It is crucial to find the right accounting software for your company.

Your chosen accounting platform will store all your financial information and allow you to manage this key part of your business operations. You need an accounting platform that you can trust, meets your business needs, and is affordable.

You might be thinking about Zoho Books as a possible solution.

Are Zoho Books accounting software the right choice for you? We’ll be reviewing the platform to help you decide if it’s right for you.

Let’s get started!

What are Zoho Books?

Zoho Books, which is part of the Zoho Suite, includes over 40 business operations apps. This cloud-based accounting software helps businesses manage their finances, automate workflows and cross-functionally work between different parts. 

Although most Zoho products are designed for large enterprises, Zoho Books can be used by small and medium-sized businesses. You can outgrow it if your finance and executive teams exceed the 10 users.

Zoho Books was introduced in 2011 by Zoho. It has since been a major player in the accounting market. You can access your account from anywhere you have an internet connection, and you can also use your mobile accounting app on iOS or Android.

Zoho Books key features

Zoho Books has many features. These include inventory management and a time tracker. It is a great fit for all types of businesses because of its wide variety of functions.

These are the features Zoho Books offers:

Receivables

Zoho Books allows you to keep the money coming in. This platform offers powerful invoicing features with high customization, automation and templates. It also has encryption, deposit capabilities, and encryption. For added functionality, you can generate estimates that are automatically transferred to custom invoices and projects.

Your invoice will be sent to clients and remind them of any unpaid balances. It also allows for quick online payment via credit card or ACH through Zoho’s product payment gateway. Recurring invoices and stored payment details can help to make client relationships easier.

Zoho Books’ international accounting features are perhaps the best, including fluid currency and localized editions. These features can be tailored to your business and allow you to do business around the globe. Customers can quickly assign sales tax and receive updates with local rates. This is helpful for creating recurring invoices.

To manage your ongoing customer and recurring invoices, you can add Subscription. Get 20 free subscriptions. Then scale up your payment plan to more customers and users.

Accounts payable

This feature makes it easy to keep track of your payments and see where your money is going. Zoho Books makes it easy to manage business expenses. Purchase orders can be converted to bills in a few clicks. You can also set up recurring bills and credit vendor returns.

You can manage your procurement and payments with just a few clicks by using custom invoices, purchase orders, and sales orders. The automated workflow for expense tracking allows you to monitor and categorize financial transactions while keeping your balance sheets up-to-date.

Inventory management

Zoho Books is the best platform for inventory tracking and management. You can organize your inventory with great detail.

You can set your reorder thresholds and automate so purchase orders are sent out to suppliers whenever you have less inventory. If stock is lost or damaged, you can adjust your inventory instantly. You can easily access inventory information and set up reports to view your inventory status.

Banking

Zoho Books will automatically import and categorize transactions from your bank account. This allows you to save time and reduce frustration. Bank reconciliation can be made fast and efficient by automating bulk actions and bulk actions. You can see your financial information at a glance with the banking dashboard. Visual reports are available to help you predict cash flow.

Note – Zoho Books collaborates with Yodlee, an online banking solution provider, to import live bank feeds. This could violate any Terms and Conditions that you have agreed to with your bank. Before you make the switch, please check with your bank to confirm that Zoho Books has access to your banking.

Time tracking

Businesses need to keep track of time spent with clients and contractors for accurate billing. Zoho Books allows you to log time on projects daily, weekly, and even use the widget’s timer to track the time you spend.

You can use Zoho Books to organize your projects, in addition to time tracking. You can manage multiple projects with the platform by creating new projects and adding tasks to each project. Additionally, you can assign tasks to employees.

Contact management

The contact portal is one of the best features of Zoho Books. This portal allows you to manage customers, vendors, and contractors and allows you to collaborate quickly.

Clients can view their estimates, invoices, project details and other communications through the client portal. Clients can also comment on and pay in the portal. Notifications will be sent to clients when invoices are viewed or paid. You can also request testimonials and reviews.

Reports

Zoho Books creates more than 50 business reports from your business data, which can be used to simplify accounting tasks. The dashboard will immediately present financial information in a visually appealing way. You can then generate any additional reports that you require.

