One of the basic features within Freshbooks that is very valuable is that it allows you to invoice a client online and then have the client click on a link and pay right there. No need for the business owner to process a credit payment or wait for a check in the mail. They have numerous secure ways for clients to pay including Verisign, Paypal, Authorize.net and others. Time tracking is simple to use within Freshbooks. You can monitor not only your staff’s time but also any sub-contractors that are working with you on a specific project. Speaking of sub-contractors, they can bill you for their work through Freshbooks and you can seamlessly bill the client all in one simple sequence. All of these invoices stay in one place which continues the theme of organization that Freshbooks provides. Also, it is important to note you can keep sensitive client information and mark-up rates hidden from contractors.

One additional new feature added in December of 2009 is full integration with MerchantOS. This is very valuable for retail business owners as they strive to have accurate inventory ready to quickly handle any special orders, layaways, large bulk orders and more. This new partnership helps alleviate one of Freshbooks main weaknesses which was lack of any inventory management integration. Another feature that has been recently added is the ability for Freshbooks to integrate with numerous CRM services such as the popular Salesforce platform and others.

There is a detailed price sheet which offers great value for the business owner just starting (three clients), to a booming business (5,000 clients) and everything in between. For the mobile workers, there is an iPhone app as well. Freshbooks works with the Blackberry platform with the ReportAway app and a TimeDroid (which tracks time via Freshbooks) app as well. A full fledged Android app is supposed to be released soon.  Take a look at this video interview of two customers of Freshbooks and hear their story: