pdf file

Why Accounting Firms Need A Document Management System

Performing Manual Calculations

For any financial services company, a client’s financial data is at the heart of its operations. As such, it becomes crucial for them to invest in a document management system and all the tools and processes it entails.

Underscoring this fact, CPA Practice Advisor outlines a number of pros and cons for having a paperless office with a document management system in place. As expected, the benefits presented by the pros outweigh, by far, the struggles imposed by the cons.

A document management system can drastically improve the workflow for accounting firms and clients alike.  

For one thing, it saves business costs on paperwork. Businesses and customers can reduce paper dependency, ultimately making documentation, transactions and records easily accessible online.

For another, it allows companies to automatically create an electronic audit trail that can keep documents accurate and in compliance with industry standards. Document workflows can be set up and incorporated into daily processes, making routine procedures easy for accountants.

However, one important caveat to keep in mind is that simply having a document management system in place doesn’t mean your workflow is fool-proof. Depending on the dynamics of your clientele and your document processing routine, your needs can shift and change from day to day. In fact, companies that incorporate document management systems can still struggle.

CFO Momentum
Momentum, a renowned financial and credit services  company, is one such example. They keenly  felt the affects of a document management system that quickly became inadequate. “Our working volumes grew exponentially and then came to a point where the manual process no longer made any sense,” Riaan Verbeek, CFO of Momentum explains.

Turning A Flawed Document Management System Around

As one of the leading services in the area of financial advising, insurance, investment and health, Momentum had client data already digitized in the PDF format. But there was a weakness in their document management system.

The company quickly found that they needed a dedicated PDF to Excel converter in order to improve, complete and streamline their document management system.  They needed to efficiently extract the vast amounts of PDF data to Excel and handle the data generated by the accounting department, as well.

Improving Document Management With Able2Extract

With this in mind, the company added Able2Extract to their document management system to fill that need.  A case study on Momentum shows that the company’s workflow did nothing but improve from the addition. You can read the full Momentum case study here. Successful highlights from the case study include:

  • Saved $30,000 annually
  • Saved 100% of their time on information assembly
  • No training required to start converting PDF to Excel
  • Experienced accurate data conversions

By making an adjustment in one troublesome area in their document management system, Momentum was able to start processing and handling their client data more effectively.  

Implementing a document management system can do wonders for the productivity of accounting firms. But that system must be flexible enough to change with your daily activity and routine.  

If your firm has a system already set up, make sure it has a tool for every step in the process. Tailor the workflow and make adjustments as needed. If the addition of one PDF converter can improve Momentum’s metrics, think of what it can do for your firm.

How To Work Faster With Your PDFs Using Able2Extract 9

How effectively do you convert PDF files? Are you spending more time on setting things up? Making formatting adjustments after conversion? Checking in for conversions to start and end?

Well, with this short guide, we’re putting our foot down on some of the most common PDF conversion time-wasters.

If you’ve got Able2Extract, you may already be familiar with a few of the features on this list. But if you haven’t given them much thought before, you’ll want to take a closer look now. Because when combined, they can eliminate a majority of the small tasks that add up and slow you down.

Specify Custom PDF To Excel Settings Only Once

Performing a custom PDF to Excel conversion is one of the most effective ways to get your spreadsheet data right. But it’s all too easy to get caught up in getting the rows and columns formatted just right. This is why Able2Extract offers Custom Excel Templates.

When you use this feature, you can easily save your column structure and use it to instantly convert other PDF tables that are formatted in the same way. You don’t have to reset your parameters or remember how you set your conversion up.

Custom Excel Template Option

Once you have a template saved, you can simply load it to perform the same conversion any time. So if you’re dealing with customer data or PDF invoices in standardized forms, this feature can do a lot of the leg work for you.

Quickly Open PDFs Without Clicking

When opening a PDF file, you probably waste more than 4 clicks to get it open and set up. Did you know that Able2Extract will let you open a file in less than half of that? Try a couple of these quick PDF-opening tricks:

  • Drag the PDF onto the Able2Extract shortcut on your desktop

This will open a new window of Able2Extract when you want to quickly start viewing a PDF in isolation, away from PDFs to be converted or edited.

Opening PDF With Shortcut

  • Drag PDF documents into the Able2Extract 9 interface

Doing this will open a PDF file within the application simply by dragging your PDF into the open application. No double clicking needed. Use this trick to work with a specific group of PDFs at the same time which aren’t located in the same folder.

