Missed Our Webinar on ‘The Easy Way to Do Billing in Atera’? Catch Up Right Here!

If you’re using the PSA with Atera, and you want to know more about our new billing features and integrations, this is the right place to be. If you’re not taking advantage of the PSA yet, this might well be a solution that fits your business, so keep reading!

Yasmin and Jan shared with our Aterans a live demo of how to use the billing system on Atera, both with and without the integration. Catch the webinar here, or let’s break it down for you.

You can manage all of your billing needs, including products, rates, taxes, and more, all within the Atera platform, from the Admin page. You create a contract by heading to a customer, and simply clicking ‘create contract’.

This needs to include a start and end date, and information such as if the contract is taxable, the contract type such as a retainer or hourly, the quantity, and your billing period. When creating an hourly contract, you can also set this to be billed on-demand, allowing you to create your invoice whenever you choose, rather than waiting for the billing period to come to an end. From this same dashboard, you can also set an SLA, edit your rates, and customize any other factors that you need. It’s important to set a default contract for each customer, that will automatically be assigned to every new ticket. This will make sure that you don’t lose track of any billable hours.

Another cool feature we’ve recently added is ad-hoc invoicing, which is available now! This update allows you to create an invoice on demand that isn’t bound to any particular contract. Simply click a new invoice from anywhere within the customer screen. You can add labor or expenses, and choose from a drop-down list of existing products, or add a new one. Choose the rate, add tax details, and simply customize the invoice how you choose. One update is that any products added here will now be added to your product list going forward. Save, export, and send to your customers. Easy as 1,2,3.

Making it Simpler with QuickBooks Online and Xero

If you want to manage all of your billing through QuickBooks Online or Xero, both of these are available now, fully integrated with Atera. Just head to the Accounting page, and click Connect. Once you’ve set up the integration, you will be able to manage everything through your accounting software of choice. If your favorite isn’t available yet, QuickBooks Desktop, Wave, and Sage are all in the pipeline, with QuickBooks Desktop coming up soon. Keep your eyes on the Accounting page, found under Admin!

Whichever you choose, make sure to complete all the steps of the wizard so that the whole integration installs successfully. Don’t worry, all your information won’t be lost in Atera, just hidden. If you ever want to disconnect the integration, that data will be automatically unhidden so that you can use billing and invoicing again directly through Atera. The old method of exporting invoices to QuickBooks Online and Xero will no longer be available. If you would like to export your invoices to one of these accounting systems, you will need to set up the integration.

Here’s How it Works

Jan walked our Aterans through the integration process, showing how to sync with either QuickBooks Online or Xero, both of which have the same steps. Don’t forget, for the initial log in, you will need to add your credentials. In a matter of seconds, you will be taken to the integrate account page, where you can start the step by step wizard to integrate your Atera account with the accounting software. This is split into three areas, Taxes, Products and Rates, and Customers. Once complete, all of the billing elements previously handled in Atera can now be handled natively.

The wizard will walk you through the process, which allows you to match your information from Atera with that of the accounting software. This could include changing customer names so that they are consistent, matching products and rates, and importing new customers or product lists that don’t currently exist in Atera. This can also be done via third party data such as Excel spreadsheets. Don’t forget that with QuickBooks International, products need to be related to a tax amount.

At the end of the wizard, you’ll be shown an overview of where you have mismatches, which you will need to assess before you can complete the wizard integration.

Congratulations! You now have a centralized place to manage billing and accounting, allowing you to handle taxes, products, rates, customers, and invoices from a single pane of glass.

Taking Charge of Billing in the Simplest Possible Way

From Atera, simply head to the Accounting page, and you can see taxes, products, and customers via QuickBooks or Xero at a single click, or import more customers as and when you need it.

Jan also showed us how easy the communication between Atera and QuickBooks Online or Xero really is, by creating a new ticket, using exactly the same format as before. He picked a title, a technician, impact, type, and description. You can then edit using your product and expenses list, and either allow the time to be recorded automatically or set the time entry you want for the ticket. It is now available for billing! Jan recommended that we check the billing in the reports and timesheets section, allowing you to make a decision about what you want to build in terms of batch invoicing. You can then export this invoice information into QuickBooks Online, saving you a whole lot of time on your administration. When you sign into QuickBooks Online or Xero, you can see that the invoices that you’ve exported will appear there automatically, and with immediate effect.

That’s all there is to it! We’re excited to see what great use you make out of this new integration, but if you have any questions at all – please don’t hesitate to reach out to one of our Customer Success team.