Although often dismissed as old-school and out-of-touch, successful florists understand that offering their customers house or charge accounts, the ability to charge now and pay later, is a great way to build customer loyalty and win over lucrative corporate accounts.
The funny thing is that some of the same floral industry gurus that tell florists to ditch house accounts are often the most aggressive about handing them out. They want to keep this secret weapon for themselves.
The problem is that dealing with and accounting for AR (accounts receivable) can be time consuming and frustrating. Collecting receivables can be slow and difficult, crippling cash flow. Most floral POS systems are so bad at dealing with receivables that the florist ends up walking away from this secret weapon.
The ability to send what they want, statements and/or invoices, when they want (according to their billing cycles) is what let me win over big accounts like high end hotelr and luxury automobile dealerships. The ability to do it quickly and easily is what gives me the time to go and sign more accounts like that. Lisa P, Lilium.
You may not want to read about all of the features below and that is OK. All you need to know is that when you go out there, determined to land serious accounts and satisfy demanding payables departments… FloristWare has you covered. We give you the tools you need to make charge accounts your secret weapon, and your shop the one big accounts want to work with.
Detailed Easy-To-Understand Invoices Reduce Billing Questions and Statements Get You Paid Faster
When the customer promptly receives a detailed invoice (or statement) they have no doubt what it’s for: “Oh, yeah, those flowers are in our reception area right now”. They pay it quickly.
When invoices lack detail the customer is more likely to be confused: “What’s this for? Not ringing any bells… I’ll put it aside and ask them when they call me looking for money”. Late invoices can face the same fate, or worse: “Great… a bill for something we threw away weeks ago… we’ll deal with that later.”
FloristWare statements are, without any work from you, richly detailed. The customer is left with no doubt, no reason to call and ask for clarification, no reason to delay payment.
And, although you can choose to send statements and/or invoices at a specific time, like the end of each month, FloristWare is ready to go as soon as the order is entered.
Attractive, Customized Invoices and Statements Reinforce Your Brand, Authority And Ability to Charge
Like all customer-facing documents generated by FloristWare you get an unprecedented degree of control over the look, feel and formatting of your invoices and statements.
The best retailers and most successful flower shops realize that these documents send a powerful message about their brand and credibility. Sure - you know you are the best shop in town-but do your invoices and statements convey that?
FloristWare allows you to use the fonts, style and formatting of your statements and invoices to remind everyone that you are the best at what you do.
Easy Accounting Reduces Headaches While Increasing Cash Flow
Florists that have offered charge accounts before know the problem. The customer gets a statement and is confused. They call you for clarification.
Knowing the nightmare that awaits you trying to first understand it yourself and then explain it to the customer… you put it aside. You end up waiting for your money, and the customer ends up looking for a florist that sends statements they can understand.
FloristWare makes these headaches go away. Even if their payments never actually match the invoices, you can quickly and easily show a customer how much of each payment was applied to each charge.
No more dreading these questions. Instead you’ll tackle them quickly and easily. The customer will be more confident and pay you faster.
Controls Reduce Risk And Bad Debt
One downside to giving your customers charge account privileges is that you can get stuck waiting for payments. FloristWare helps lessen the risk by letting you set (and helping you police) credit limits and account statuses.
FloristWare also gives you powerful AR tools to monitor and collect your receivables.
Powerful Options For Late Payment Fees & Interest Penalties Encourage Prompt Payment
FloristWare lets you to attach both Late Fees and/or Interest Charges. Late fees are applied once, interest charges are applied each month.
In each case, with Late Fees and Interest Charges, you get to set the following:
Start counting from… (Invoice Date or Statement Date)
Tell FloristWare when the "clock" starts ticking... when the invoice or the statement is generated.
Number of days…
How many days after the event above (invoice or statement) is the penalty applied?
Late fees can take the form of a fixed dollar amount or a percentage of the balance. Interest charges are calculated according to a monthly or yearly percentage rate that you set.
And like so many settings in FloristWare these settings cascade throughout the system. So first you set default terms for your store, and those terms cascade down by default to all new accounts.
But you can also change them at the account level. If for example you have a potential customer that requires slightly different terms you can adjust the late payment penalties for that account only. These revised terms will then cascade down to all sales charged to that account.
And it doesn’t end there. You might have customer that wants to make a special purchase, but asks you for special terms on that sale alone. FloristWare allows florists to adjust the terms for that individual sale but leave the usual terms on for the rest of the sales charged to that customer.
FloristWare Keeps Track Of How Customers Want To Be Invoiced, Keeping Them Loyal
Some customers want an invoice emailed to them immediately. Others want a statement mailed to them at the end of each week. Some want a summary statement with copies of each invoice at the end of each month.
FloristWare keeps track so you don’t have to. This keeps Payables departments on your side. Think about it… would you rather the Accounts Payable contact be glad you respect their way of doing things, or frustrated that you just can’t get it right? Handle your receivables the right way and it’s easer to keep and retain large corporate customers. And they’ll pay you faster.
Fix Mistakes Easily And With Full Transparency
When dealing with receivables, florists often make mistakes. A sale is charged to the wrong account, or a check applied to the wrong sale.
FloristWare makes it easy to correct these mistakes, and does it in a fully transparent way that leaves no doubt that your invoices are accurate. Your customer will be confident in your billing and pay you faster.
Proper Accounting And GL Entries
Everything you do in the accounts receivable section of FloristWare is backed up by the best accounting of any floral POS system, with the correct GL entries that make accounting a snap. Unlike other systems that you have to work around, FloristWare gets it right, saving you time and reducing bookkeeping and accounting expenses.
Three Different Account Types
In most POS systems the customer is the account and the account is the customer. FloristWare is far more powerful than that.
Private
This type of account can only be used by the customer it is attached to. This is the typical “personal” account, for an individual that is buying on their own behalf.
Shared
These accounts can be shared by multiple customers. One example is a real estate office or auto dealership, where multiple salespeople (each an individual customer of yours) changes to the same company account, whose Payables department then gets a single detailed statement (assuming that is what they want).
Password Protected
These are like shared accounts in that they can be used by multiple customers, but requires that the customer making the charge have a password coordinated between you and the payables department.
And in most systems each customer is restricted to one account. FloristWare allows each customer to use multiple accounts. For example one customer might charge their personal orders to a private account, and their business purchases to one or more shared accounts.