Zoho Books: The Perfect Accounting Software for Your Business

Zoho Books: The Perfect Accounting Solution for Your Business

It’s one of the most dreaded tasks in self-employment: handling the bookkeeping. Scanning receipts, writing invoices, managing payables and receivables, calculating VAT – the list seems endless. But cheers to digitization, which has provided us with a wealth of great tools – like Zoho Books. That’s right, Zoho offers an application for your bookkeeping that takes care of all this tedious work for you. Discover the accounting software you’ve been dreaming of. In this blog post, we give you a comprehensive introduction to Zoho Books.

What is Zoho Books?

Zoho Books is an online accounting software. What once required pen and paper, and a lot of manual effort can now be efficiently managed digitally. Speaking of efficiency and digitalization, Zoho, the company behind Zoho Books, has been a pioneer in this field for over two decades. Founded in 1996, the Indian software company has specialized in comprehensively digitizing all areas of a business with its Zoho One Suite. And it’s been a success: more than 90 million users in over 180 countries currently rely on Zoho.

Accounting software for SMEs

If you research Zoho Books online, you will often find that the application is considered the perfect software for SMEs – and for good reason! It stands out primarily for its intuitive user interface, which makes it easy to use, and its excellent capabilities for tax preparation. With Zoho Books, you can generate detailed financial reports and keep track of VAT amounts. The flexibility and time savings are also highly praised: thanks to automated workflows, various business processes can be streamlined, and in combination with numerous integrations, Zoho Books enhances communication between departments. Customers are also well taken care of: the software provides a customer portal, enabling you to offer not only better service but also more efficient collaboration. And the best part is, you can do all this from anywhere: since all data in Zoho Books is stored in the cloud, you and your team can access it anytime, even while on the go.
In most cases, all it takes is one click, and you have an overview of all the relevant figures on the dashboard, which you can customize to your needs and download reports at any time.

How much does Zoho Books cost?

First and foremost, the pricing for Zoho Books is clear and transparent. The accounting software is available in five different pricing plans.
With a single user, you can take advantage of the free plan, one of Zoho’s unbeatable USPs. Whether you’re just testing the software, or your business is still in its early stages and you can’t yet make large investments, you won’t need to pay a cent. The free version allows you to create invoices and quotes, manage expenses, handle credit notes and refunds, use the customer portal, set up payment reminders, and perform bank reconciliations. You can also manage corrective invoices, profit and loss statements, VAT, and perform a DATEV export.
The Professional package, priced at €40 per month per organization, allows up to 5 users in the system and adds features to the free version, such as multi-currency invoicing, supplier invoice creation, and the ability to track expenses, orders, sales orders, and inventory. Additionally, you can configure VAT rules and set up project accounting to monitor project profitability.
The Premium package, priced at €50 per month, allows you to work with up to 10 users, schedule up to 200 reports, and manage up to 25,000 invoices per year. Features such as cash flow forecast reports, the use of a custom domain for portals, and the ability to set validation rules for fields are also included.
The Elite package, priced at €170 per month, adds even more powerful features, such as warehouse management, serial number tracking, batch and shipment tracking, as well as integration with Shopify stores.
The Ultimate package offers 15 users, up to 100,000 invoices per year, and extensive features for €330 per month. In addition to all the features of the Elite package, you can access real-time reports and analytics, track key financial metrics, analyze Zoho Books data alongside other data, and embed reports in websites and apps.

Is Zoho available in Germany?

Since 2021, Zoho has had a branch in Düsseldorf, making it available for German-speaking countries. In terms of finance, Zoho has been offering its German-language Finance Suite, better known as Zoho Finance, since 2023. This includes Zoho Books for accounting, Zoho Invoice for invoicing, Zoho Billing as billing software, Zoho Expense for travel and expense management, and Zoho Inventory for inventory and order management. In line with Zoho’s philosophy, all applications can be seamlessly integrated, allowing all financial areas of your company to work together smoothly.

Why should you use Zoho Books?

