Cashboard Info - News

Updated Liquid Template filters

2010-03-04T04:00:00Z

Most of you won’t care about this change, but a select few power users will find this extremely useful.

We’ve lagged behind the official Liquid Template Syntax release version a bit, so we took the time today to update our version.

What this means is that Cashboard now supports many new Liquid Template filters, such as ‘plus’, ‘minus’, and a whole host of other math operations.

We’ve also updated our Liquid Variable Reference, as we’ve renamed the ‘id’ variable to ‘number’ for invoices, estimates, and payments. No need to update your existing templates – we’ve already done that for you.

More reliable delivery for client emails

2010-02-23T08:50:00Z

As you know, Cashboard is a great way to send email notifications of invoices, estimates, and payments to your clients. Thousands of emails get sent on a daily basis without incident from Cashboard.

Unfortunately, a small minority of our customers had been complaining of undeliverable emails because of restrictive SPF settings.

Because of this we made a small change over the weekend to the way emails are now sent to your clients.

Previously emails have been “spoofed” or “forged” from your account owner’s email address. This means we would send the email as you, directly to your clients. Some mail servers look down upon this practice and reject the email from ever being delivered.

In an attempt to make our service more reliable we’re now sending the emails from Cashboard Support, with your account owner’s email address in the “reply-to” field. This enables your customers to still reply to the email in question and directly connect with you, while providing a more reliable method of email delivery.

We understand this might not be a great solution for those of you who are looking for a “white label” solution where your customers never know about Cashboard and we are keeping that in mind while moving forward with the application and our feature set.

If you have any questions on the subject please let us know in the comments below, or feel free to contact support.

PDF files for invoice schedules and reminders

2010-02-13T19:32:00Z

Last night we launched what must be the most requested checkbox in Cashboard history.

Many of you have been asking for a way to attach PDF files from your invoice schedule emails that get sent automatically.

That day has finally come.

Those of you paying close attention will also notice that we’ve enabled the auto-attach PDF feature for your invoice reminder emails as well.

Numbering system / Assigned IDs

2010-01-28T19:51:00Z

Cashboard allows you to have your own numbering scheme for Invoices, Estimates, and Payments. We’ve tried to make the numbering scheme as configurable and flexible as possible.

The system will default with a six digit number for all of these items (000000), but you can easily change the number / id when creating an item.

For instance… If you enter “020” as your first invoice ID, the next one you create will be numbered as “021”.

From that point on the system will try to reproduce your numbering scheme when creating new items.

Prefixes

Letters “A-Z” and the characters ”_” and ”-” are recognized as prefix separators.

Let’s say you enter an Invoice ID as “ABC001”. The next invoice that gets created will default to having an ID of “ABC002”, the following one “ABC003”, and so on.

Other possible prefixes:

2009_001
COMPANY-001
ABC001

Smart sorting

Some customers of ours have to reset their invoice numbers each year. Cashboard can handle this as well.

Let’s say you’re using the scheme “2009_001” for all invoices created in 2009. When 2010 rolls around, manually enter “2010_001” for your next created invoice. All invoices created after that point will use the “2010_00X” numbering scheme.

Rounding for time entries

2009-12-24T05:43:00Z

Another highly requested feature has been the ability to round time entries up to a specified number of minutes.

We felt this tied in well with our latest timer update and snuck it in as an additional Christmas present for you all.

You can round time entries to the nearest minute, 5, 10, 15, or 30 minutes. All time entries are affected, including ones entered from the web site, or via our timer widgets.

To access the preference, visit your Settings > Preferences / Integration tab.

More robust timers

2009-12-22T10:28:00Z

Lots of people love using our dashboard widgets to accurately track time in a stopwatch like fashion, but the majority of our customers track time within Cashboard itself.

The old method inside Cashboard required you to leave your browser open while timers ran for your entries. That’s fine for people that work on the web all day long, but it can be a hassle. What’s even worse is that if your browser crashed, or you accidentally closed your Cashboard window you’d lose the time you hadn’t saved.

Server-side timers

Today we will be launching our newest feature, server-side timers. You’re no longer chained to your browser if you want to track time on the clock.

Start a timer by creating an entry with no hours, or click the clock button on an existing entry.

Come back when your work is done and you’ll find the timer still running. Simple, but effective. This is also great for those of you that work on multiple tasks throughout the day and need to jump back-and-forth between them.

To toggle a timer off, just click the clock again.

I’ve also put together a small video demoing the feature if you’d like to check it out.

Widget / mobile server-side timers

We haven’t made this feature available to our widgets and any mobile devices just yet, but that will change with the highly anticipated launch of our API.

Merry Christmas!

^ SB

Tracking Expenses

2009-12-06T03:47:00Z

Not only does Cashboard track your incoming money with invoices and payments, it can now track your outgoing expenses.

