Document Management

By: Valerie Briley, CPA, Founder, and Chief Business Driver, Reveal Business Solutions

One typical new year resolution is to “get organized.” After binge-watching the reality show, The Home Edit jump on the resolution bandwagon and implement document management and records retention systems for your business. We think this is an excellent way to reduce your time on administrative tasks and accounting.

What is document management and records retention? Document management is the system or process used to capture, track and store documents. Records retention is determining what records should be kept and for how long.

Businesses may use Google Drive or a similar tool for document management since it comes with your email management. These are excellent options for storing organization documents, client contracts, employment agreements, vendor agreements, etc. To quickly find stored documents and protect the information, we recommend establishing company standards for saving, sharing, filing, and naming documents.

Records retention is a method and practice used to maintain essential documents and records for the required period. Applying a records retention system to paper and electronic records is important. You may have heard the 7-year rule for retaining documents. However, deciding to keep or destroy records depends on the type of business and document.

The critical takeaway is establishing a document management system to protect and easily find documents and a retention policy to keep what you need and purge what you don’t. An excellent place to start is by establishing a list of the types of documents you have. Here’s a link to IRS guidance on document retention.

We are big fans of apps and automation that help us with document management for accounting records. Hubdoc allows us to manage a high volume of electronic receipts and bills. We love that Hubdoc efficiently attaches supporting documents to expenses and bills in QBO. This helps us help you maintain support for expense deductions, and attached support helps us transform your business by accurately recording transactions to produce actionable financial data.

Maybe getting organized isn’t at the top of your goals for 2023; we’d love to hear what is. If you have questions or need help automating and streamlining your accounting processes, contact our team today!