There are many tasks involved with small business bookkeeping. These tasks often take much longer than we expect because concepts are easier to understand than to implement.
Here are some simple solutions to your bookkeeping problems:
Book this Deposit
You, the owner, make a deposit. You are only depositing 5 checks. Piece of cake, right? Not exactly. You didn't have time to make copies of the checks, no invoices match, you forgot how many how many checks were in the deposit, or the invoice numbers of your customer checks are non-existent. Situations like this occur often and take time to sort out... sometimes hours.
Simple Solution -
Keep a copy of all the checks. If a customer goes by more than one name jot them down. Attach the deposit slip. As a result, keeping track of your deposits and customer payments becomes simple and effective.
Enter a Budget
You, the owner, prepare a budget and ask your bookkeeper to enter it so you can see if your sales and expenses are on a monthly track. The categories don't match your financial accounting system accounts. You really need a cash flow analysis, but you call it a budget. You try to enter the budget into QuickBooks, or your financial accounting system, but you realize converting your information into a P&L takes much more time than expected.
Simple Solution -
When you prepare a budget for a small business you should request a "Chart of Accounts" from your bookkeeper. Use this account information to prepare a budget. Your bookkeeping fees will be substantially reduced because of the time saved in entering the budget.
Reconcile the Bank Statements
You, the owner, need to reconcile your bank statements. Bank checking accounts and credit card statements can be a snap to reconcile, right? Wrong. You find that not all of the receipts correspond with the account information. Without this information, which can frequently be missing from clients, reconciliation grinds to a halt. Tracking down this information is time consuming. With the right information, bookkeepers can easily keep track of your statements and make sure that all of information corresponds.
Simple Solution -
Make a habit of keeping all receipts and writing down the purpose immediately. Or create an account for your bookkeeper, call it your Needs Category. This information can be printed out quickly for your weekly review.
If you have more bookkeeping problems visit our Services Page and check out what BudgetEase's QuickBooks certified advisers, or contact us to set up an appointment.
