Raise your hand if you hate that box of receipts you’ve been meaning to put into your financial program for the last 6 months or more. Just kidding, don’t raise your hand we all know I can’t see you anyway.
But seriously, that box of receipts is out of control and you need a quick solution to handle it. So here it is…Neat Receipts.
If you haven’t seen the commercials or seen it in action you are missing out. I can put an expense report with 20 receipts together in less than ten minutes. It can also export into many of your favorite programs like Excel and QuickBooks.
This is not a plug for Neat Receipts, it’s just something I feel can save you time. Even if you are on top of all your receipts you can save yourself time and keep organized with this program. Here are a few of the ways I use it:
- Stacks of business cards
- Scan them into Neat, it will recognize it as a contact
- Export the files into Excel
- Import the files into Outlook
Voila! Your contact list just got bigger.
The biggest drawback is Neat does not like business cards that are too busy. It’s hard for it to pick up the type. But I still believe is saves me time.
Receipts
- Scan them in, Neat will recognize it’s a receipt
- Tell Neat what category it goes into
- After all receipts are in export it into your financial manager
Biggest drawback, if the receipt has been balled up into your pocket and run through your washing machine it may not be able to pick up the type. I’m guessing by that point you won’t be able to either.
Invoices
- Scan them in
- After one is in it will usually recognize which category it goes into
- Save your invoices wherever you electronically file them
Biggest drawback, if you don’t intend on saving them in a neat file you better remember to save them as a PDF.
Last but not least, you can use it as a scanner. Just place your document into the machine and hit the PDF button. I wouldn’t suggest it for saving your favorite pictures but scanning a quick document to send over email is great.
The desktop version is pricey, so I went with the portable version for under $200. You can also use their cloud system for a fee but I prefer Dropbox, it’s free. All in all for the price, I figure Neat has saved me over $200 worth of my time so I recommend it.
