Have you ever carried around a wallet full of receipts, forgot to log them, and lost out on tax write-offs? Or maybe you have a bookkeeper who manages your books and is always on you because you're missing receipts.
This is my favorite (painless) way to save and organize receipts to ensure you don't lose out on write-offs and can always locate one if you ever need to refer back to it. This method assumes you have a cloud-based storage system like Google drive, which has an app and mobile functionality. Follow these 4 simple steps and you'll be good to go!!
File Organization for your Business
Before we jump into receipt organization, let's talk about creating organization in your drive overall. Most businesses have files that can fit into one of the following 8 categories. This is how I help all my clients organize their Google drive:
Finance
Marketing
Communications
Operations
Clients, Products, Events, or Services
Strategy & Planning
HR
Team
You can see how almost everything you need in your business would fall under one of these categories. Organizing it in this way enables you to find things easily, as well as any team members or contractors you bring on! Today we're zoning in on the Finance folder, which usually contains one or all of the following subfolders:
Mileage
Receipts
Reports
How to Organize Receipts
Organize your receipts using these 4 simple steps!
1. Yearly Folders: Assuming your fiscal year matches up with the calendar year, create a folder for each year. I nest this subfolder under Operations > Finances in my drive.
2. Monthly Folders: Inside that folder, create a folder for each month. Be sure to include the year as well, so it's easy to tell folders apart once you have multiple years of business. 3. Save immediately: When you're spending for your business, save the receipts immediately upon purchasing before they get lost or forgotten. When I'm out and about, I snap a picture of the receipt and share to the appropriate folder in my drive using the Google drive app. *BONUS TIP #1* If you have Quickbooks Online, use this awesome automation hack to connect receipts to transactions directly from your inbox. 4. Naming Structure: Use this simple file name template for every receipt: DATE - VENDOR - PURPOSE (ie 9-29 - Starbucks - Client meeting) Any time you need to locate a receipt, simply search in your Finances folder for the vendor name OR go to the month you know you purchased it and scan until you find what you need. If you use a bookkeeper, you can give them direct access to your yearly folder so they can find everything they need.
BONUS TIP #2: Does it drive you crazy that the folders are in alphabetical order instead of chronological? Put the month's number before the name to align them with the calendar!
How to Archive Receipts
Now that you've gotten everything organized, you want to keep it that way, right?! Here's how I maintain my folder throughout the years.
Once a month is over and I have all receipts saved to the monthly folder, I drag that monthly folder over into the Yearly folder. It looks a little something like this:
Guess what this means? Yep: Your receipts will be nice and tidy for your Bookkeeper or Accountant at the end of the year.
How to Share your Receipts Folder with your Bookkeeper
Sharing folders from Google Drive is super simple.
Just click on the 3 dots next to the folder you want to share...
Then enter their email into the email field.
Be sure your sharing settings are appropriate for the permissions they need. Consider whether they need to edit or just view your receipts.
You'll also want to make sure the General Access makes sense for you and your team. If you have hired a bookkeeping agency, for example, you'll want to change General access to "Anyone with the link", or ask your primary contact to give you the email of any people who will be helping with your books so you can add them as well.
How do you organize your business receipts? I'd love to hear in the comments!
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