Franchisee accounts are usually straightforward and we also have to consider the capabilities of the franchisee too. 

Sage and Quickbooks are two accounting packages which are used commonly within small businesses, however these are overly complex for many franchisees and more importantly for you suffer from the same drawbacks we saw with Goldmine and ACT! when considering lead management.

These are that the franchisee has full control of the financial data and you have very limited visibility of it. The data is also at risk – is the franchisee backing up correctly, or if they go – will they take the data with them.

Again a single hosted finance system is what you’re looking for. All the data is managed centrally so you can ensure it’s secure and each franchisee only has access to their own financial information.

To make things easier for the franchisees wouldn’t it be nice if when quotes are accepted and invoices are raised, the quotes we raised in the CRM system are converted into invoices in the Accounts. It’s this sort of integration which turns a bunch of separate applications into a Franchise Management System.

But because it is in a single system, you have full visibility of every franchise and obtain proper Management Information when you need it – not when the franchisee decides to send it in (if they do of course).

Because you now have access to that information, the system can help manage the commission due to you, calculating what’s due when you want it. We handle all common finance modules used within franchising:

• Independent - Where franchisees raise their own invoices and perform their own credit control. MSF is reported back to Head Office for each reporting period
• Centralised Collection - where franchisees raise their own invoice, but all customer receipts are collected at Head Office, reconciled and returned to the franchisee after any deductions (with all appropriate contra invoices being automatically raised).
• Centralised Invoicing - where Head Office raise invoices and collect on behalf of their franchisees.

Only Webchise finances has been specifically designed for the franchise market. Webchise automates all the transactions between franchisor and franchisee automatically calculating who owes what to whom and creating the appropriate invoices at the end of each period - which of course drop straight into the franchisees' ledgers so they have even less to do to keep their books up to date.

Features include:

• Capture Expenditure and Deposits
• Customer and Supplier Invoices
• Bank Reconciliation
• P&L
• VAT Returns
• CIS (if required)
• FInancial Reports
• Fully integrated into Webchise CRM, eCommerce and Mobile modules
• Commission Management
• Deduction Management and Franchisee Self Billing
• Handles all common Franchise finance models