditure that is relating to your business is automatically a business expense. While there are expenses that are unavoidable and common, in the business categories, any expense that is associated with your business is a legitimate business expense. Here is a list of some common business expenses you should know;

• Advertising
• Bank fees
• Commissions
• Consulting fees
• Contract labor
• Dues and subscriptions
• Mileage
• Office supplies
• Postage and delivery
• Printing and copying
• Salaries
• Software
• Travel
• Utilities

Although, there are various ways to track your business expenses manually. However, it is only advisable if you have a few business expenses to track and keep check of. The best way to track your business expenses is to make use of the small business accounting software, that makes it easy to track your expenses. As well as organize them correctly, and have updated financial information about your business. 

The most common importance of using a business tracker to track your small business is for tax purposes. Since you definitely want to get the least expense deductions that you can get. You can typically find the best business expenses that suit your small business perfectly. This is in order for you to be able to manage your business properly, keep track of expenditures, and account for your expenses correctly. These are basically what a good tracker would do for your small business.

How to use a business tracker to track your small business

Here’s how you can track your business expenses with any software that works for you;

• Open a business bank account
• Choose the appropriate accounting system
• Choose between either cash or accrual accounting
• Link financial institutions
• Start managing receipts correctly 
• Record all expenses accurately
• Consider using an expense app

Best Business Expense Tracker App 

The aim of using the best business expense tracker app is to carefully ensure that your business finances are accurate and in order. Also, using the best expense tracker for your business will enable you to see how your business is really doing financially over a period of time. This typically gives you the information you may require at any point in time in making financial decisions for your business when necessary. 

Examples of the Best Business Tracker App for Businesses

The following are our recommended seven best expense tracker software or even an app that will aid you to track and categorize expenses for your business. They include;

1. BizXpenseTracker (BXT)

This expense tracker is usually suitable for small business owners because it covers the overall expenses of the business as well as organizes and saves the business fund. This expense tracker also allows for the creation of PDF and CSV reports and for importing them into Excel. And most importantly, this app is accurate in its time tracking, of expenses. It can also be used to customize rates hourly, daily, or by visit. This app makes it simple to calculate overtime.

2. Concur Mobile

This type of expense tracker business is best for tracking travel spending in a business. This tracker app is suitable for the speedy and accurate creation of expense reports, which is a necessity for the small business owner. Concur Mobile also allows you to integrate expenses and capture your business spending. Furthermore, this app organizes the reporting procedures, making it easy to track travel spending or reimburse workers.

3. Expensify 

Expensify is an expense tracker app that best captures receipts. This app offers the ultimate way to manage and save business receipts as well as record expenses. The Expensify expense tracker app also allows for the syncing of your credit cards so that company expenses can typically be pulled. 

With the aid of this app, you can submit your business receipts directly to the business managers or the company’s accountant. It also makes it possible for immediate expense approval or rejection from the app. There is also a next-day reimbursement feature in the app that allows for quickly reimbursing employees. Although this free expense tracker app only accepts a specific number of complimentary scans for each month.

4. Goodbudget 

The Goodbudget tracker app is Best for Beginners. It begins at home, and it is designed with that purpose in mind. Goodbudget is one of the best expense tracker apps. Because, it syncs between mobile devices and the web, which automatically allows users to plan their household spending using the envelope method. 

This method involves allocating a specific amount of income into many spending categories with a particular amount due each month. This includes rent/mortgage, groceries, childcare, transportation, and debt payoff. Because this app was developed with the intention of helping its users to stick to budget limits without having to place actual cash into real envelopes. The app with this method automatically sends a notification to the user once their budget is low.

5. Wally 

I typically recommend Wally for Millennials. Because this app is designed with millennial sensibilities in mind. The app is also built with appealing graphics and social features which centralize the user’s accounts to provide a clearer understanding of your spending habits. It typically accomplishes this purpose by syncing your financial accounts and then using artificial intelligence to focus on your expenses.

