Ask a business owner where the admin time goes and the answer is rarely “the VAT return”. It’s the small things in between: re-typing a web shop order as an invoice, photographing a receipt and booking it, finding which invoice a payment belongs to. Each takes a few minutes. Every month, again. This article covers which pieces you can automate, in what order, and what you don’t have to do for it: switch packages.

You don’t have to switch

The first reflex is often: we need a better package. Usually the package isn’t the problem. Exact Online, Moneybird and e-Boekhouden all have an API — an official connection other software can use to put data in and take it out. An integration uses that connection. Your accountant keeps working in the same package; only the re-typing disappears.

Five things you can automate

  1. Web shop orders as invoices. Every order in WooCommerce or Shopify becomes a sales invoice automatically, with the right VAT code and customer. This is almost always the first and the best-paying one.
  2. Matching payments. Payments through Mollie, Stripe or the bank are matched to the right invoice. No more “paid?” lists.
  3. Purchase invoices and receipts. Invoices that arrive by email are read in and set up for booking; you check instead of re-type.
  4. Invoicing hours and projects. Hours from your planning or time tracking become an invoice at the end of the month.
  5. Sending e-invoices. Belgian customers have required e-invoices over Peppol since 2026, and the rest of Europe follows. Your package can then send them over Peppol directly.

In what order?

Start with the task that comes back most often, not the one that annoys you most. Re-typing ten orders a day costs more than one awkward monthly report. The automation ROI calculator shows in a minute what a task costs per year and when automating pays for itself.

Then agree with your accountant how entries should arrive: which ledger account, which VAT code. That half-hour conversation saves corrections at the end of the quarter.

What does it get you?

  • Time: the hours that now go into re-typing come free.
  • Fewer mistakes: an integration doesn’t mistype an amount or forget an invoice.
  • An accountant who finishes sooner: books that add up save their hours too.
  • Current numbers: revenue and receivables are right today, not after the month-end close.

What does it cost?

An integration between one system and your accounting package starts at € 2,950 and usually lands between € 2,950 and € 9,000, depending on the direction and how many kinds of data go through it. A good integration checks its own work: if something doesn’t go through, you get an alert instead of a surprise at the VAT return.

Conclusion

Automating your bookkeeping doesn’t mean switching. It means removing the steps between your systems, starting with the one that comes back most often. See what we do in accounting automation or request a free quote: tell us which package you use and what you do by hand.