Setting up an office

hec, i am company and have all that in the truck. If you have an all in one printer, you can print sign and scan back in, no faxing necessary. I do it with trip pac.

 

I have a all-in-one laser for the office and an all-in-one inkjet for the truck. Computer, 4-drawer filing cabinet and that's it. What more do you need? I suppose you could also consider the SD memory card and external hard drive for data storage and protection too. All of $30 for those two.

 

As the above said a good copier/scanner/printer all in one deal works pretty good. Mine is an HP that was $225 a few years ago at Best Buy. Get an E-fax for $12 month ( I use Metrofax ) that way you are just scanning / emailing it to a fax number and when brokers / drivers / shippers fax you it comes straight to an email address and on your phone assuming you have a smartphone. This way it is all on a pdf and can be saved to your hard drive. KEEP A COPY OF ALL BOL's / RATE CONS / PROOF OF DELIVERY

As for another small list:

Paper ( lots of it, if this is your first year you are going to spend a ton of time getting "set up" with brokers and that means 12 page packets to go through ) One small piece of advice, for contracts and rate cons always just print the pages you need, not the whole thing. Do try and save the whole packet on your hard drive though for information purposes.

Envelopes - occasionally a broker will want the "originals" which is really just another stall tactic to delay payment but they are the customer.
Accounting Software - get a bookkeeper or learn Quickbooks or just some basic method to track it all until then.
Return address stamp - it will save time when you do use envelopes and it is inexpensive at the copy / graphics shop
File folders - you are going to have more paperwork than you know what to do with very soon.

I am sure others will chime in w/ further suggestions. Best of luck out there and stay safe!

 

A lot of what has already been said.

Computer
All in on printer - if you are doing a lot of scanning to brokers make sure it has the features you want. The HP i have has a horrible scanning program but luckily I don't have to use it much. The business I worked for before had a much nicer copier with a better/faster scanning. It was a canon not that I am making a recommendation one way or the other. I just regret not spending an extra $100 bucks on a higher grade all in one
Accounting software - I use quickbooks but there are many options out there.
Cheques - I prefer computer cheques as they can be directly printed from your accounting program
Envelopes and stamps for when needed.
Extra paper and ink cartridge - especially for when you first buy the printer as the ones they give you in the box are only half full
Files - you will need to set up your files for your maintenance files, driver file, revenue files, bank reconcilliations, payments, petty cash, log books. I like the ones that have the clips in the top so you can keep everything in order. You can buy them pre-done or make them yourself. You will need a two hole punch

The biggest thing I would suggest doing is investing some money in yourself to make yourself a better business owner. Look into enrolling in some correspondence courses or classes at the community college to give you a base understanding of accounting and accounting software. It is something that you can easily do yourself and no need to pay a bookkeeper to log your revenue and expenses. The added benefit is you also will have a better grasp on what your business is doing which will help you be successful. You don't need to be a CPA but not understanding the numbers behind your business is where most people tend to fail.

 

The accounting and business background of my Industrial Management degree makes it a LOT easier for me to work with my CPA.

I can create my balance sheets/profit and lost statements and statements of cash flow in about 5 minutes using Quicken.

It makes his job that much easier and allows me to have a much cheaper tax prep bill every year.

Additionally, I can forecast out when and what expenses can be paid before they ever become an issue. Including setting up escrow accounts for IRP, IFTA, 2290, Estimated Self-employment tax payments etc.

I have probably spent more time in the accounting program than anything in this business. When I leave to go on the road for 2-3 weeks, I know what I need to do and when I come home, it's accomplished and if I do it earlier, I get more home time as a reward.

http://www.thetruckersreport.com/tr...-trucking-software-for-o-o-2.html#post3312529

 

metrofax.com is very handy. 500 pages per month for $6 to $8 i forget..... plenty of other similar sites out there so you dont need a fax machine or extra phone line.