Opening PDF By Dragging

Automatically Convert To Different Microsoft Office Versions

We know that not everyone uses the same version of Microsoft Office. At one point or another, you probably came across this compatibility issue with others. Ever have to re-convert a PDF or re-save the converted Office file?

Well, instead of re-working the already converted Word, Excel or PowerPoint data, Able2Extract will let you switch up the default format even before you start converting the PDF.

Usually, Able2Extract will convert your data to the Office version you have installed by default. But you can also set the Office output format to 2007 so you convert to the .docx format regardless of the Office version you have installed.

  1. Go to View> Conversion Options
  2. In the dialog, depending on the format you’re using you can,
  • Switch the PowerPoint default format from the General tab
  • Switch the Microsoft Word default format from the Word tab. You can choose between .RTF and Word 2007.
  • Switch the Microsoft Excel default format from the Excel tab. Select between .CSV and Excel 2007.

To make things even easier, you can save your conversion settings as a file. This way you can easily switch between different Office output settings as needed.

Convert To Different Worksheets With One Click

Excel conversions are hard to nail. Oftentimes, you may opt to simply extract everything into one worksheet and then spend a few minutes, post-conversion, moving data around into different worksheets.

If that’s the case, then you should take a look at the Excel Single Worksheet feature. With this functionality, Able2Extract converts selected data from your PDF into one single Excel worksheet.

Excel Single Worksheet Option

By default this is turned on. So if you want to break up your converted data and get each page into separate worksheets for more precise conversions, you can do so before you convert. Here’s how:

  1. Go to the View menu
  2. Click on Excel Single Worksheet to remove the checkmark next to it.

Microsoft Excel Multiple Worksheets

Or you can simply hit F5 to turn the feature off.

Automate And Perform Multiple PDF Conversions At Once

With Able2Extract’s batch conversion, you can get the most done with the least amount of effort. Of all the features in this list, the Batch Conversion option is the one that saves you the most time as it works on multiple PDFs at once. If you have a handful of straightforward conversions to the same format, use this feature.

Automating Batch PDF Conversion

The process is automated, so you don’t have to sit and supervise each process as Able2Extract goes down the list. Just set it up and Able2Extract will take care of the rest. You can quickly access the feature from the command toolbar or by hitting CTRL + V.

How To Sign PDF Documents With Google Docs & Offline

Sign PDF with Google Docs and PDF Editor Software

The business world is now a digital one. Professionals and users are looking to do and keep everything digital–even signing PDF documents. Users are turning to access a quick way to deal with e-signatures without having to print, sign, and re-scan contracts and forms.

There are a ton of services that can help you sign your documents, both online and offline.

In this tutorial, we show you how to sign your PDF documents offline using Able2Extract Professional PDF editor and online using Google Docs.

Continue reading →

PDF Page Editing Made Easy

Editing Pages

With digital and mobile workflows trending in the office place, it’s all about the 2 P’s: Paperless Productivity. And for us in the PDF industry, this not only means going digital with your documents, but that you work efficiently with them as well.

To that end, one of our goals is to make it so that you don’t have to resort to other tools to get a separate PDF task done. And we’ve made some great progress towards that goal with Able2Extract 9.

You already know about its proven track record with multiple conversion options, and are now just getting a taste of its PDF creation abilities.  Curious about its PDF editing features, too?  Here’s a quick orientation guide for you.

Able2Extract’s PDF Editing Features

You can find these features by going to Edit>Pages in both the Standard version and the Professional version for editing scanned PDF files.

PDF Page Editor

As a PDF editor, Able2Extract can do a few things to alleviate some of the panic you experience when opening a less than perfect PDF document.

Delete

Got redundant pages? We’ve all had them at one point.  Whether they’re pages meant for specific people, blank eBook pages, or automatic page inserts, they add to the file bloat and extra scrolling. Good news is that you don’t have to put up with them anymore.

Deleting PDF Pages

Once you have your PDF opened in Able2Extract 9, you can delete PDF pages by specifying the page range and clicking on Delete. Enter the same page number in both fields to delete a single page. Your PDF page content will automatically shift up or down, of course, but the unnecessary page will be gone.

Move

Being able to move PDF pages comes in handy for long document revisions or PDF presentations where content order is especially important. When you need to rearrange or re-order pages in your document, use this feature.

Accessing this option will give you the following dialog:

Moving PDF Pages

Just input your page range accordingly and the number of the page you want your selected range to be placed before. Note that your page sequence is modified after each move. So be sure to use the most recently modified page numbering to define the Put Before Page value for your next PDF page move.

