After the implementation of GST, it has been difficult to maintain records of mammoth data of the businesses that deals with the supply of goods and services. Though, GST has brought a lot of positive changes, the business owners didn’t get enough time to prepare themselves for the biggest taxation change. Due to the complications and issues like GST calculations has led Government to introduce a specific GST software that is not only able to perform the complex calculations required for calculating monthly taxes but can also maintain record of the data generated every month. It should be able to manage your finances well from inventory management to tax compliant, billing to purchasing, everything must be covered.
Let’s discuss the essential features that a GST software need to have.
- Invoicing
After the introduction of GST, business owners need to upload invoices every month of number of purchases done. A software for tax calculation must have a feature that ensure the generation of professional invoices and is able to set remainders too. It should maintain a record of estimates, able to share proposal after the approval of customers and convert them into invoices or sales order. For fast payment, online transaction payment mode must be available for customers. The timesheets must be maintained for each employee to know whether the accounting hours are fulfilled or submitted on time or not.
- Inventory
Another feature that a GST software must have is automatic updating of inventory. Whenever you make a sale or purchase, it should be able to update the inventory and set the custom prices to get an accurate view of profit and losses. It must be able to organize the inventory according to the product price and quantity with vital information such as stocks and SKU. It must be able to create purchase orders to communicate your requirements to the concerned vendor with maximum clarity. The GST software should not only be able to track the inventory but also the entire journey from manufacturing to delivery.
- Bank Reconciliation
One of the important feature that every business need to have in its accounting software is the automatic banking feeds. As the business grown, the number of transactions increases and therefore, manual entry of each product individually becomes a bit difficult. This is why, it’s important to have a software solution that maintains a proper record of banking transactions, categorize them in an order and reconcile them in few clicks. A GST software must have a banking dashboard to give a hassle-free overview of the entire cash flow.
- GST- Filing
Your software must be GST-ready. A software that is GST compliant and is able to maintain a record of returns, filing of taxes, and make payments. It should be able to track sales of registered and unregistered users in order to claim the tax credits accurately. The software must be able to define SGST, CSGST, IGST tax rates and levy them on every transaction that you do. It must be automated to an extent of paying taxes on its own.
- Contact Management
Contact management is something which is very important when you’re running business. Organizing details of customers, vendors in one place, billing address of concerned contacts, default payment terms and so on. It should be able to view the outstanding amounts, statements and past transactions for better understanding, allow your customers to view the transactions and give feedback on the same.
- Reporting
The dedicated GST software must be able to make informed business decisions based on real-time and accurate data in order to enhance your sales and purchases. An automated software can analyze your business performance and enhance it into a faster application. It must know how to prepare balance worksheets, cash flows instantly. It can not only track all purchase activity but also be able to view your aging summary, monitor sales and so on.
Wrapping Up
A reliable software resolves all your accounting query and save your time by automating everything. It allow you to track all the necessary details related to your business be it filing taxes, claiming returns, generating invoices, defining roles of financial data and so on. There are several formats of invoices that are required by different businesses according to their revenue generate and the taxes they have to file. Therefore, the software should be capable of generating invoices in different formats. This is how, you can manage your business in an organized way and invest your precious time in its growth rather than dealing with the finances.
This article has been contributed by Priya Sharma, financial advisor at GST Keeper. GST Keeper is an online GST portal for complete range of GST services.
