“I used to keep track of my time on scraps of paper and many hours went unbilled each month. Using the time-tracking features in Office Accounting 2008, I’ve increased my billable time by 20 percent.”
Catherine Jurkowski, Owner, PChelp2U
When Catherine Jurkowski started PChelp2U, she needed an efficient way to track her time and manage potential leads. Jurkowski installed Microsoft® Office Accounting Professional 2006 and participated in the beta release of Office Accounting Professional 2008. She used the enhanced features of Office Accounting 2008, and its improved integration with Office Outlook® 2007 with Business Contact Manager, to simplify invoicing and increase revenue.
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.Document published February 2008
Business Needs
In 2004, Catherine Jurkowski decided to turn her passion for technology into a new business. She launched PChelp2U, and began offering PC tune-ups, repairs, and technical support to individuals and small businesses. “I love to help my clients with anything technology-related,” Jurkowski says. “I’m actually a certified programmer, so I create simple Web sites and offer desktop publishing for my clients as well.”
As a busy mother of six, Jurkowski needed an easy way to manage the administrative details of her company. “I was keeping track of my billable time on scraps of paper,” Jurkowski says. “I would write down the time I started working and the time I stopped. Then I’d add it all up and hope I didn’t forget anything. It was time-consuming, I’d lose my pieces of paper, and it didn’t look very professional when I was on the job.”
As word about her work began to spread, Jurkowski also needed a way to keep track of potential new clients. “I kept track of leads by collecting business cards in my wallet,” Jurkowski laughs. “I definitely needed something more efficient.”
Solution
Jurkowski became a registered member of the Microsoft® Partner Program and subscribed to the Microsoft Action Pack, an annual resource that provides subscribers with new software releases and updated marketing materials. “The Action Pack is a great way to learn all about Microsoft software,” Jurkowski says. “As a small business owner, I can’t afford to purchase every piece of software that Microsoft releases, so I subscribed to the Action Pack and installed everything I could.”
One of the products that Jurkowski discovered was Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2006. “My brother told me about this product,” Jurkowski explains, “so when I saw it in the Action Pack I decided to give it a try. After I played around with it for a little while, I was so excited that I started telling all of my clients about it.”
A few months later, Jurkowski accepted an invitation to participate in the beta program for Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2008. “I was interested to see how the new version differed,” says Jurkowski. “I saw definite improvements over the previous version, like the enhanced memorization features and the ability to save invoices as PDFs.”
Jurkowski also installed Microsoft Office Professional 2007 and began using the Microsoft Office Outlook® 2007 messaging and collaboration client with Business Contact Manager. “I use Business Contact Manager to create leads, and can turn a lead into an account with just the click of a button. I really like having everything at my fingertips.”
Benefits
PChelp2U is using Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2008 to accurately track billable time, to easily create invoices and financial reports, and to quickly pay bills. Jurkowski recommends Office Accounting 2008 to all her clients because, she says, “It’s easy to use, the Microsoft Office user interface is familiar, and there’s almost no learning curve. It’s a very intuitive program.”
Accurate Time Tracking
Rather than tracking time manually, Jurkowski simply marks appointments as billable time in her Microsoft Office Outlook calendar. Then, with a single keystroke, she creates invoices by transferring that data to Office Accounting Professional 2008. “I love having a linked, centralized file that I can access when I’m traveling with my laptop or Palm Pilot,” Jurkowski says. “I used to keep track of my time on scraps of paper and many hours went unbilled each month. Using the time-tracking features of Office Accounting 2008, I’ve increased my billable time by 20 percent. Now I have an accurate, visual way of keeping track of my time.”
Jurkowski used to spend as much as an hour manually calculating her time and typing up each invoice in a Microsoft Office Word document. “Now I spend maybe two minutes creating invoices, thanks to the integration of Office Accounting 2008 and Business Contact Manager,” Jurkowski says. “I also really like that I can save my invoices as PDFs because several of my clients want invoices e-mailed to them. It looks very professional and is very easy.”
Simplified Administrative Tasks
Jurkowski estimates that she saves at least 20 hours per year on tax preparation and financial reporting. “I create one filtered report for my accountant,” Jurkowski says, “and I just e-mail it to her.”
With Office Accounting Professional 2008, Jurkowski can enter information once and it automatically populates across other Microsoft Office programs. “It’s even easier for me to pay my bills with Office Accounting 2008 than with the previous version,” says Jurkowski. “I don’t have to fill out the same information over and over again because of the way the program memorizes my vendors’ general ledger codes and billing information.” Jurkowski simply enters the vendor name and all the data appears.
“I am really excited about this product,” Jurkowski concludes. “It saves me so much time and is easy to use. I’m telling everyone about it.”
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.Document published February 2008