Software for pdf quotes and receipts

[dougie212]

Hi there

I currently run a furniture restoration business from home. I generate quotes and receipts by a design I made on adobe illustrator and print them off to handwrite as and when I need them. This was on my old laptop.

I have now purchased a mac and am looking at getting more efficient so would like to have my quotes and receipts available on the mac so I can just type in the necessary fields and print it out.

Does anyone know if there is a program I can use my current pdf documents in to do this or do I need to completely redesign them? Alternatively is there an app or program anyone can recommend where the sheets are made automatically? I have been told of business apps, but I am only in my 2nd year and although looking to push, would like to keep costs down with buying programs etc.

Many thanks

Cary - That Vintage Feeling

 

[Maxwell83]

I simply use mail merge to extract data from my spreadsheet (which I use as a database of all client/case details) and put into a pre-written word document (which already has my company logo etc in it). Then just "save as" PDF. Voilà - PDF everything!

 

[dougie212]

Thanks for your response Maxwell.. is mail merge a program?

 

[Maxwell83]

no, its just a function within Word that allows you to pull data from a spreadsheet into a word document.

Say for example you have a spreadhseet with 10 clients' addresses in it, you can write a letter in Word and use mail merge to get the addresses from your spreadsheet. It will create 10 letters - 1 for every different client. Or you can tell it to just produce the letter for the 6th client in the spreadsheet if you like.

It save me lots of time when it comes to issuing standard documents like invoices and letters.

 

[dougie212]

ahh right.. sorry... Told you i was a beginner.
I don't have word on my mac as I was told there are alternatives already on the mac so I shall see if I can find it.

 

[tobinharris]

FreshBooks gets good reviews, and I've received professional invoices from it. $20 a month might be more than you wanted to pay?

 

[Chris Fickling Design]

Use google docs (now called Drive). Access from anywhere (browser based) and download your docs as PDFs. Very simple and straightforward way of doing things - just keep master files for your templates and don't overwrite them. There's no functionality for calculating VAY etc but by the sounds of it you don't want that anyway.

 

[jf-financial]

I was going to suggest Excel but Google Docs as per above is a good idea if you don't already have excel

Maybe have one sheet for your inputs (i.e. price, description of work, client name, date, quote number etc) and then on another sheet make that your template quote document that looks pretty and updates with the data from the input sheet. Then download as PDF and save for your files as well

 

[Office Cleaning]

Hi we use echo-sign by adobe it does what you need but also allows for e-signatures, I find it straight forward to use. It keeps all the documents in one place, sends reminders for those who haven’t signed up, is easy to create/send quotes/pdfs via email etc. The google doc/drive is good alternative though if you don’t require e-signatures and costs nowt if you use gmail.

 

[The Byre]

I have now purchased a mac and am looking at getting more efficient so would like to have my quotes and receipts available on the mac so I can just type in the necessary fields and print it out.

If that is all you want to do, I would get on ebay and buy an old copy of Page Maker 6.5.

Alternatively, as you have used Illustrator, you can register as a user with Adobe for nothing and download anything and everything in CS2 for free and use InDesign - which is Page Maker on steroids.

 

[Synology Hosting]

Google Docs is good...but Google has access to the documents and can use them look in there terms of service to find out more

 

[DarrenMcCabe]

Xero + Quotient. Very cheap, cloud based, you create a quote and can either send them a PDF copy or email them a direct link to the quote. They can then review and click ACCEPT. When they click ACCEPT it turns it in to an invoice in XERO, you review it and send it out.

Very simple to use, customise and manage.

 

[Small Biz Geek]

no, its just a function within Word that allows you to pull data from a spreadsheet into a word document.

Say for example you have a spreadhseet with 10 clients' addresses in it, you can write a letter in Word and use mail merge to get the addresses from your spreadsheet. It will create 10 letters - 1 for every different client. Or you can tell it to just produce the letter for the 6th client in the spreadsheet if you like.

It save me lots of time when it comes to issuing standard documents like invoices and letters.

That sounds excellent. I love learning tips like that and by now I really ought to have found a more streamlined approach to my MS Word invoice templates. At present I'm manually copying and pasting names and addresses into a variety of Word documents that use formatted tables.

I'd like to work with people like you on my small business blog. A guest post or video explaining office/publishing techniques like that are the kind of content I'm interested in.