Invoicing and taxes are two of the biggest challenges faced by small businesses and freelancers. Because of a general lack of knowledge and resources, many small and medium businesses (SMBs) experience difficulties with tax compliance, cash flow management, and invoicing inconsistencies. As a result, they risk their financial security while creating unnecessary stress.
The launch of QuickBooks Self-Employed (QBSE) from financial software giant Intuit has provided a lifeline for small businesses and freelancers, allowing them to manage invoicing and taxes through intuitive systems more easily.
During his tenure at Intuit, Android engineer Sriram Santosh Aripirala has been a key driver for innovative change, helping to make QBSE a must-have for freelancers and SMBs—all while making invoicing and tax setup easy and accessible for millions of users.
Invoicing Mobile Module
One of the main goals of QuickBooks is to make invoicing simple, giving users an intuitive solution that helps save time and money—particularly for small businesses and freelancers lacking accounting expertise.
However, Aripirala found that QuickBooks' invoicing system was not only outdated but also lacked scalability, leading to reduced engagement and app adoption. This highlighted a clear need to modernize the invoicing system and introduce a reusable, modular invoicing feature that would be compatible across QuickBooks' mobile applications.
To this end, Aripirala and his team created a new invoicing module that was not only scalable but could be used across multiple Intuit apps, including QuickBooks Mobile and QuickBooks Self-Employed. This helped address many of the pain points experienced by users, and it also meant that users could enjoy a seamless experience when switching between different apps or devices.
To achieve this seamless interoperability, Aripirala's team built an Android module using the Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) architecture and innovative tools such as Jetpack View Binding and Navigation, Kotlin Coroutines, and Apollo GraphQL. These tools enhanced UI responsiveness, streamlined navigation, and optimized data gathering, leading to better performance within the app.
Automatic Sales Tax Setup Mobile Module
Sales tax is another key administrative hurdle for SMBs, and while QuickBooks was designed to make this process simpler, its setup has been historically complex—meaning users have had to rely on external resources to ensure compliance with tax law.
The challenge: The platform needed a reusable, in-app sales tax setup module that could automate tax determination and calculation, simplifying tax compliance for small businesses and ensuring they could stay within the app for a successful setup.
To accomplish this, Aripirala introduced a three-step sales tax setup process that was based on user location, removing the need for external resources or extra user input. He also developed tools that would automatically calculate and apply sales tax to invoice line items. This significantly reduced manual errors, ensured businesses were compliant with various tax requirements, and allowed users to set custom sales tax rates and recognize tax-exempt customers.
This tool was designed to be scalable, again using a modular MVVM architecture that could be reused across other Intuit mobile products. It also relied on Integrated Apollo GraphQL for more efficient data fetching.
A Pioneer in SMB Tax Efficiency
Sriram Santosh Aripirala's work has directly led to unprecedented growth at Intuit. His improvements to user engagement and retention resulted in a 31% growth in Intuit's online ecosystem and a 15% increase in revenue (around $1 billion). By enhancing these core user features, he also contributed to a surge in mobile adoptions, leading to over 4 million downloads of QuickBooks' mobile applications and 500,000 for QuickBooks Money.
Beyond Intuit, Aripirala's work has also reverberated throughout the industry, inspiring competitors to follow his lead. In particular, his work on automated tax features has directly influenced other industry leaders, as evidenced by Xero's launch of its Automatic Sales Tax feature in November 2023.
Through his dedication to creating powerful yet user-friendly tools, Aripirala has fundamentally redefined user expectations for mobile financial applications. His unwavering commitment to usability and scalability has not only transformed QuickBooks' offerings but has also established new benchmarks for the entire mobile financial technology sector.
In creating these powerful, user-friendly tools, Aripirala has helped set new standards in usability and scalability, enhancing user expectations by pushing the limits of what mobile financial applications can achieve. By transforming QuickBooks' offerings and establishing new benchmarks for the industry at large, his work stands as a testament to how thoughtful technical innovation can transform complex financial processes into accessible, efficient solutions for businesses worldwide.
