Uku logo

Log in

11 Essential Apps for Accountants: 2024 Guide

11 Essential Apps for Accountants: 2024 Guide

Published

May 6, 2024

3 min read
apps for accountants 2024

It’s a common misunderstanding that apps for accountants make us procrastinate and waste time. Let’s bust that myth and reveal the best apps for accountants the internet offers! 

Technology can help you be more efficient, never miss any deadlines and easily handle communication. You can be the accountant of your client’s dreams. Apps also come in handy after work. They provide a break and help you to unwind and relax.

We have combined the ultimate accounting tech stack with apps for accountants that you can use to make work easier. Each category has particular examples of apps Uku’s clients and employees swear by.

Accountants app for communication

Communication is key – I am sure we’ve all heard that before.

There is no accounting without communication. Face-to-face is the best way to share information with a colleague, but we can’t all be available at all times. It’s often impossible with remote teams or when working from different locations. This is where communication apps come in handy.

Slack and Teams                       

Slack and Teams are two of the most popular apps that can help facilitate real-time communication, file sharing, and collaboration among team members.

In addition to practical information sharing, connecting with coworkers helps people feel and work better. A study by BetterUp found that those who cultivated friendships in the workplace had more positive relationships,

36% greater life satisfaction, and 27% more job satisfaction. They also had a 34% improvement in reaching their goals.

Both Microsoft Teams and Slack address specific needs within accounting:

  • Increased Efficiency: By streamlining communication, these apps help accountants respond to client needs more quickly and manage deadlines more effectively.
  • Greater Accuracy: Real-time collaboration reduces miscommunications and errors, leading to more reliable financial reports and documentation.
  • Flexibility and Balance: The ability to communicate effectively from anywhere supports flexible work arrangements, which can be crucial for balancing the intense periods typical in the accounting cycle.

Microsoft Teams for Accountants

microsoft teams app icon

Microsoft Teams is a platform tailored to facilitate communication and collaboration among accountants. Integrated with Microsoft Office, it ensures that familiar tools are just a click away, enhancing usability across the board. Here’s what Teams offers:

  • Secure video meetings are vital for discussing sensitive financial details remotely, ensuring privacy and a personal touch.
  • Simultaneous document editing allows multiple users to edit documents simultaneously, reducing the need to send multiple versions back and forth via email.
  • Organized channels allow you to set up channels for specific clients or projects to keep all related discussions, files, and tools in one place, making it easy to manage and retrieve information.

microsoft teams app

Slack for accountantsslack app icon

Slack offers a flexible and efficient way to communicate that fits naturally into the informal yet urgent nature of many accounting communications.

Here’s why Slack is beneficial:

  • Immediate messaging simplifies quick queries and updates, ensuring that information is forwarded as soon as possible.
  • Extensive app integrations connect Slack with numerous other tools, including project management and time tracking software, centralizing your workspace in one app.
  • Interactive collaboration allows Easy file sharing, quick polling, and group discussions in a relaxed format, encouraging more open and frequent communication among team members.

Accountants app for accounting work

Today, there’s no longer a need to wrestle with complex Excel formulas and manual entries. The move to cloud accounting software transformed how accountants work, providing powerful tools for automation, collaboration, and management. These apps for accounting simplify traditional processes and enhance accuracy and efficiency. Usually, accounting work apps integrate with practice management, CRM, and other software essential for accounting work.

Xero

xero app icon

Xero

stands out as a globally recognized leader in accounting software favoured by small businesses, accountants, and bookkeepers. It is used by nearly 4 million people around the world. Xero helps with everyday accounting and reduces the manual workload by automating daily accounting tasks. It is with you anywhere you go. 

Xero invoices
Xero invoices

With Xero, you can:

  • Automate financial processes such as bank reconciliations and repetitive invoice preparations, saving valuable time and reducing human error.
  • Enhance collaboration by providing real-time access to financial data for both accountants and their clients, ensuring transparency and facilitating easier decision-making.
  • Integrate seamlessly with over 1,000 applications, including CRM systems like Pipedrive, practice management software like Uku, and time-tracking tools like Toggl, creating a connected ecosystem that simplifies various business processes.

QuickBooks

QuickBooks is another cornerstone among apps for accountants, noted for its comprehensive functionality and flexibility to suit various business sizes and needs. 

Here’s how QuickBooks improves your accounting :

  • Versatile financial management that enables accountants to handle payroll, sales tax calculations, expense tracking, and invoicing all in one platform
  • Insightful reporting with customizable dashboards and reporting tools that provide deep insights into business performance, aiding accountants in offering precise, data-driven advice
  • Scalability to meet the needs of different types of users, from freelancers to small businesses and growing enterprises, ensuring it remains a suitable tool as client requirements evolve
  • Integrate with many applications, similarly to Xero.

E-conomic

e-conomic app icon

E-conomic is the preferred accounting software in Scandinavia. It is highly regarded for its powerful features, which cater specifically to the needs of Danish accounting firms

E-conomic enhances accounting workflows by:

  • Automating essential tasks like invoicing, VAT reporting, and receipt uploads reduces manual data entry.
  • They simplify client management through streamlined and automated workflows, allowing accountants to focus more on strategic activities than routine tasks.
  • Offering extensive app integration, similar to Xero, facilitates a more cohesive operation and allows for an all-in-one solution that manages various aspects of a business.

Adopting one of these advanced accounting software allows accountants to provide high-quality, efficient services, turning tedious tasks into organized, manageable processes. Make the technological shift to free up valuable time for strategic advising and position accountants as indispensable advisors to their client’s financial success.