Now, the fun part about Wally is that you can start groups amongst family and friends and budget, and track day to day, your expenses. You can as well sync together to reach shared goals.

6. QuickBooks Online 

This is another best business expense tracker quick book that is typically suitable for comprehensive financial management and is one of the most extensive financial management programs on the market for small businesses. One of the top features of the app is its ability to upload receipts with a photo, which enables an app to automatically match the receipt to existing expenses or even create new ones.

Furthermore, for importing and categorizing your expenses, Quickbooks has the ability to create invoices, track your inventory, and receive payments. Additionally, there is also QuickBooks Capital, which is a feature that allows you to access your business credit score by collecting information from banks. As well as vendors, business credit card usage and other third-party sources.

7. Everlance 

Lastly, Everlance is best for reimbursement and mileage. It’s a popular app among self-employed businesses because it offers advice on how to track their business expenses. This app allows you to track mileage, expenses, and receipts and sync your credit cards and bank accounts to track expenses. The Everlance expense app also tracks revenue, including income from many sources using GPS technology.

8. Spenmo

In addition to the list, there’s also Spenmo. An all-in-one software perfect for businesses who want to track their expenses real-time, automates bill payments, consolidates corporate cards, features employee expense reimbursement to employee expense claims and many more. This software is perfect if you want to have visibility over your expenditure.

Free Expense Business Tracker

Most of this business tracker software allows a free trial for users, which automatically helps you to make the best decision suitable for your business. Although there has been a wide range of this software in recent times, there is a common feature you need to look out for in software before deciding to use them.

Major Features of a Business Expense Tracker

The following features which you should look for in your business expense tracker app are:

• Compliance
• User-friendly
• Mobile-friendly
• Good syncing 
• Mobile operating system 
• Analytics 

Can I use Excel to track business expenses?

You must make a spreadsheet and enter the necessary data if you want to track business spending in Excel. Date, Description, Category, and Amount are likely to be the most significant columns.

How do self employees keep track of expenses?

A self-employment ledger, often known as a “tax ledger,” is simply a fancy term for the place where you record all of your business’s earnings and outlays. You can record information in a handwritten “ledger” book, an online spreadsheet, or accounting software.

What’s the 50-30 20 budget rule?

The 50/30/20 rule is one of the most popular percentage-based budgets. Spending 50% of your money on requirements, 30% on wants and 20% on savings is a general principle. Find out more about the 50/30/20 budget rule and decide if it applies to you.

How do I record my daily expenses?

In a spending diary, you record all of your outlays for every day of the week. A great strategy to monitor your spending is to keep a spending diary. Spending less is only one of the many advantages of maintaining a spending journal.

Can I do bookkeeping using Excel?

Excel includes a number of beneficial features and functionalities that can assist you in developing a successful bookkeeping system for a small business. Through Excel, you can enter and categorize transactions, create different bookkeeping templates, keep track of invoices, and do a lot more.

Does Microsoft have an expense-tracking app?

Spending Tracker is the most straightforward and user-friendly personal finance app available. The best part is that it’s free! The simple truth is that keeping track of your expenditures can help you stay to budget and ultimately save money.

What is the 70 20 10 Rule money?

You divide your take-home money into three categories depending on a specified percentage using the 70/20/10 budgeting method. Your monthly expenses and regular spending will take up 70% of your income, 20% will be spent on savings and investments, and 10% will be used to pay off debt or make donations.

Free Small Business Expense Tracker 

Small businesses are the most users of expense tracker because it helps in tracking their day-to-day business expenses. However, most of these small businesses often opt for a free expense tracker for their business in order to reduce costs and still run their business effectively.

Some of the non-free software offer free trials for one month. However, at the end of the trial period, you have to pay a specific price to continue using the software. The prices of these apps can vary from the type of your business to the app’s features and functions.

Examples of Free Expense Tracker for Business

Some of these apps that run a totally free expense tracker for small business includes;

Mint 

This is a popular personal expense tracker and simple tool for smaller businesses. It is also suitable for freelancers to track where their money is going. As well as aiding you to create budgets and goals for your business in the app. Mint makes it possible to track the credit score of your business.

