With over 25 years of experience, Monika has seen it all in the industry. Yet, anytime when conversation turns about accounting her eyes start to shine. How is that possible? No days are the same for her: many interesting companies from various business fields require different approaches and solutions. Monika is sure she would have changed her career path a long time ago if accounting was about processing documents only.

At the moment Monika runs two successful accounting offices in Tallinn and Tartu: Raamatupidamine & Finants OÜ and P&M Accounting OÜ. She and her teams provide comprehensive business support, from start-up to closure, including bookkeeping and legal advice.

From stacks of paper to remote work

Accounting in 1998 when Monika interned at an agency was very different. She vividly remembers delivering paper declarations in-person to the Tax Office, as well as manually processing mountains of invoices, receipts and contracts. Today, Monika loves the fact she can do her work on a laptop by a campfire next to a lake. We sat down to discuss the changes in the industry she has witnessed.

Accounting software

To start with, basic smartphones today are much more advanced than the computers 20 years ago. Same with software: it is incomparable to what we use now. The first accounting software for Monika was Hansa Classic. She is still using the same software, but it has changed name and ownership multiple times, and is known today as Standard Books by Excellent. From a basic software it has grown into a comprehensive cloud-based software with modules for various business processes.

Years ago accounting softwares we closed: could be accessed and used only on the licensed computers, tying the accountant to the desk. Today we see a different picture: users can access their data and work from any location with internet, as well as integrate and use 3rd party software and services with the main accounting system

Manual data entry and piles of papers

Processing paper documents used to take the most time and effort. A full week to deal with a single clients’ records was a norm. The monthly routine started by a client delivering all the invoices and receipts to the office in big folders. Then documents had to be sorted by the issue date before manually entering data into the software. Illegible and wrinkled receipts were quite frequent, therefore Monika and her colleagues were masters of “ironing” the documents over the edge of the table.

Thanks to rapid developments in technology, businesses are quickly transitioning from paper to digital documents, which allow quick and automated data sharing between the companies. Even now there are clients who prefer paper documents, but Monika empathises with them. After all, there is something undeniably satisfying about the physicality of paper invoices and receipts: they can be annotated, sorted into piles, and flipped through with ease. The tactile sensation of having the paper at hand just cannot be replicated when you keep all your documents online.

Nevertheless, Monika is sure that digitalization of business processes is the inevitable future and has successfully introduced various solutions to her clients. When accounting becomes simpler and faster, everyone involved wins.

Besides convenience, another big catalyst for document digitisation was necessity during Covid-19. Without an option to bring documents to the office, businesses had to share documents with accountants digitally. So when the pandemic restrictions were lifted, no one wanted to go back to folders with papers.

Communication with institutions

In the early 2000s, after the data was entered in the system, a report for the Tax Board had to be compiled and printed. And then, of course, physically brought to the tax office. Once every three months, the accountants held their breath as paper statements submitted to the Tax Board were compared with the numbers in the accounting software. All discrepancies had to be traced and corrected. While now it is much more simple to investigate through thousands of records and find the mistake, it used to take ages.

On top, there were no integrations with systems of the banks. The first one allowed accountants only to send the payment orders to the bank, but the reconciliation of the account statement with the accounting entries had to be made manually. This meant that the statement was printed out, a transaction number was written for each transaction and those transactions with missing documents were marked with a coloured sticker.

All of this hassle is gone: tax reports are submitted digitally on the Tax Board platform, and bank account details are showing up in the accounting software.

Document digitisation with Costpocket

Sometimes it is the client who teaches the accountant - yep, you read that right! Monika learned about CostPocket when a client showed how they manage expenses in the company. Blown away by the ease of use and quick results, she soon started advocating to use document digitisation for all of her clients. Now the offices are filled with more smiles and less papers!

Being a prudent accountant, Monika decided to go with CostPocket digitisation service only after comparing the alternatives in the market. The other service she tested had an extra step of editing and confirming the digitised data on its own cloud environment before syncing with the accounting software. As CostPocket sends data to the accounting software right after digitisation, the decision was easy to make.

After several years with CostPocket, Monika values the simplicity of use the most. When she onboards a new client, Monika goes through the settings of the account herself: dealing with software integration, managing steps of expense reporting, etc. After this, her client can immediately start submitting documents without a need to go over tutorials or account settings.

Through the years Monika has also noticed the improvements of CostPocket digitisation robot accuracy. When she started with our services in 2019, the robot was correctly capturing 71.3% of data. After learning from millions of processed documents, the robot has improved the accuracy 91.1% (January 2023).

All in all, CostPocket is the perfect tool for Monika's needs. It allows her to quickly and securely collect data from her clients and enter it into the accounting system with ease.