Basic reports such as balance sheet, cash flow and profit & loss can all be run automatically to send to your email at any frequency that you choose. Tax liability reports can make tax season simpler, while custom tags allow you to create reports for sales and audits with any data you require.

Mobile apps

The App Store and Google Play have positive reviews for Zoho Books’ mobile apps. Zoho Books is a great option for business owners who need to be mobile. You can do:

• Invoice generation and transmission
• Recognizing expenses
• Multiple currencies
• Accountant access
• Get quick business insight

Zoho Books can be subscribed directly from your smartphone or tablet and you can access the majority of the software functionality, even if you don’t have a computer.

Zoho Books is easy to use

It is easy to get started using Zoho Books. You will need to provide details about your business during the initial setup. This includes industry details and type. Next, you will need to add tax details. Next, you can enable the modules that you would like to be used in your business. There are many options. Finally, connect to an assortment of online payment platforms. You can change any information that you have added during the setup at any time.

After you have completed your initial setup, Zoho Books will display the getting started screen. This screen shows a brief video overview and your client portal’s name. You can also set up your opening balances, configure your bank feed, and chart of accounts.

The left-hand side has a vertical navigation bar that provides drop-down menu access for all Zoho Books features. Even novices will find it easy to navigate all data entry screens, as well as a brief description of the feature that you are using.

Zoho Books security features

Zoho Books has strong security measures. These include two-factor authentication, data encryption and regular virus detection. The company is also compliant with the EU-US Privacy Seal Framework.

To ensure data security, additional physical measures such as surveillance 24/7/365, bullet-resistant walls, video monitoring and other precautions are taken. Zoho Books regularly backs up data to multiple servers at undisclosed locations.

For complete security information, visit Zoho’s site.

Integrations with Zoho Books

It is easy to connect with an existing Zoho account if you are already using Zoho CRM and Zoho Inventory. It may not work for you if you want to integrate with third-party platforms.

Zoho Books can integrate with many platforms, but they are all in the same category such as online tax filings or online payments.

A second thing to mention is the recent launch of ZohoPayroll, a payroll platform by Zoho Books. It is currently only available in India, Texas, and California as of January 2020. Zoho Books does not integrate with third-party payroll systems, unlike other platforms like Sage and Wave.

Zoho Books pricing plans

Zoho Books has three pricing plans that are affordable even for those with tight budgets. Sign up to receive a 14-day free trial of any plan. You don’t need to provide any banking information or credit card details and can cancel at any moment.

Subscription payments are made monthly. However, if you sign up for a year-long subscription, you will get two months free. You can cancel your subscription at any moment, even if you have been with the company for a year. Year-long subscribers will receive a prorated refund.

These are the pricing plans for Zoho Books:

Plan	Price (per organization/ month)	The key features
Basic	$9	Contact up to 50 people 2 users Automated workflows – 5 – Bank reconciliation – Custom invoices Tracking expenses Timesheets and projects – Recurring transactions – Sales approval Budgeting – Zoho Sign Integration
Standard	$19	Contact up to 500 people – 3 Users – 10 Automated Workflows per Module All the benefits of the Basic plan plus: – Bills – Vendor credits – Reporting tags – Purchase approval – Twilio integration
For professionals	$29	Contacts >500 – 10 Users – 10 Automated Workflows/Module All the benefits of the Standard plan plus: – Orders – Sales orders Stock tracking – Custom domain – Vendor portal

There are additional costs that must be considered before purchasing Zoho Books.

• Extra Users. Additional users are $2/month/user You can also pay $20/year/user

• Snail mail credit. This allows you to send estimates and invoices by mail through Zoho Books. It costs $2 per credit. For US mail, one credit is required. International mail requires two credits.

• Auto Scans. This allows you to scan receipts or documents and upload them to Zoho Books. For $15/month, you can purchase 25 auto scans.

Support for Zoho Books customers

Zoho Books provides a variety of customer service options with knowledgeable and helpful customer service representatives. You can access almost every support option directly within the platform, making it even simpler.

