391: Is Your Bookkeeping A Mess Whether You Are Starting A Business Or Side Hustle, A Solopreneur, Entrepreneur, Mompreneur, Freelancer, Accountant, Bookkeeper, Virtual Assistant, Business Owner
- 6 days ago
- 11 min read
391: Is Your Bookkeeping A Mess Whether You Are Starting A Business Or Side Hustle, A Solopreneur, Entrepreneur, Mompreneur, Freelancer, Accountant, Bookkeeper, Virtual Assistant, Business Owner, Or Self-Employed
When you have a small business, it is easy to think you can handle all of the tasks that need to be completed and wear the many hats that come with owning a business. This may be true or even possible when you are just starting your business, but as your business grows and each task starts to take more time, you will find you may not be able to handle everything yourself and may need help. One of the first tasks small business owners look at hiring out is their bookkeeping. It is often listed as the most frustrating aspect of owning a small business and it doesn’t matter if you are doing your bookkeeping manually or using QuickBooks, Xero or Wave to help automate your bookkeeping. You may have felt this way and wanted to hire a bookkeeper from the very beginning of starting your business if you didn’t feel qualified or confident doing your bookkeeping, or maybe you really like keeping track of all the money coming in and going out of your business. Either way, there are some pretty important signs you will notice in your small business which will help you make the decision of whether or not you need to hire a bookkeeper to help you master your small business finances. Many small business owners think hiring a bookkeeper is expensive, but in reality, depending on how many transactions you have in your business, you may be able to have your bookkeeping done for as little as $100.00 per month. Today I’m going to dive into a few of the signs you may need a bookkeeper and help you decide if and when you should start thinking about hiring a bookkeeper for your small business. Your financials tell you a lot about your business and help guide you to make sound business decisions, but when you don’t have accurate, reliable and timely information, you and your business could start to suffer. Listen in and find out if you may have reached or are getting close to reaching these important signs that you should hire a bookkeeper for your business. It doesn’t matter if you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks, Xero, Wave, or FreshBooks for your business finances; or if you are doing your bookkeeping manually with an Excel spreadsheet or even a Google Document, this episode will be helpful for you…
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Show Notes:
When you have a small business, it is easy to think you can handle all of the tasks that need to be completed and wear the many hats that come with owning a business. This may be true or even possible when you are just starting your business, but as your business grows and each task starts to take more time, you will find you may not be able to handle everything yourself and may need help. One of the first tasks small business owners look at hiring out is their bookkeeping. It is often listed as the most frustrating aspect of owning a small business and it doesn’t matter if you are doing your bookkeeping manually or using QuickBooks, Xero or Wave to help automate your bookkeeping. You may have felt this way and wanted to hire a bookkeeper from the very beginning of starting your business if you didn’t feel qualified or confident doing your bookkeeping, or maybe you really like keeping track of all the money coming in and going out of your business. Either way, there are some pretty important signs you will notice in your small business which will help you make the decision of whether or not you need to hire a bookkeeper to help you master your small business finances. Many small business owners think hiring a bookkeeper is expensive, but in reality, depending on how many transactions you have in your business, you may be able to have your bookkeeping done for as little as $100.00 per month. Today I’m going to dive into a few of the signs you may need a bookkeeper and help you decide if and when you should start thinking about hiring a bookkeeper for your small business. Your financials tell you a lot about your business and help guide you to make sound business decisions, but when you don’t have accurate, reliable and timely information, you and your business could start to suffer. Listen in and find out if you may have reached or are getting close to reaching these important signs that you should hire a bookkeeper for your business. It doesn’t matter if you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks, Xero, Wave, or FreshBooks for your business finances; or if you are doing your bookkeeping manually with an Excel spreadsheet or even a Google Document, this episode will be helpful for you…
Welcome Back…Making a decision to hire a bookkeeper can feel overwhelming and complicated, especially since when you get to this point, you as the business owner are normally time strapped and have even less time to look for a bookkeeper. I want to help you proactively see the signs that you need a bookkeeper early so that you will know when you should hire a bookkeeper and it isn’t a stressful situation where you are rushing to find a quick fix to your problems. When you make this decision, it should be clear, and you should feel good about the decision you are making as well as enjoying the additional time you are opening up to spend on other areas of your business.
The first thing I want you to do is to have a good idea of how much time you are currently spending on your bookkeeping. To do this, track the total amount of time it takes you to complete your bookkeeping tasks each week for at least a month. Once you have this amount of time figured out, ask yourself if there are more important items in your business that should be getting done, like…If you spent more time on sales, would this generate additional income? To help you decide, you can also determine how much your time is actually worth and calculate how much it is costing you to do your own bookkeeping. To do this, take into consideration how much one hour of your time is worth, and multiply this by the time it takes you to do your bookkeeping. Comparing your actual cost or expense to do the bookkeeping to the cost of hiring a bookkeeper to do the same work can give you a clear vision of whether you should continue to do your own bookkeeping. If you feel like your time would be better spent doing other tasks in your business and you could be more profitable by handing your bookkeeping off to someone else, this may be a good time to start looking into hiring a bookkeeper for your small business.
Next, ask yourself if your bookkeeping is up to date. If you are finding you put your bookkeeping off for months at a time and you are never able to rely on your books to make sound business decisions, you are putting additional stress on yourself as well as your business. I get it, there are only so many hours in a day, and you probably have good intentions, but when you start to notice you are having a hard time keeping up, that’s when you need to start looking for a bookkeeper to help you get caught up and consistently have reliable information for you to look at on a monthly basis. By not having your bookkeeping up to date, you could be missing out on tax strategies to help reduce your taxable income. When this happens, you won’t be able to keep your hard-earned money in your pockets and will instead be sending it off to good old Uncle Sam. When you have a qualified bookkeeper helping you compile your data, you are able to rely on accurate and timely information. This in turn helps you make better decisions and allows you to plan accordingly.
