The market is awash with online invoicing and billing software, but not all programs are created alike. We’re here to help you decide which software is right for your business’s needs.
Today, we’re reviewing the pros and cons of Elorus. With an emphasis on small- and medium-sized businesses and freelancers, Elorus has created a simple-to-use invoicing software that automates your business practices, saving you precious time you need for other tasks while making you look more professional.
Elorus is a tech startup company based in Athens, Greece, and has quickly become popular in Europe and the United States. Although it is a relative new-comer to the game, Elorus has learned from other companies’ mistakes and has truly thought of everything. Elorus is particularly prevalent among graphic designers, programmers, photographers, law firms, hotels, caterers, doctors’ offices, construction companies, real estate agents, auto repair shops, and other service-based industries.
Elorus Features
Table of Contents
Invoicing, Billing & Reports
- Unlimited Invoicing: While most software charges per invoice (or per invoice over a certain monthly threshold), Elorus uses a different model. You pay per client invoiced, allowing you to send far more invoices per month for the same price.
- Free Automated Recurring Invoicing: Most invoicing programs require an extra fee per month to perform automated recurring invoices—but not Elorus. You can set up auto-invoicing for free, leaving you with more time to dedicate to other parts of your business.
- Collects Payments: Elorus is not just an invoicing software—it’s also a payment collector. It currently works with PayPal, BrainTree, Authorize.net, VivaWallet, and other third party online payment processors. It also allows you to record cash or check transactions to keep your reports accurate and balanced.
- Your Personal Debt Collector: Elorus follows the due dates you input on your invoices and notifies you and your client when a bill is past due.
- Easily Convert Quotes & Estimates into Invoices: With one click, you can turn a work estimate into an invoice, saving you time and hassle over other programs.
- Tracks Revenue, Expenses, & Cash Flow: Elorus monitors your incoming and outgoing transactions and will produce reports to help you better understand the financial state of your business.
Convenience
- Inventory Tracking: Though Elorus is not yet optimized for retailers, it does offer some inventory tracking that is necessary for many small businesses. Simply import your inventory, and Elorus will update your inventory based on your sent invoices.
- Recurring Expenses: While Elorus cannot place your orders for you, you can program it to account for regular expenses you incur.
- Payment Reminder: You can set expense reminders through Elorus so you never miss a payment deadline again.
- Automatic Currency Conversion: If you work with clients in other countries, you’ll be thrilled with Elorus’s currency conversion. You’ll see clearly how much you are billing and how much you are receiving in your own currency and theirs.
- Mobile-Friendly Design: Elorus was built from the ground up for mobile use. Its cloud-based software can be accessed from your desktop browser or from your smartphone or tablet device.
Other Features
- 8 Languages: Elorus supports 8 languages, including English, Spanish, French, German, Greek, Italian, and Bulgarian.
- Theme Designs: You can create a colorful template for all of your documents, making your invoices look personalized and professional. Customize your font, logo, color theme, and more.
- Customized Documents & Numbering: You’re not tied down to a particular invoice format with Elorus. They’ve made it simple to customize the layout and details of your invoice, right down to your own numbering system. You can even include your own custom policies and terms & conditions.
Elorus Pricing Packages
Elorus offers seven pricing packages—three monthly billed, three annually billed, and one free package. Unlike many competitors, Elorus does not charge per invoice but instead charges one simple flat flee for plans with unlimited invoicing. The restriction is instead on how many unique clients you wish to process per month.
To choose the right pricing package, you must choose how many clients and suppliers you wish to work with per month. Elorus caps this per month but allows unlimited numbers of different clients and suppliers. With the free plan, for example, you can work with three clients per month, but this could be a different set of three each month for a total of 36 different clients per year.
Next, you simply choose the number of users you’d like to have restricted log-in access.
For three clients or less with one user account, you’ll pay nothing at all. One of the greatest benefits of this plan is that it’s not a “free trial.” You can use this free plan forever if it fits your needs. If you need to bill more than three clients per month, you’ll want to start looking at the priced packages.
The Good About Elorus
Time-Saving Automation
Elorus excels as a time-saving software program, and business owners know that time is money. The free recurring invoices are particularly helpful and can save many hours per month of manual input. However, we are most impressed with the “debt collector” feature. Having Elorus track your invoice due dates and send follow-up reminders to clients saves a tremendous amount of time, hassle, and headache. We found it even looks more professional having the software give a little nudge rather than you having to send a potentially off-putting e-mail or, worse yet, make that awkward “Time to pay up” phone call.
Great Reporting System
Despite branding itself as an invoicing software, Elorus excels at providing a more comprehensive overview of your financial status. Its generated reports visually and numerically depict your revenue, expenses, and cash flow. These can be helpful for business owners as well as their accountants, who can log in under restricted user authority.
Excellent for International Businesses
Service-based industries commonly work with clients and suppliers in other countries. That’s why it’s important to have an invoicing system that can simply and easily convert currency and translate languages. Elorus allows you to assign a language and currency to each client to make invoices easier to generate. The software also monitors real-time exchange rates and can process payments in foreign currencies.
Client-Friendly
The dedicated client log-in is superb. Instead of simply sending a document over e-mail, Elorus allows you also to provide a log-in for a browser-based app that lets clients see current invoices as well as past transaction history. Not only is this helpful for the client, but it comes off more professional than attaching a document to an e-mail. Clients also love being able to view and pay their bill online right away rather than having to arrange a payment method over e-mail or phone.
Team-Friendly
The ability to create role profiles enables business owners and freelancers to easily add an accountant to their Elorus plan. Having a professional on-hand to look over the data ensures you are maximizing your business’s potential.
The Bad About Elorus
Not Great for Retail…Yet
In its current iteration, Elorus works best for service-based industries and not retail. Retailers and their suppliers tend to need a more robust system to track inventory and orders. Elorus says they are working on a future upgrade that will better serve retailers.
Limited Scope
Elorus is missing a few features that you may find in other paid software. It focuses on invoicing and payment processing, which it does very well, but it does not include other useful business features, like time tracking (for billable hours) and project management. However, programs that include those extra perks cost more, while the additional features can be easily performed with other free apps.
Our Verdict On Elorus
For the price, it’s very hard to beat Elorus. Its straightforward, flat-rate programs and monthly rolling counts of clients mean no surprise fees.
Some consumers might balk at having to pay for invoicing software when other competitors are completely free. However, most of these free programs don’t offer the same features that Elorus designed to save you time and money. In the end, you truly get what you pay for.
For instance, some free software programs let you draft an invoice that you then attach via e-mail, but they don’t accept payments for you or remind clients that they’re overdue—that’s just another job for you to do. They also won’t provide analysis reports of expenses and revenue, provide a client log-in, or allow you to customize your invoice for a more professional look.
With its free package, it’s certainly worth trying Elorus. Simply start with three clients per month using this new system and get a real-time comparison of its functionality compared to your current invoicing method. You’ll soon find whether or not it works better for your business than your current software.
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