Zoho Books customer service is available from Monday through Friday, 24/5. These are the Zoho Books customer support options:

• Phone. Phone. There are rarely any wait times and the representatives are helpful.

• Email. For assistance, you can also write to Zoho Books.   

• Webinars. To learn more about Zoho Books, you can sign up to receive weekly webinars. You can also watch a recorded demo of Zoho Books.

• Knowledgebase. The Knowledge Base contains FAQs, help articles and videos. There are also business guides, welcome guides, migration guides and a forum. You can access all the information right within Zoho Books. There is also a well-developed search tool.

• Accountant finder. Zoho Books will help you locate an account close to you.

The pros and cons of Zoho Books

Pros:

• It is very easy to use
• There are many features to choose from
• High-quality security measures
• Small and medium-sized businesses can afford it
• Features-rich mobile apps
• Numerous and helpful customer service

Cons:

• Integrations are limited
• Limited integrated payroll features available only in India (and 2 US states) as of January 2020
• Fixed asset management is not available
• Transaction limit of 5,000

Alternatives to Zoho Books

Xero

Xero is one of the most popular accounting platforms over the past few years. It offers many robust features to meet your business requirements. We love these features:

• It’s easy to migrate. Xero makes it easy to switch accounting software companies. The platform allows you to convert data from existing accounts so that you can start immediately without the need to spend time entering data.

• 500+ app integration. Xero has one of the most extensive collections of widget and app integrations. It is possible to add tools such as Shopify, Square and Google Suite.

• Payroll. Xero offers full payroll capabilities so that you can manage your employees and business. To manage your business and employees more efficiently, you can create multiple users.

All these features, and many others, are part of Xero’s offering. There are three packages available from Xero:

• Starter Plan: $20/ month
• Standard Plan: $30/month
• Premium Plan: $40/ month

LessAccounting

LessAccounting has a smaller company than the previous ones, which makes it an excellent resource for entrepreneurs just starting out. LessAccounting offers a variety of tools to help you achieve that goal.

• Customizable invoices. You can customize your invoices with the platform’s invoicing feature.

• Full-service bookkeeping. LessAccounting offers full-service bookkeeping. This option can be added to your monthly subscription so that all of your information can be easily accessed from one location.

• Personalized customer service. This is what makes LessAccounting stand apart from the rest. The company has a dedicated customer service team that can assist you with any financial issues.

Pricing plans for LessAccounting include:

• Invoice-only Plan: No Charge
• Lite Plan $24/month
• Team Plan: $36/month

FreshBooks

FreshBooks is a platform that has been in existence for almost 20 years. It’s taken time to perfect its packaging, and make use of all available tools to create a fully functional, well-organized platform.

There are many helpful features offered by the company, including:

• Estimates: Before you start a project, you can create estimates and send them to your clients. This is an important first step to get your project started on the right foot.

• Per-project organization. You can organize your projects or clients using the platform to help you stay organized. This seems small compared to other features like payroll. These little details make financial management much more simple.

• Tools for time tracking. FreshBooks allows you to track your time and keep track of it once you have sent out estimates. FreshBooks’ time tracking tools allow you to start, pause and stop your time, and then add the recorded amount to your next invoice.

FreshBooks charges by the number of clients you add to your account. This is in contrast with other accounting platforms that charge for features. There are four pricing options available at FreshBooks:

• Lite Plan $6/month
• Plus Plan: $10/ month
• Premium Plan: $20/ month
• Select Plan: custom pricing

The bottom line

Now that we have concluded our Zoho Books review it is up to you to make the final decision.

Are Zoho Books accounting software the best?

Only you know your business well enough to determine the best accounting solution for you.

However, Zoho Books is an affordable platform that offers a wide range of features and is highly customizable. Zoho Books offers three pricing options that allow you to automate and manage your bookkeeping and accounting tasks. This makes it a great choice for small and medium businesses.

However, if your business is larger than the limit on clients or users, or if you require more integration options, Zoho Books may be an option.

You can only decide which accounting software is right for you by comparing and researching various platforms. Don’t forget to tell us what you think about our review. Thank you for reading!