Guides › Small Business Admin
Clear your weekly admin in one focused hour
Sort invoices, receipts and supplier emails into folders automatically, then get a Friday list of what to pay, chase, file and reply to.
When to use it
Every Friday afternoon
Step by step
Create admin folders
In Outlook, create folders called 'To pay', 'Receipts', 'Suppliers' and 'Customer admin'. Gmail users can do the same with labels.
Add rules to sort mail
Use Outlook's Rules (found in its settings) to move emails into each folder by sender or by words like 'invoice', 'receipt' or 'order confirmation'. Start with your ten most frequent senders.
Book a weekly admin hour
Create a recurring Friday event in Outlook Calendar called 'Admin hour' and treat it like a client meeting.
Get a to-do list from the week
In your admin hour, copy the key details from each folder into your AI assistant (or use Copilot in Outlook if your plan includes it) with this prompt.
Prompt to copyHere are this week's admin emails, grouped by folder. Turn them into a prioritised to-do list under four headings: Pay (with amount and due date), Chase (who owes me and how much), File (receipts or documents to save and where), Reply (who and what about, with a one-line suggested reply). Put anything due in the next 7 days at the top. Leave out anything already handled. Don't include bank details. [paste emails or summaries]Work the list and log it
Work through the list, then update your invoices or expenses spreadsheet in Excel before closing the hour.
What you get
PAY: Greenway Packaging £418.80 due 24 Nov; phone bill £42 due 28 Nov. CHASE: Harper & Co £960 (38 days). FILE: 6 receipts to Receipts > November. REPLY: Mill Lane Gym asking for a copy invoice - 'Attached, thanks for letting me know.'
Tips
- Check your rules' folders for a couple of weeks so nothing important is filed away unnoticed.