Accountability is something everyone needs to do, personally or in business. Today we will talk about Business Accountability. Our little tips can apply to every business, but since we are in the business of Point of Sale (POS), we’ll try to relate to accounting issues we have encountered and we suspect our customers are likely to also encounter in the course of their business.
Accounts payable and receivable departments and processes are always very crucial in every business to find not only the net profit but also sources of profits, losses, and sources of losses and so on. Whether you are running a cell phone store, clinic, furniture shop, a subscription service or any other business where people can ‘pay you later’ via credit card or check or other types of bill payments, someone in your business must ALWAYS be on top of collecting the ongoing future / remaining charges.
For example, small businesses that are in the cell phone store business often get multiple types of commissions for selling their phones, services, upgrades and so on. While a cell phone store may offer its customer that shiny new iPhone XX for only $1000 with a 2-year contract, when direct Apple purchase price maybe $1500, a lot is going on in the backend. A cell phone store may be getting $100 commission for selling a 2-year contract to a customer, from Boost Mobile for example. While this is a good amount, it is FAR less amount comparing the subsidized promotion of say, $500 that the said cell phone store is due to receive from Boost Mobile after several weeks. While the commission may be easy to track as that is something easy to calculate and keep track of, the 2nd part–subsidized amount for equipment may require further follow up with the big service providers up the ladder; i.e. Boost Mobile.
You are already busy with your daily business and have to deal with inventories and orders and returns and angry customers, your personal life, etc. It becomes very hard, if not impossible to keep track of all your multiple layers of commissions, equipment reimbursements, rebates, promos, etc. Give it few months and you may easily lose thousands of dollars of UNCLAIMED money–which was rightly yours.
Thus, you either need to hire a dedicated person or a department in your business, if your business is big enough. If you are the sole person running the show or can’t afford an additional employee just for accounting, you may as well sign up with Reconciliation service for a small monthly fee.
Check out https://www.cellsmartpos.com/reconcile/ to learn more.
Whatever you may decide to do, be it hiring a person or signing up with a Reconcile service, do keep in mind that selling is NOT the only important aspect of a successful business.
