I was going through the Chrome Web Store to see what cool apps are out there. One thing most don’t know: You can do a lot without paying anything for it. Case in point – Wave Accounting: the online accounting site.
I was set back – an accounting program that is FREE? Not a “lite” version, nor a trial, but absolutely, positively nothing but free, FREE.
It looks like the company makes money by working with other banks to help people clean up the “shoebox”. After all, if you get your accounts in order, you can pay your bills on time. If you pay your bills on time, you can get loans. If you get loans, you can make money. Etc, etc, etc.
Wave Accounting came on the scene in November 2010. They have raised $1 Million in funding. The Toronto Canada based business employs 10 people.
Setting up Wave was very straightforward. You sign up for the account, then go straight to a page to enter invoices, expenses and more. You can connect your bank account to the site (which I didn’t do). You can also connect your credit cards and other loans into the system so you have one place to do your accounting.
For a brief time I had Microsoft Money installed on my computer. It was nice to corral all my bills into one system. I guess that this free service is just like Money. Now I know why Microsoft killed the product…
Is Wave Accounting Software Safe?
They boast 256-bit encryption. It does have the Verisign seal. When you log in, you are using an encrypted site, just like you would with your online bank account.
Wave also will back up your data. Since your accounting information is in the cloud, you can access on any machine. Therefore, if something fails, you can still get to your data.
Invoicing at your fingertips.
I hate to write invoices. Before, it was Microsoft Word, emailing each invoice separately. This system seems pretty straightforward, sending the invoice to the customer via email.
This was the main reason I wanted to try the site out. If invoicing was the only thing I used this site for, I would be happy. But the additional option to moderate my expenses and tell me when a bill is due is pretty sweet. I can even set permissions for someone else to view or edit an invoice.
What Wave cannot do (just yet)
I don’t see any time tracking. Import features are in beta right now, but I never used Google Docs or FreshBooks for accounting.
The big thing it doesn’t do is give you access when you are not on the internet. Of course, that is always the issue when you are working in the cloud.
I have just started using this software. With any cloud accounting software, you should try to back up your data as much as possible. Nonetheless, if I can get invoices out easier, then I am all for this program. If I can do it for free, well, let me get to work!