Accountants app for AML

Anti-Money Laundering (AML) is an accountant’s compulsory task in many countries nowadays. Failing to comply with AML regulations can result in fines and damage to a firm’s reputation. Luckily, technology has made AML processes much more accessible and efficient, so accountants can spend their valuable time doing more complicated tasks.

Ondato

ondato app icon

Ondato is a pioneering KYC compliance platform incorporating all the necessary know-your-customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) tools and services for safe client onboarding, AML screening, and lifecycle management. Reduce non-compliance risk and ensure your client’s financial activities are legitimate and transparent. By incorporating AML compliance apps into workflows, accountants can provide better service and value to their clients while maintaining high levels of regulatory compliance.

Your work management software might help you with AML processes as well. For example, Uku, the work management software for accountants, has a simplified AML process management. New fields will be added to your client’s data, and the system will remind you to update them.

Accountants app for time tracking

Efficient work is the key to success. One of the ways to guarantee effectiveness is to know the time you spend on work tasks to ensure accurate billing. Unlike the popular opinion, that time-tracking wastes time, the time-tracking apps also provide valuable insights into work habits to identify areas for improvement and increase productivity. Tracking time manually is quite ineffective because we humans tend to get distracted by tasks or deadlines.

Toggl

toggl app icon

Toggl is a popular time-tracking app amongst accountants. You can start and stop the timer with just one click, and the app will automatically track the time spent. Toggl also offers detailed reports that provide valuable insights into time spent on specific projects or clients.

Accountants app for work management

Accounting is complex and requires high organisation and attention to detail. Accountants must keep track of time spent on specific tasks, clients, and projects to ensure they are billing accurately and efficiently. Invoicing can be time-consuming, especially when regularly creating and sending invoices for multiple clients.

Instead of using several different apps for CRM, time tracking, and other work management-related actions – use work management software. It does all of these and even more!

Uku

uku app icon

Uku is a work management app designed for accountants. It has advanced work management features such as time tracking, task plans and templates, recurring tasks, and detailed reports. With Uku, accountants can easily keep track of their tasks, have a thorough overview of working hours and monitor client agreements.

In addition to work management, Uku offers billing features that automatically generate and send invoices based on the data you enter. It’s highly personalizable, as every contract is different. Uku can also automate email communication with clients, allowing accountants to stay in touch without manual intervention.

Uku billing product

A convenient client base covers the need for a separate CRM app. All of your clients, documents, accesses, and notes are available in one place and accessible to anyone who needs them. In addition, you can communicate with your clients, send and receive documents, and assign tasks to your clients in Uku’s Client Portal.

Uku's client profile view with recurring tasks

Like other apps, Uku integrates seamlessly with accounting software, like Xero and e-conomic, allowing smooth data exchange with clients and invoices.

Accountants app for sharing and managing files

For decades, companies have handled their files on paper, which they combined into binders and stacked on bookshelves. Although the colourful display is fun, managing files online is much easier.

Google Drive

google drive app icon

Google Drive is a popular cloud-based storage app allowing users to store or share files and documents easily. This can be especially useful for accounting offices that need to collaborate on documents or access files from different locations. You can share the files or folders of files with clients and hide the ones that need to be a secret.

Accountants app for password management

Using different passwords is the best way to stay safe and avoid scammers. So to remember them, should you write them in a notebook? Absolutely not! We never know who might want to steal our data. This is why a password management app is another vital consideration for accounting offices.

Did you know that the most commonly used password in 2021 was “123456”?

1Password

1password app icon

1Password is a powerful app that can help you manage passwords and secure sensitive information. You can save your passwords to the app, and 1Password remembers them for you. However, no one can access the saved passwords unless you unlock the app.

Accountants app for listening to music

Accounting work can be demanding and stressful sometimes, so the need to take breaks and unwind is not a surprise. Engaging in fun activities during breaks or after work can help reduce stress and prevent burnout, which is essential for maintaining good mental health.

Music is a powerful tool that can positively affect mood and reduce stress and anxiety. Whether you need to focus on a task or relax and unwind during a break, find the playlist suitable for your mood and go on.

Spotify

spotify app icon

Spotify is the world’s most popular music streaming service. It offers various playlists and genres, including instrumental music designed to improve concentration, upbeat hits from numerous genres, calming classical music, and jazzy vibes.

work music meme

Accountants app for mental health

In a high-stress industry like accounting, taking care of your mental health and managing stress levels is important. Yoga, pilates or meditation classes are often expensive and require commuting to the location they are held. A much easier (and cheaper) solution is to use apps.

Many successful business leaders, including Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Arianna Huffington, credit meditation with helping them achieve success.

Headspace

headspace app icon

Meditating apps like Headspace offer guided meditation and mindfulness exercises to help reduce stress and anxiety and improve focus. By taking a few minutes to meditate, you can improve your overall well-being and mental clarity, boost immunity and sleep quality, and reduce symptoms of depression.

Technology has become an integral part of the accounting industry, and many apps can help you stay organized and productive and relax after working hours.

By embracing technology and incorporating these apps into daily routines, you, as an accountant, can become more productive, efficient, and a well-rounded professional to be the accountant of your client’s dreams.

Juuli Pihel
Marketing Specialist at Uku

Please share:

Uku logo

Practice Management for Accounting Firms

TOP Accounting practice management SOFTWARE

4.7
G2.com
4.7
Capterra.com
4.7
Getapp.com
Practice Management for accounting firm

Similar articles