Cut the Paperwork: AI Tools for Efficient Expense Tracking and Invoicing in Kitchen & Bath Design

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So far this season we’ve covered a wide array of areas where AI can help you in running your business. One area we haven’t touched on yet is… finances. No better time to talk about how you can be leveraging the hottest bots to make managing your money even easier. In this episode we’ll cover how to use modern tools and approaches to manage receipt & expense tracking, mileage and invoices.

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Episode Transcript

(00:05):
Greetings, dear viewer orlistener, and welcome to another
episode of Elevated, the podcastall about helping you build a
better kitchen and bath businessthrough innovation and
modernization.
I'm your host, Brandi Lawson,lover of all things innovation
and paper production.
So far this season, we'vecovered a wide array of areas

(00:26):
where AI can help you in runningyour business.
One area we haven't yet touchedon is finances.
No better time to talk about howyou can be leveraging the
hottest bots to make managingyour money even easier.
In this episode, we'll cover howto use modern tools and
approaches to manage receipt andexpense tracking, mileage, and
invoices.

(00:46):
Two things people learn fairlyquickly about me are, one, my
adoration of ridiculous shoes,and two, my burning disdain for
paper.
This is likely due to one of myearliest jobs being to file for
my parents business.
Piles of paper meant a ton ofwork for me.
My dislike runs so deep that CBSreceipts may just be the most

(01:07):
offensive thing I've ever seen.
So, why does any of this matter?
Well, in business, the moneyaspect of the organization
typically involves the mostpaper.
Invoices, receipts, bills,statements.
Do you think accountants justhate trees?
Or enjoy paper cuts?
The whole thing is reallyconfusing to me.
At any rate, my hate for paperand obsession with efficiency
come together to ensure that I'malways at the forefront of

(01:30):
finding all the ways to reducemy contact with paper while
ensuring that the business isstill dotting all the i's and
crossing all the t's fordetailed financials and tax
filings.
Perhaps the largest paperoffender is expenses and
receipts.
Yes, I get it.
We need information about wherethe money goes, and that
information typically comes inthe form of a printed paper that

(01:52):
gets handed to us at the time ofthe transaction.
But that doesn't mean we have tokeep the information in paper
format.
If you're getting paperreceipts, the best thing to do
is throw them in the trash.
Well, right after you've snappedthe photo.
All modern smartphones have highenough camera quality that the
photo of your receipt can beused by apps to aggregate your
expenses.

(02:12):
There are dozens of apps outthere for receipt capture and
expense management.
But my top two are HubDoc andFileHQ.
HubDoc is pretty much, as itsounds, a place to capture all
your documents.
You can forward emails to it,upload documents, or capture
photos.
It will then use OpticalCharacter Recognition, OCR, to

(02:34):
pull the information from thedocument so it can be easily
categorized or matched with theexpense.
It integrates with QuickBooksand Xero, so matching
transactions with thedocumentation is really easy.
FileHQ is a good fit if you havemultiple employees who submit
expenses.
File helps you collect receiptsvia text and automatically
matches them to the righttransactions.
Users just text a picture of thereceipt, file extracts the data,

(02:57):
and then uses its AI to code theexpense.
If additional data is needed,the AI will prompt the user for
that input via text.
It integrates with the mostpopular bookkeeping software as
well.
If you're already usingQuickBooks Online, you can use
the mobile app for receiptcapture.
It appears to have some of thebasic information extraction
capabilities, but thisfunctionality isn't as robust as

(03:19):
other options.
On the other hand, it is also anexisting functionality of
software you already use.
Another area where AI can assistwith your business finances is
mileage tracking andclassification.
Thanks to GPS, your phone canrecord everywhere you go, so no
need to keep, be keeping amileage log notebook or jotting
down sticky notes when you getout of the car.
The app I use is called MileIQ,but other options include

(03:43):
MileageWise or Timeiro.
Each of these is an app youinstall on your phone, give
permission to track yourlocation.
You then can set the usual stopsor other parameters for it to
auto classify drives for easymileage tracking.
If you drive a lot for business.
Like an outside sales rep orcustomer service role, you might
be interested in Everlace, whichis an app that does both mileage

(04:05):
tracking and expense management.
One other area of finance thatcan cause angst and stress is
invoicing.
In the kitchen and bath designbusiness, generating invoices
can get complex, especially ifyou're doing more than just
cabinetry.
AI and innovation can simplifyand streamline this.
However, it takes more effort toimplement this than using bots

(04:26):
for expenses and mileage.
To get automated invoicing, youfirst have to be using some kind
of project management software.
This is the data that will thenbe used to create the invoice
line items.
Creating automated invoicing canuse any number of specific
tools, apps, and methods, alldepending on the other things
you're currently using.
So let's just discuss high levelhow this can work.

(04:48):
As each item in the projectmanagement software is either
created or reaches a certainstatus, that information can be
added to a dataset that thengets put in the next invoice.
Then, when a specific taskreaches a specific state, or
when a project is marked as acertain status, the invoice can
trigger to be created and sent,or even just drafted for a human
to review and send.

(05:10):
As you can see from ourdiscussion in this episode,
there's no need to compile reamsof receipts, keep a mileage log
book, or even sweat creatinginvoices when you fully employ
AI and automation.
In the next episode, we'll walkthrough a specific scenario on
how to best use these kinds ofapps while traveling for
business.
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(05:33):
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Everyone deserves to have lessstress and more impact.