Save Time and Money and Improve Your Accounts Receivable
Modern accounting software apps are easy to use. Indeed, many software vendors sell their small business accounting apps on the premise that business owners can maintain their books themselves. But the question you should be asking, is doing the bookkeeping yourself the best use of your time when you have enough on your plate running your business? And equally important, do you have the know-how to maintain your books properly? Here are ten compelling reasons why hiring a bookkeeper to manage your company’s accounts would be the best option.
1. You Don’t Have the Expertise
There is more to keeping books than you realize. A professional bookkeeper will know the correct accounting treatment for transactions. And they will understand how an accounting system will need to be set up to provide you with the financial information you need. Your accounts will be an essential management tool as your business grows, so your books need to be accurate and up to date from the first day that your business begins trading.
2. You Don’t Have the Patience
Keeping books can be one of the most tedious aspects of running a business. You will not have the patience to post batches of vendor invoices or write out a pile of checks. You will probably take shortcuts or leave some accounting tasks to the last minute. Delays in updating your accounts will reduce the usefulness of the management information and may cause you issues with your suppliers if you pay them late. However, your bookkeeper will be happy to keep your accounts right up to date, and they will also pay more attention to detail than you would.
3. Maintain Your Accounts Receivable
When you are busy running a start-up, you may neglect to stay on top of your receivables. Not chasing overdue sales invoices could cause you a cash flow problem. Leaving the raising of sales invoices until the weekend will also impact your cash flow. A bookkeeper will be able to raise sales invoices as soon as they are due and chase outstanding invoices for you. The only time you will need to get involved in the administration of your receivables is if an account becomes seriously overdue.
4. Provide Timely Information
The financial fortunes of a business can fluctuate when you are running a start-up. You will need to keep a close eye on costs, sales, and your gross margins. But finding out you are not hitting targets six months after the event is not going to be a lot of use. A bookkeeper will be able to provide you with financial information and management accounts in a timely fashion and allow you to react faster to the changing situation.
5. Provide You with Advice
A professional bookkeeper will have a wealth of experience working for lots of different clients. That experience could enable your bookkeeper to see things in the accounts that you may have missed. As well as providing you with the financial reports, your bookkeeper could also be a useful source of advice and a helpful second pair of eyes.
6. Ensure that Taxes Are Filed Correctly
It is easy to forget a tax filing date when you are busy running a business. A bookkeeper will make sure that your taxes are filed accurately and on time, which will help to avoid penalties. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) estimates that 40% of small businesses get hit with tax penalties every year. Hiring a bookkeeper will help you to avoid becoming one of those businesses.
7. Ensure Everyone is Paid on Time
A business cannot afford to pay its creditors on time. If you fail to pay the wages on time, your employees will quit. If you are late paying taxes, you will incur penalties. If you pay vendors late, you may find that essential supplies are cut off. A bookkeeper will keep on top of what needs paying and provide you with a regular payments list. All you will need to do is make sure that you are happy with the proposed payments, check your cash flow, and sign the checks.
8. Save You Money
Hiring a bookkeeper may seem like an unnecessary expense, but it will save you money in the long-term. Your bookkeeper will help you manage your cash flow and provide information to help you make better-informed decisions. A bookkeeper will also save you money on unnecessary tax and other late payment penalties. Plus, you won’t be wasting your valuable time on keeping the books.
9. Allow You to Focus on Making Your Business a Success
One of the most compelling reasons why you need to hire a bookkeeper is that you have more important things to do. Keeping the books of a business can be time-consuming. And as your business grows, the bookkeeping will demand more and more time. Hiring a bookkeeper is one way of ensuring that you can focus your efforts on managing your business and making it a success.
10. Get the Work-Life Balance Right
You will have a lot of items on your daily to-do list when you are operating a business making sure it is a success. The bookkeeping will inevitably become a job to be done in the evenings or on the weekends, but even when you are working hard to build a business, you must make time to relax and spend with your loved ones. If you don’t get some time out, it will impact your ability to make decisions during the working hours. If you hire a bookkeeper, your accounts will be kept up to date, and you will get more time to spend with your friends and family.
The Bottom Line
To sum up, hiring a bookkeeper will save you time, and it will save you money in the long-term. A bookkeeper will also be able to provide you the information that you need to manage and grow your business. Bookkeeping is a task that some business owners probably could complete themselves, but the time that it would take for an owner to keep their books themselves would be far better spent expanding the operations.
About Universal Funding
Universal Funding is a private funding source that has funded thousands of businesses and more than $2 billion since 1998. We turn your accounts receivable into the funding you need through invoice factoring and can have capital in your hands in a matter of days.
