Manage your Invoices Anywhere with the iPhone
We’ve made a lot of changes in the most recent release of Billing Manager, but the one I’m most excited about is our new iPhone-optimized site. As cell phones become more powerful–and better designed–the way people work is going to adapt, and we wanted to take a first step in learning how Billing Manager users want to work on the go.
Getting to the iPhone version of Billing Manager is easy: just go to billingmanager.com on your iPhone. We think the application is simple and straight-forward, but I’ll quickly go over the main features and show some screen shots for readers without an iPhone.
Once you sign in, you get the My Account page, which provides a summmary of your invoice folders. From this page, you find customers in your address book, see your account’s recent activity, or look at the contents of each invoice folder.
Address Book is a list of organizations and individuals from your Billing Manager address book. Tapping on a entry brings up a page with contact details and buttons for mapping or calling the contact.
Recent Activity shows you what’s happened with your Billing Manager account…recently. Specifically, it shows a list of the ten most recently paid invoices or invoices that have become overdue.
Each of the invoice folders contain lists of invoices. If you click on one of the invoices, you’ll see a summary page for that invoice. If an invoice is unpaid, you can record a payment from an invoice detail page.
If an invoice is unpaid, you can tap the Record Payment button and record the receipt of cash, check, money order, any form of payment Billing Manager supports–including credit cards if your are signed up for QuickBooks Merchant Service. That means that you can now accept credit card payments from your iPhone. We are very excited to offer our customers this feature.
That’s about it for the what Billing Manager for the iPhone can do. I’d like to mention a couple of things it can’t. Specifically, you can’t create invoices or view the items on an invoice. We decided to release this initial version of the product with these limitation for a couple of reasons. First, practically speaking, we wanted to get something out for you to use as soon as possible, so some things had to wait. But more importantly, we weren’t sure that 1) our users want to create invoices on their iPhones or that 2) even if they do, we wanted to design an interface optimized for the iPhone’s interface, which is a challenge given how large and complicated Billing Manager’s invoice page is.
So, all you iPhone-owning Billing Manager users, I encourage you to check out the latest release. As I said above, we’ve introduced version of the product to help us learn. What you love, what you hate, the features that you never use, the features you’re dying to see.
April 30, 2008 at 8:30 pm
[...] Billing Manager Blog « Manage your Invoices Anywhere with the iPhone [...]
July 21, 2009 at 8:53 pm
This is great, can you port it to the G1?
August 18, 2009 at 1:12 pm
iphones are nice… what about blackberry? However I wouldn’t use it without the ability to create invoices.
May 4, 2010 at 12:41 am
it works ok on bolt browser on a blackberry (i have the 9000), not counting the size of the screen.
May 2, 2008 at 12:49 pm
[...] More screenshots of Billing Manager on iPhone are availalbe here. [...]
September 7, 2008 at 4:39 pm
i can’t create new invoices. Improvements!
September 9, 2008 at 10:26 pm
I would love to be able to create a bill my clients on my iphone with your service. I am actually still puzzled why this is not an option? (even after reading the blog post) It would be a huge advantage for me to be able to create, review, send and mark paid all of my invoices from my phone!!! Please add this feature!!!
September 19, 2008 at 3:11 pm
I second wanting the ability to create an invoice on the spot with my iphone. I just discovered this app today and have already sent out multiple invoices that would have sat around for at least a week. I called a customer today who has been looking for this type of system and he is nearly sold to migrate his entire company over to this system. He is looking to purchase iphones for all his employees and have them create invoices and manage invoices at their job site.
Improvements/ Recommendations/ Wishes:
1. Invoicing via iphone
2.The ability while creating an invoice to check a box that indicates the invoice is also paid for without having to create the invoice then go back and edit the invoice to mark paid in full.
3. Quickbooks intergration feature. Export invoices
4. Keep up the great work. I know many small companies that would use this app and I’m looking forward to seening its ability to grow.
June 27, 2009 at 6:14 am
I also agree that mobile invoicing for quickbooks is one of the most needed applications for Iphone. I currently service about 100 different customers monthly and that generates well over 400 invoices each month and this is just at one of our locations. Our technicians in the field write up a hard copy then turn it in to the office to then be added into quickbooks manually. We receive payment every 30-45 days. How nice it would be for each tech to be able to make up an invoice via their iphone that integrates with quickbooks so it updates automatically so we can then update our computer via a sync with your server. Do not forgot that iphone also is bluetooth and infra red so it has the ability to print a hardcopy for the customer immediatly in the field with a bluetooth printer on board. I know several people that are waiting for an app to be made for the iphone that would do just this very thing.