Using Cashboard’s expense tracking features, you can re-bill expenses to your clients, track payroll, and keep an eye on the financial health of your business.

Billing for expenses

Record expenses using the Expenses tab, then select the Project they belong to. Selecting the Billable checkbox will allow you to import the expenses next time you invoice your client.

You can even markup those costs by using our new Markup % box at the time of invoicing. Cashboard tracks this profit and can report it back to you later.

Employee tracking

Your employees also have the ability to record expenses just as they record time entries. All employee expenses are marked non-billable by default, allowing you a chance to approve them by using the Billable checkbox.

Employees must be assigned to a project in order to record expenses for that project.

Reporting

Payroll

Tracking payroll has never been more simple. We’ve introduced a brand new set of tools that show you how much you owe your employees and help you automatically record their payments.

Profit / Loss Report

Recording your expenses in Cashboard allows the system to generate accurate Profit / Loss reports with one click of the mouse.

You can easily report on income based on Invoices sent, or Payments collected. All numbers shown on the report can be clicked to “zoom in” and see any expenses within the system.

If you need to share this information you can export the report to a Microsoft Excel compatible CSV file.

Simple and accurate Payroll tracking

2009-12-06T02:18:00Z

We’ve removed our previous Cash Stats report in favor of a much more flexible Payroll Report.

Using this tool you can report on employee costs for time entries during any date range. The Payroll Report works by pulling time entries and multiplying them by each employee’s pay rate on a per-project basis.

You set an employee’s pay rate when assigning them to a project. This can be done by editing the employee under our Contacts tab, or by editing the project itself.

Reconciling Payroll

We’ve also enabled you to accurately track expenses on a per-project basis with our Reconcile Payroll tool. Using this, you can automatically create expense entries to balance total owed and total paid per-employee for the date range selected.

One non-billable expense will be created for each project that has time tracked against it. Doing so allows you to track profitability on a per-project basis by using our Project Cost vs Profit report.

Markup and Discount percent

2009-12-05T03:43:00Z

Markup

In the spirit of tracking expenses and giving you a more accurate way to track your profits we’ve introduced a Markup % field for Invoice and Estimate line items.

The markup field affects any price per and flat fee you’ve entered. The original prices are only shown to you, and the “marked up” prices are shown to your clients.

Markup for Estimates

Using markup on estimates allows you to specify an estimated profit margin. If you take that estimate, transform it into a project, and bill for that project you’ll find our new Project Cost vs Profit report handy.

This report will automatically calculate your ‘job costs’ and profits based on various factors, including amounts invoiced, expensed, and markup %.

Markup for Invoices

If you’d like to invoice for products you have on hand without going through the hassle of keeping an inventory, using markup % on invoices will be extremely beneficial for you.

Simply enter what items cost in the price per field, then use a markup on those items. Cashboard will automatically track the profit you’re making.

By using our Invoice Cost vs Profit report, you’ll be able to see what types of invoices are most profitable for you.

Discount

Many customers have also requested the ability to provide discounts to their customers on estimates and invoices.

In the past we’ve recommended adding a line item, then using a negative amount in the flat fee box to give a discount. This option is still available but we’ve also provided a much more simple alternative.

Simply enter a percentage you’d like to give as a discount on the estimate or invoice. Cashboard will automatically calculate this discount and provide it to your customers.

Invoice / Estimate redesign

2009-12-04T17:38:00Z

We’ve totally redesigned the way you manage invoice and estimate documents.

This redesign has one goal – to simplify your workflow. It comes from many hours of usability testing we’ve conducted and is a major upgrade from what we had in place.

From the get go, what you see is what you get. When viewing an invoice or estimate, you see what your clients see. If you’ve modified our custom document templates, you’ll see your invoice as it was intended right on the page.

Editing is only one click away – with no page refresh. Adding and editing items will automatically calculate new totals right in your browser. Adding items happens all inside the page, and feedback from saving is immediate.

We’ve also extended this edit-in-place workflow to project tasks, expenses, and time entries.

Importing Time & Expenses

When you’re creating or editing an invoice, Cashboard lets you import any outstanding time entries or expenses you have pending.

You can import items from multiple projects at once, and quickly choose a date range you’d like to pull from.

We’ve eliminated any needless pop-up windows and extra steps necessary to import your billable items onto an invoice.

Improved Basecamp Sync

2009-12-04T09:17:00Z

Today I’d like to highlight our much improved Basecamp Sync.

We originally wrote the Basecamp integration with the launch of Cashboard. The API they provided back then didn’t allow us to do some things, such as importing and exporting time entries during a project sync.