The question should rather be: why wouldn’t you? Because, generally speaking, in the digital age, using online accounting software is definitely the way to go: On one hand, it ensures proper bookkeeping and provides you with a comprehensive overview at all times, and on the other hand, it helps to lighten the load for your team. The features of Zoho Books speak for themselves: it is efficient and, above all, easy to use – and it’s no coincidence that the software consistently receives a 10/10 rating for user-friendliness on review platforms.
In addition, Zoho offers a wide range of features that ensure the automation of accounting processes and enable complete customer management – an aspect that users greatly appreciate as well.

DATEV export

Currently, there is no direct DATEV connection from Zoho Books, but you can export all the data required by your accountant from Zoho Books to DATEV.
This data is exported as a posting batch that reflects the accounting in DATEV and can be directly imported there. The associated images for the document transfer to DATEV are also exported in such a way that the links to the postings are preserved. Additionally, the correct handling of the DATEV tax key is ensured, and your data is fully encrypted using a user password.

Secure protection of financial data

One question that naturally arises when choosing online accounting software is how securely the data is handled. After all, it involves highly sensitive company and personal data stored in the cloud. Zoho Books has addressed this concern by protecting your financial data not just twice, but six times over.

Encryption during transmission and storage

Nothing happens at Zoho without encryption: Zoho Books uses TLS 1.2 encryption for data transfer between the server and the end device, which also protects against eavesdropping. Additionally, when the data is at rest, it is secured with AES 256-bit encryption, providing the same level of security used by banks.

Double-secured access

You can secure access to your data by assigning roles within the system and enabling two-factor authentication (2FA). In the Zoho Books settings, you can define different roles with specific permissions and assign them to employees, ensuring that only a select group has access to your financial data. Additionally, with 2FA, you can create a second layer of security for these selected employees when logging into the system.

Certified data centers and back ups

All Zoho servers are located in highly secure, ISO/IEC 27001 certified data centers with access controls, 24/7 monitoring, and contingency plans. Zoho regularly performs automatic backups and has implemented disaster recovery protocols to ensure data can be restored as quickly as possible in the event of hardware failure.

The features of Zoho Books

As mentioned earlier, the features of Zoho Books are diverse and cover the entire accounting process. We’ve summarized the key features for you – get ready to be impressed!

Invoicing

In Zoho Books, you can create invoice templates with your own layout and text elements to match your corporate design. The invoice can be easily generated in the interface with just a few clicks using various drop-down menus, and then instantly sent via email or saved as a PDF.
You can also enable approval for transactions, so invoices must be reviewed before they are displayed in the account. Once an order is completed, you can create an invoice from it with just one click.

Cost estimates

With Zoho Books, you can not only create invoices but also generate quotes for your customers. They can then accept or reject the quotes in the customer portal. If they accept the quote, you can easily convert it into an invoice.
You can check the status of your quote at any time. If the quote is still pending, you can send automatic reminders to follow up.

Expenses at a glance

Recording, managing, and analyzing expenses in Zoho Books provides you with a comprehensive overview of your finances: Expenses can be recorded and categorized into predefined or custom categories. Bank transactions are automatically imported and synchronized with your bank accounts. Receipts can be easily uploaded and linked to the corresponding expenses. You can also set budgets for specific projects in Zoho Books and receive notifications if you approach or exceed the budget limit.
Zoho Books also tracks your recurring expenses, such as rent and software subscriptions, and automatically sends you payment due dates, ensuring that you never overlook any invoices or payments that are approaching.

Banking

Zoho Books also enhances your financial processes with its intuitive banking features. It allows you to synchronize your bank feeds with Zoho Books, removing the need for manual data entry. You can view bank transactions such as incoming and outgoing funds and retrieve live bank feeds for seamless import. Additionally, you can add, reconcile, and edit bank accounts, credit card accounts, and PayPal accounts for online payments directly in Zoho Books.

codafish – Your Zoho partner for all digital applications

Not only as a Zoho partner but also as a Zoho customer, we can tell you that we are thrilled with Zoho Books! We experience firsthand how easy and intuitive the software is to use, and how workflows and automation simplify our daily tasks. It’s not just the invoice creation that impresses, but also the entire sales process – from quotes to orders, invoices, advance payments, and recurring invoices. The purchasing process is also excellently structured: from the order to the supplier invoice, all the way to expenses, everything is perfectly organized.
Would you like to learn more? Feel free to schedule a free consultation with us! We will answer all your questions about Zoho Books, provide tips, and, if you wish, fully set up the software for you.