Lowfat please feel free to get in contact with me and I can go over further details with you. I represent the largest franchise in a franchise system and this may turn out to be a blessing to you aswell as maybe offer incentive to roll this out faster for the other folks posting on this site aswell. Best Regards!
August 20, 2009 at 4:30 pm
i speak for alot of people when i say i love billing manager but i will have to say the app sucks or not a app what ever it is. we need to be able to make estimates and do invoices though this if not who cares if we can just see them. our customers want a invoice on the fly.
August 3, 2010 at 3:53 pm
I agree with moondog. I am going to be using this to keep track of payments more than anything. I usually receive payments for jobs on the spot so it would be nice to not have to go to my laptop first to create the invoice. And it would also be nice to be able to mark the invoice as paid. The way it’s set up now takes too much time to mark the invoice as paid. Thanks Intuit for a great free app. I am looking forward to seeing where you guys go with this.
November 6, 2008 at 10:54 pm
please add the feature to create a new invoice in iPhone version as well. this will be a major improvement and convinience for us. I just signed up for merchant account and this way i can bill my clients right in their office and have them pay me right there while I’m still there. thank you for your consideration, we are loyal users and this will sure take billing manager a couple of spot ahead of any competition you may have. thanks.
December 22, 2008 at 12:09 pm
UPDATE: I am now using the T-Mobile G1 (Android) phone and I can see the Billing Manager mobile.
And YES, please incorporate invoice creation into mobile version.
thanks,
hf2
December 24, 2008 at 7:24 am
This (for me at least) is useless without the ability to invoice right on my phone. This is issue most users complain about other apps such as Freshbook for the iphone.
Please add this feature!!!! Im guessing for every person that requests this feature – we represent a great number of users that do not have a WordPress account to write this down!
Please add this feature X1000!!!!
February 8, 2009 at 7:44 pm
I totally agree with what most of the other people posted already. Creating invoices on the iPhone is so important for me and clearly everyone else. I do computer consulting and there have been times where I’m out at a client’s home or business and the internet is down or I don’t have access to a computer at the time. Life would be so much easier if I can just get my iPhone out, create an invoice, receive/process a payment (credit card included), and email the client a copy of the invoice and receipt. I think most people would expect all that functionality when they see your site say “iPhone Support.” I’m greatly looking forward to you adding this!
Also, QuickBooks integration / exporting invoices is another feature that would be expected… especially since this site/tool was made by Intuit. This may exist somewhere but I have not found it.
I do want to thank you for the great tool you provide. I just signed up for a free account and it has already been making invoicing a lot easier. Invoicing is the part of my business I struggle with the most. Tools like this take away lots of the stress and work involved with invoicing and billing.
Thanks again!
August 18, 2009 at 2:13 pm
Check MobileInvoice.com. Invoice creation, printing, emailing, payments, credit cards and sync with Quickbooks all from your smartphone(has to be Windows).
June 4, 2009 at 11:11 am
Here is another vote for the invoicing creation option. We use “Mobile Invoice QuickBooks Edition” from http://www.lowfatsoftware.com but would really like to have that functionality on the iphone instead. The software is very simple, in that it allows you to download key database records like customers and items (products & services) to the mobile device. Then you can create either invoices or sales receipts ( a simple point of sale transaction without the cash register functionality), let it calculate the sales tax, and you record the payment method (check or cash). Then at the end of the week you upload all your invoices and sales receipts to the QuickBooks mothership (would be even cooler if you could upload them real time wireless), and create your bank deposit for the week. Do you think that would be complicated to add this functionality to your product?
August 9, 2009 at 5:23 pm
Real time wireless invoicing/uploading available in latest release of MobileInvoice version 5.
June 27, 2009 at 6:16 am
figured id bump this instead of just replying.
I also agree that mobile invoicing for quickbooks is one of the most needed applications for Iphone. I currently service about 100 different customers monthly and that generates well over 400 invoices each month and this is just at one of our locations. Our technicians in the field write up a hard copy then turn it in to the office to then be added into quickbooks manually. We receive payment every 30-45 days. How nice it would be for each tech to be able to make up an invoice via their iphone that integrates with quickbooks so it updates automatically so we can then update our computer via a sync with your server. Do not forgot that iphone also is bluetooth and infra red so it has the ability to print a hardcopy for the customer immediatly in the field with a bluetooth printer on board. I know several people that are waiting for an app to be made for the iphone that would do just this very thing.