To get around this, we’ve allowed you to directly import time entries to an invoice, and sync tasks on a project. This has caused many customers mass confusion and admittedly was a pretty hackish solution. Customers believed that you should be able to sync tasks and time while running a project sync. They were right.

In the next release of Cashboard we’ve made this dead simple. If you import a project from Basecamp, the sync window will automatically open for you. Syncing has the ability to pull and push tasks and time entries to/from Basecamp. Simple, easy.

Importing time entries from Basecamp for people that don’t exist in Cashboard will automatically create them an account. A welcome email will not be sent for people created in this manner (but you can send one later).

Exporting time entries for people that don’t exist in Basecamp will assign those entries to the account you’re using for API access – as the Basecamp API does not support creation of people inside Basecamp.

Synchronizing data will update Cashboard or Basecamp with the most current data for tasks and time entries you’ve previously imported and exported.

Send snail mail invoices with PostalMethods

2009-08-14T15:21:00Z

PostalMethods has a wonderful writeup on how to send postal mail invoices from Cashboard today.

We still plan to offer a deeper integration in the future, but this is excellent news for the time being. I’d love to hear from anyone using this solution to hear how it’s working for you.

Click here for full instructions from PostalMethods

Interface refinement

2009-07-16T08:18:00Z

You might have noticed something a little (or a lot) different with Cashboard when you logged in this morning.

We’ve been busy designing new features and decided to release some of the improvements now instead of waiting.

These latest improvements have everything to do with reducing the clutter, visual noise, and weight of the Cashboard interface.

Home

The old interface had extremely LARGE fonts, which were a bit…loud. We’ve reduced the fonts to let the interface breathe with some needed whitespace. Sorry for yelling. We’ll keep our voice lower from now on.

Header size has also been dramatically reduced, ~~and we’ve eliminated display of logos within the header~~. Your logo will now show on the Cashboard login page and inside the app on the header.

The next step to reducing clutter and confusion was to eliminate all sidebar buttons. We’ve made creating items and searching much more clear by moving those menus and highlighting them with images.

Project Tasks

Again, you’ll notice the lack of sidebar buttons here. We’ve moved those functions in-line with the project into a toolbar.

Overly wordy help text has been axed, along with displaying edit/delete/time logging icons for each task. You’ll now only see those icons when placing your mouse over a task row.

Creating Projects

Wordy help text only added to the clutter and confusion of this screen.

That text has been moved into minimal tooltips. The help is there when you need it, and doesn’t distract you when you already know what you’re doing.

Invoice Worksheet

Invoice buttons have gotten the same treatment as the rest of the application. The Invoice Details section is also much more intuitive to use.

We’ve eliminated the pop-up window editing in favor of direct manipulation of those options right on the screen.

When viewing any invoice, partial important details are hidden. The rest are just a click away.

Odds and ends

You’ll notice some other minor things, including two brand new color schemes which many of you should enjoy. We’ve touched many parts of the application with this update, but we’ll continue to reduce and refine as we go.

Cashboard isn’t perfect, but we’re working towards that goal. As always, comments and feedback are welcome.

Thanks again for being a customer.

Downtime this morning

2009-07-01T17:31:00Z

As many of you know, Cashboard was down for about an hour and a half this morning.

We’re extremely sorry for any issues this caused you. We were having some hardware problems that were getting worked through and in the rush it slipped my mind to update our twitter feed with news about the event.

If this has caused you any loss of productivity please email support and we’ll get you sorted out.

- Seth

Reusable items for Invoices, Estimates, and Projects

2009-06-22T06:59:00Z

Many of you work on the same types of projects repeatedly and have been asking for a slick way to reuse or copy items from a “standard list”. Some of our competition offers this ability, but we were never quite satisfied with the way we’ve seen it implemented.

The usual solution is to offer you a place where you can “manage” these items, then you have to go through some sort of special step to include them in your project (or invoice). To us this seems like a hacked solution based on flawed interface design principles.

We’ve taken a different approach to the problem, which we believe is much more elegant than anything else out there.

Starting today, any line item you’ve created on any Invoice is available to be re-used simply by typing its name into the title field when creating a new item. All relevant attributes will be inserted into your form after selection of an existing item. This allows you to modify different properties if you feel the need.

There is no “management” of reusable items. All items you’ve created in the past are available to be reused. We’ve also added this feature with our Estimates and Projects, so you should experience the same workflow improvements there as well.

Keyboard Input

Finally, we took the time to optimize all of the new item forms for quick keyboard entry. Once you start creating items you should be able to use your keyboard to fill out your Invoices, Estimates, or Projects without touching a mouse. Quickly tab through the fields, hit enter to add a new item. Once your new item is inserted your cursor will return to the “title” field so you can add another item.

Simple, effective, elegant – we think you’ll agree.