If you’re an accountant or high-stress professional, you want to start enjoying your life more, both at work and at home. You’ve likely built a successful career, but at what cost? The problem is you’re so buried in deadlines and to-do lists, there’s no time or energy left for the things that really matter. You’re great at managing clients, deadlines, and numbers, but your own stress, time, and well-being, well, they always seem to come last. The constant pressure leads to burnout, guilt, and feeling like no matter how much you do, it’s never enough. I see this all the time. As a CPA with over 20 years of experience and a Certified Coach, I’ve helped high-achieving professionals like you go from stress and burnout to a more integrated and balanced lifestyle using The RE*INVENTION™ Process. This process helps you reduce stress, reclaim your time, and finally build a healthier, happier, more balanced lifestyle without sacrificing your success. The truth is, stress doesn’t go away on its own, and eventually, the cost isn’t just exhaustion; it’s your health, your relationships, and your love for the work you once enjoyed. If you’re ready to build a life you don’t need a vacation from, it’s easy to get started. First, schedule your Complimentary Stress Audit & Clarity Session, where in just one session, I’ll help you pinpoint what’s really draining your time and energy, create a personalized action plan to help you simplify your life, reclaim your time, and increase your productivity so that you start living with more energy, focus, and freedom. You don’t have to keep doing this alone. I can help you customize a plan to stop the overwhelm and start enjoying your life again. Go to www.FinancialAdventure.com, click on the Work With Me button, and book your free session today. Let this be the moment you stop just surviving and start living with more control and finally enjoy a more integrated and balanced lifestyle again. In the meantime, check out all the other resources and solutions on my website that you can immediately apply to your life so you can stop being stressed out and feeling like you're never doing enough, and instead breathe a sigh of relief at the end of the day, knowing you've accomplished enough and can enjoy your life more.
Another sign which is very similar to putting off your bookkeeping is when you don’t even touch, or plan to do your bookkeeping throughout the year and you decide you will just bring all your documents and files into your tax preparer for them to generate financial statements after a full year has gone by to process your small business tax return. By the time your tax preparer compiles all your financial information it is normally too late to take advantage of any tax strategies, and you were never able to use any of your financial information to guide your business decisions throughout the past year. Not only could you be missing out on potential tax write-offs, but you could also be paying a premium price to have this work caught up during tax season when your tax preparer or Certified Public Accountant is in their busiest season.
What if I asked you right at this moment, how much money your customers owe you? Would you be able to give me a pretty solid answer? Would you be able to break it down by each customer? If you know you have money coming in from customers but have no clue how much and when it will be reaching your bank account, you may want to have a bookkeeper help you with this. Cash flow is one of the main problems small business owners struggle with. Easing the stress in just this one area could be a huge win for you if you hired a bookkeeper to help you keep your receivables up to date. Imagine how nice it would be to request and receive an accounts receivable report at any point in time and you know exactly who owes you money and how much. It is also important to keep an eye on those customers who are not paying you. Collecting from customers who are extremely delinquent on their payments can be harder and harder to do. You want to make sure you are catching these amounts early and following up with those customers on a timely basis. Another point to think about here as well, is if you are able to actually invoice your customers on time, or if you find you are too busy and invoicing your customers doesn’t get done right away. This will also slow down your cash flow and the ability to collect on money that customers owe.
Have you noticed your late fees are adding up? If you are consistently paying additional late fees due to untimely payments, you could be saving this money or think of it this way, you could even apply that savings directly toward the cost of your bookkeeper. Not only would you be saving money by ensuring you are making payments on time, but you would also be saving the time you would normally be spending on your bookkeeping. This is a win-win situation for sure.
If you feel like your business is starting to get too complicated and you don’t understand the complexity of how your bookkeeping needs to be done, this is a sign you should be looking for a bookkeeper. Let’s face it, you may be an expert in your field and that’s why your business is so successful, but when you start to doubt if you are doing your bookkeeping correctly, you want to hire a bookkeeper. Just as you are an expert in your field, bookkeepers are experts in yes, you guessed it…bookkeeping. Don’t waste your valuable time guessing how your bookkeeping should be done and basing your business decisions on potentially incorrect data. If you feel uncomfortable about your books, now is probably the time to hire a bookkeeper. Not only will your books be accurate, but you will have peace of mind knowing you don’t have to second guess your decisions.
Keep these signs in mind as your business grows and ask yourself periodically if you need to hire a bookkeeper. As your business grows, you will need to reassess your situation. Your small business finances are one of the top reasons your business will be successful. You want to make sure you are relying on accurate and timely financial information. Don’t wait until it is too late to make these decisions. If you are noticing the signs I mentioned are impacting your small business, start looking for a bookkeeper today. You want to make sure you have the time to find someone who is not only capable to do your bookkeeping, but you want to have a good relationship with the bookkeeper you choose so that you feel comfortable asking questions.
And, you know I’m going to ask…what’s at least one thing you will take away from this episode that will help your business succeed and grow your bottom line? If you want accountability or support, visit www.FinancialAdventure.com. You’ll find links to join our private Facebook community, connect with me on LinkedIn, and discover more free resources to help you reduce stress, boost productivity, and build a business and life you truly enjoy. I’ll see you there.
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