Lowfat please feel free to get in contact with me and I can go over further details with you. I represent the largest franchise in a franchise system and this may turn out to be a blessing to you aswell as maybe offer incentive to roll this out faster for the other folks posting on this site aswell. Best Regards!
July 16, 2009 at 7:58 pm
I am waiting for an application that will allow me to create an invoice and
record the payment and print a customer receipt BEFORE I PURCHASE an iphone!
I was about to by a laptop to do this but realized a smart phone would be a
million times more convenient if it could do this. Now I know that it can do
this and I am just waiting. Please hurry!!
July 29, 2009 at 9:04 pm
What about Blackberry?!?!
July 31, 2009 at 5:16 pm
I don know why Billing manager blocks the ability to create an invoice from the iphone. Why? How long until you unblock iphone invoicing? I can tell you as soon as another company comes up with this feature you are going to loose a whole lot of customers. Mark the words!
August 19, 2009 at 7:12 am
This app would be Excellent if we were able to create invoices from iPhone. HURRY!!
August 19, 2009 at 9:15 am
Start using MobileInvoice now on a Windows smartphone because it could be quite a while until anything like this is available for iPhone.
August 22, 2009 at 7:39 pm
I do web server and web site design. The ability to invoice from my iphone is a crucial step I’m waiting for. That and a way to do timer invoice much like Freshbooks does. I would rather see it come from Intuit so I can integrate everything from my Iphone billing to my desktop Quickbooks.
I go on site and need to start a timer for that job or even when I do a phone call to immediately be able to hang up and then enter a invoice for a tech call support and send it to the customer or at least to log it so I can invoice them at the end of the month.
So my list is this:
- Credit card processing on the phone with your software/online billing.
- Timer or timers to track my time for invoicing my time to clients.
- Make invoices via iphone would be extremely nice for those really simple onsite jobs.
September 1, 2009 at 9:15 am
I understand the allure of building a web app (close to write once deploy nearly everywhere). However, I would really prefer to see this application, for the iPhone at least, as just that, a local application that talks to the BillingManager.com server.
While there are many reasons for this, I’ll give you one quick one: Say that I’m in a client site where cell phone signals cannot get through ((big building that seem to eat cell signals) or on an airplane with airplane mode on). The client doesn’t want to give me access to their WiFi–how can I go ahead and make use of the time? Well, I certainly cannot work with my invoices because it is a browser-only system. A local app, that stores current invoicing information, would allow me to do that. Then, as soon as I get a signal, it can run updates via push-notification. Also, a local app would be able to easily integrate with my local contact database and not require me to upload yet another contact list to yet another isolated web service.
So, in addition to being able to create invoices on my iPhone, a native iPhone application would be huge for me.
September 2, 2009 at 5:36 am
I agree with everyone. I will immediately switch to this app when and if it allows invoice creation on the iphone.
An obvious need.
And, with it looking like Apple will be opening up the iphone to other U.S. carriers in the future, it’s even more obvious.
But, I have to believe that the free part of this service will become history. We are all now the beta testers/market study for Intuit.
If there is a fee in the future, I would consider the service if structured for my small business.
September 2, 2009 at 11:31 am
I reviewing the Billing Manager software now. I’m trying to determine what advantages it has over my PayPal billing system. So far there are several advantages to the PayPal system over this one:
• Free
• No monthly fee to process credit cards directly, and competitive if not cheaper transaction costs, and no nightly processing fee
• Debit card attached to my PayPal account
• I can invoice from my iPhone using the browser interface
• There is a native iPhone application for me to review my balance, check the activity history, and to send money. But it doesn’t yet let me invoice directly from the iPhone app…yet.
Billing Manager has these advantages:
• Better looking interface for managing billing activity.
• Direct integration with QuickBooks (if I used it, that is)
• They will deposit directly to my account instead of to their own account (as PayPal does). However, I’m not quite sure of how long it takes from credit card entry to deposit. For PayPal, it is nearly instantaneous.
• …I thinking…
So…at this point, PayPal is still winning, but then I’ve just begun my Billing Manager evalation. So I hope to come across more advantages for it over PayPal.
