Accounting Technology

Accounting software is an application software that records and processes accounting transactions within functional modules such as accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll, and trial balance. It functions as an accounting information system. It may be developed in-house by the company or organization using it, may be purchased from a third party, or may be a combination of a third-party application software package with local modifications. It varies greatly in its complexity and cost.[1]

The market has been undergoing considerable consolidation since the mid-1990s, with many suppliers ceasing to trade or being bought by larger groups.

Technology

• FreshBooks
• Xero
• Intuit
• MYOB
• Reckon
• Saasu
• NetSuite
• MoneyWorks
• SageOne
• Accounting Edge
• Less Accounting
• Free Agent
• Yendo
• Zoho

Functionality

Core modules

• Accounts receivable—where the company enters money received
• Accounts payable—where the company enters its bills and pays money it owes
• General ledger—the company's "books"
• Billing—where the company produces invoices to clients/customers
• Stock/inventory—where the company keeps control of its inventory
• Purchase order—where the company orders inventory
• Sales order—where the company records customer orders for the supply of inventory
• Bookkeeping—where the company records collection and payment

Non-core modules

• Debt collection—where the company tracks attempts to collect overdue bills (sometimes part of accounts receivable)
• Electronic payment processing
• Expense—where employee business-related expenses are entered
• Inquiries—where the company looks up information on screen without any edits or additions
• Payroll—where the company tracks salary, wages, and related taxes
• Reports—where the company prints out data
• Timesheet—where professionals (such as attorneys and consultants) record time worked so that it can be billed to clients
• Purchase requisition—where requests for purchase orders are made, approved and tracked
• Reconciliation—compares records from parties at both sides of transactions for consistency
• Drill down
• Journals
• Departmental accounting
• Support for value added taxation
• Calculation of statutory holdback

Note that vendors may use differing names for these modules.

Links

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accounting_software