Mint makes it easy to set up alerts for bill reminders, large purchases, etc. It works effectively on Android, iPhone, and web browser platforms.

Excel 

Excel spreadsheets are the basic and oldest software for your Expense business tracking. All you need to do is to find a good Excel bookkeeping template and enter all your expenses at least once a week. There are various forms of these templates online to enable you to choose the best for your type of business.

One of the good things about Excel is that immediately you enter all your transactions, you can typically generate reports and start getting information about what those numbers mean. This software operates on a desktop Platform because it mostly comes already installed on most computers and is also totally free. The two mentioned above are the major apps that offer totally free expense tracking in form of a tracker for small a business.

MileIQ

Best for Transportation businesses and is free for up to 40 drives each month for individual users. While Teams receive pricing based on quotes and discounts by volume, as well as personalized training.

Zoho Expense

Zoho Expense is another low-cost option that offers the best set of features for the lowest cost. Its free plan offers for up to three users and also integrates with various software, including QuickBooks, G Suite, Slack, Evernote, and Dropbox

Concur Travel

This app is another free expense tracker for businesses with many travel-related features. It is a Quote-based pricing app that reaches out to users for a free consultation. The app also offers a range of different expense tracking products.

Free Trial Apps for Business Expense Tracker

However, there are apps that offer a free trial before payments and I have listed a few below for your business:

QuickBooks: This app manages expenses for the accounting-savvy business.

FreshBooks: FreshBooks majorly tracks business expenses for the minimalist go-getter.

Expensify: An expense tracking app suitable for business travelers.

Bench: An expense tracker for a small business especially for hands-off expense tracking and bookkeeping.

Business Expense Tracker Excel 

It is very essential as a business owner, to have a procedure or system for monitoring your financial health. The sectors of your business financial health include expenses, income, and budgeting. Meanwhile, using excel as a tracker for your business expense, to ensure that your business is moving and operating smoothly is a good idea.

In a situation whereby you want to set up a business expense tracker in Excel, You’ll first need to create a spreadsheet and then correctly fill in the right information needed. Columns that are major of great importance include; “date,” “description,” “category,” and “amount.” However, if the need arises, you can as well add additional columns like “vehicle number” used for tracking car expenses.

If you’re already familiar with Microsoft Excel, you can typically design an Excel expense tracker template for your business using the right steps and formulas.

Steps for Setting Up a Tracker for Your Business Expense in Excel

I will list the three major steps to take in order to easily use excel for your business expense tracker purpose. They include:

Categorizing

This is the first step because the category of columns of the spreadsheet you use will determine how you will break down the methods which your business will spend money from. So, to avoid any problems with the Internal Revenue Service, it’s best to use the categories on their Schedule C tax form. The categories include supplies, cost of goods sold, rent, depreciation, and utilities.

Creating the Spreadsheet

If your spreadsheet can typically keep track of expenses, it can also serve as a ledger for your business. Follow these simple steps to create a spreadsheet for your business;

• The first row of the columns is for the categories.
• Far-left columns for the date and the ones next to those for the vendor’s name.
• Type in each expense amount in the columns that connect to their category.
• Calculate the grand amount that your business spends on each of the categories by typically adding the right formula.

In case you’re using a handwritten journal for this same purpose, use the calculator to get the total. It’s possible to use a spreadsheet in summarizing your expenses and also, in comparing your expenses over a period of time. A lot of businesses use spreadsheets to capture an insight into their business. This is because it aids them in completely and quickly understanding how their expenses in each category differ from one month to another.

Conclusion 

Not just small business owners need an expense tracker. Every business owner both small and big needs a business expense tracker, so go online today and check out the free and non-free ones that best suit your business. For beginners who are just getting to know the business expense tracker, I suggest you first explore excel before diving into other apps and software for this purpose.

FAQs

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