Resize

The Resize PDF pages feature acts like a cropping tool that can help you cut out large margins or unnecessary white space, this is the feature to use. In other words, this feature resizes your pages, not your content.

Resizing PDF Pages

You can adjust your page(s) dimensions as needed, resizing as much or as little as you want. Don’t forget to set the measurement units to either inches, centimeters, millimeters or points when using this feature! Once you have your values set, click on Resize.

Adjusting PDF Page Dimensions

Scale

Unlike the Resize feature above, Able2Extract’s scale PDF page option will let you change both the PDF page content and size together.

Scaling PDF Pages

The scaling measurement is done by percentage. It can be adjusted up to within 0.01% of the scale needed, so your content remains consistent and accurate, no matter what size the page is.

Adjusting PDF Content Dimensions

Rotate

The Rotate PDF page feature is designed for PDFs that with page content that appears upside down or sideways. This can usually happen with full page images that are originally in landscape mode, but are included in a portrait oriented PDF.

Rotating PDF Pages

The benefit? Instead of extracting the pages and re-creating the PDF, you can simply give a specified page (or page range) a good 90 degree turn in Able2Extract 9.

To get the full Able2Extract editing experience, give these features a go with a 7-day free trial for Able2Extract Standard or Able2Extract Professional for converting scanned or image PDFs.

A 6 Tip Starter Guide On Document Management

Document Management

Ask yourself, how much time do you spend looking for a single document? Could your file-managing habits use some improvements?

If you work on a computer every single day, it’s all too easy to drown in a pool of digital formats. You create presentations, write essays, analyze spreadsheets, and edit images.

And at one point or another it all gets saved and stored, proving at the same time that document management is behind almost everything we do electronically.

If you need a few quick fix tips, we put together a guide on some basics to keep in mind which can help improve any digital document routine.

1. Organize Email Attachments And Documents

This is a great place to start. Your email is a powerful tool which is unintentionally used as a document management tool, as well. You email files to yourself, use it to recover accidentally deleted files, send and forward files to others, and receive them yourself on a daily basis–all of which is easy. Digging them up, on the other hand, isn’t.

For situations like this, download your attachments in bulk with a tool like Mail Attachment Downloader by GearMage. Doing so can help you transfer and organize file attachments into your document system smoothly. It can extract and download email attachments from Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and other IMAP/POP accounts. Filter out file types, specify download location and other specifics.

2. Integrate Cloud Storage Into Your Routine

The web has grown into a cloud computing platform that makes everything accessible online. Yet cloud services can create more stress than they’re worth if you don’t plan out how you’ll be using them.

Uploading Files To Cloud

Upload files wisely by integrating them with your working habits. A few methods to consider:

  • For mobile work, automate your apps to upload files from your device straight to the cloud.
  • Use dedicated services for different formats.
  • Create a designated cloud folder “recycle bin” to download stuff you won’t need permanently. It will keep your local folders free of junk files.

3. Create A Nested Folder System

This tip is a must. A structured folder system is reflective of how you remember information. It can literally point you in the right direction with every level you click through.  All you need to do is make sure that your folders have a logical hierarchy.

Start off with a main folder. Then start creating sub-folders to filter out files like on-going work from finished work, current documents, documents for review or documents organized by year. The main thing to remember is to label folders according to your work process.

Saving Files

4. Use A Standard Naming Convention

Use consistent and logical file naming conventions. File names should include things like dates, document status, names–details that can pinpoint and categorize the file’s contents.

File names should be easily scannable, naturally ordered, and highly descriptive.  Some suggestions:

  • Make updated files stand out by using an underscore before the date.
  • Decide on the format such as dd-mm-yy or first name, last name.
  • Use a numbering scheme to keep large folders of files in order.
  • Don’t be cryptic with special characters, acronyms or generic terms. Chances are you won’t remember what they referred to later on.

5. Separate Your Files By Format

Sometimes file names won’t come to mind as easily as the format will. If this is the case with you, you may want to organize your files by format. If you use this method along with nested folders, it can be a faster way to find a file. You don’t have to re-sort or sift through a folder full of different file formats.

6. Archive And Delete Files Regularly

The worst part about creating documents is that they can quickly get outdated or obsolete especially with files created ad hoc. Set up a time frame for yourself to delete files regularly to keep them from piling up.

With the way file management and creation is constantly evolving, knowing just a few of your habits can go a long way to creating a document management system that works with you. What are some of your best practices?