October 6, 2009 at 8:05 am
Do I read this thread correctly in that Intuit has not updated anything about the iPhone interface in 18 months? Two generations of the iPhone and a couple major OS updates have been released, when will Invoice Creation be available?
October 18, 2009 at 8:45 pm
I would love to be able to create an invoice while at my customer’s home. How close are you to developing this?
October 28, 2009 at 3:30 am
Would be nice to add a Windows Mobile App for this site.
November 1, 2009 at 5:35 am
Nice application. The ability to create invoices from the iphone is very important for me. I would love to see that feature added. Are there any plans to do this? If so, when is this expected to be implemented?
Thanks!
December 31, 2009 at 2:07 pm
This sucks. Why can’t i get to the full site on my iphone. No matter what i type in it takes me to the mobile site. If i can’t create an invoice from my iphone, then the app is useless. Just shut down the mobile site and then we can get down to business.
January 1, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Need to create invoice from mobile browser or Android App.
January 4, 2010 at 9:28 am
Please release billing manager Iphone App and also let us create invoices on the iphone.
January 7, 2010 at 7:50 am
Any plans as blackberry app?
January 9, 2010 at 7:41 am
This iPhone porting has been released in 2008 and there still is no way to create an invoice from the iPhone???? is this iPhone part of billingmanager still being developed at all?? it seems like it’s a forgotten and dorment project.. I was wondering if there ever will be an iphone app or a way to create invoices on the iphone… it’s a bummer!
January 26, 2010 at 7:45 am
Come on Intuit! You guys have always been great for my Business! Why do you refuse to let me make invoice’s with the Iphone? It’s such a small thing to add and would put this product at the head of the crowd. Everyone posting in these comments has had the same problem, and either you’re ignoring them which just makes us angry or your incapable, Which is sad. I know that technically this is a “Free” service, but I pay for your software, I pay for Merchant Service. I think it’s only fair that we the people get what we want. Or at the very least explain yourselves, don’t just ignore us.
February 9, 2010 at 8:40 pm
Looks like you need to use Intuits quickbooks online service to create invoices from your iphone.
http://intuitlabs.com/experiments/qboe-on-iphone
I think Billing Manager’s days are numbered.
February 10, 2010 at 5:47 am
Are there plans to get a Windows Mobile phone application out? Using this through the web browser is extremely slow, and would be nice to have an app to apply new invoices to. Makeing things simplier for all.
June 9, 2010 at 2:17 am
mobileinvoice.com
Quickbooks invoicing on your Windows smartphone.
March 31, 2010 at 8:04 pm
I love the fact that I can use this with my Iphone, however, would be soo much better if I could also create estimates and invoices while mobile, in order to do this I would also have to bring the laptop. Only downside so far
April 21, 2010 at 12:45 am
Please cancel this account…
Did not have the time to look into it.
Hope in the future to get back to you.
Right now Please cancel.
May 6, 2010 at 4:44 pm
Another stupid bug with billing manager. Try logging in with a iPad and it takes you to the iPhone log in and same limitations, how stupid. I’m on the iPad not the iPhone thank you very much.
May 12, 2010 at 8:04 pm
I need to be able to create, edit and send invoices from my iPhone also. I have just switched to this service from Fresh Books as I needed a free service that didn’t limit the amount of clients I have. I would like to see an iPhone app available (similar to Fresh Books ‘mini books’ app) to manage all of my invoicing through – including create, edit, send, etc. Cheers, Kate.
May 14, 2010 at 11:31 am
Can billing manager be optimised for blackberry?
June 22, 2010 at 7:07 am
I need to send invoices from my phone. this website is great to see what people have due and mark payments but thats it.
June 22, 2010 at 7:25 am
Call me, I have the software to create invoices on a smartphone.
619 746 8036
Dana Smith
July 20, 2010 at 11:25 pm
Obviously the need to create invoices on the iphone is an essential component, but payment options need to be more flexible too. I don’t think its reasonable to limit it to quickbook merchant account holders (although I am one). I see that these requests for invoice creation have been piling up for the last 16 months – can you indicate if and when it might happen please.
August 2, 2010 at 11:11 pm
hi
Single parents with small kids: how are you able to maintain your job, your health and your kids all at once?
August 4, 2010 at 6:05 am
What is the latest news for an Android App???