Bookkeeping tips to aleviate the challenges
Do you have someone doing your books on a part-time or full-time basis? Many times as business owners we are just glad someone likes to deal with “the numbers” other than ourselves. That being the case, do you have a way to check their work? Is there anyone else you can call to look at your books to make sure errors will not end up costing your cash flow problems in the future?
Top 10 reasons we struggle with bookkeeping tasks:
- Not recording and posting transactions regularly leaves you with a mountain of bookkeeping to deal with. Plus, the time lag can act like a vacuum, where transactions disappear and never are recorded.
- Having the wrong legal structure for your taxation needs.
- Not keeping proper records: Are you not keeping receipts or conducting a lot of cash transactions with no back up?
- Not keeping records for time periods per IRS/State guidelines: A good rule of thumb … keep 9 years, or if it’s accounting/payroll … keep forever.
- Not tracking and filing sales tax or payroll taxes: Have you missed a filing date? Do you know important state and national dates?
- Not filing income tax on a timely basis.
- Not recognizing revenue appropriately: Cash basis vs accrual, deposits, progress billing and more.
- Not reconciling bank statements and mistaking cash for profits.
- Co-mingling personal spend with business expenses.
- Not hiring a payroll service: The minor cost of hiring out this task provides a huge benefit for your company. It can free up your time and help avoid the financial penalties that go along with late and incorrect filings.
It can be hard to find experienced help who will give you confidence in keeping your records. If your business experiences growth or a cash-flow problem, it’s important that you find reliable and trusted accounting partners that can handle small audit functions to look at your books for a quick and low-cost solution. To get more helpful bookkeeping advice visit our blog where we discuss this and more on Tulsa bookkeeping.
