Small business owners often struggle with the bookkeeping process. They have the same needs, albeit on a smaller scale, to large business; that is to record the money coming in, the money going out, what it is paying for, where it is going and so on. The difference is in the quantity. Large businesses generally have enough work to keep an in-house bookkeeper fully occupied, but small businesses don’t.
Large businesses generally have an ample budget to pay for their bookkeeping requirements, whereas small businesses struggle, particularly at the beginning. This is especially true when your business is new. At start-up, concentration is mainly on growing the business, networking and supply. As it grows slightly you then have staff and wages to add to bookkeeping records. The more the business grows, the more your bookkeeping requirements grow too, and these can be quite time absorbing, if you let them. For a small business, outsourcing their bookkeeping needs makes perfect sense and is the most practical choice by far.
Initially it may seem simple to do a few sums, subtracting what you paid out from what you earned, to get your end result, but financial statements, particularly those for the taxman, need to be much more in-depth than that. Paying a bookkeeper can be quite costly but there are many apps that will streamline this and do all the work for you, providing you with detailed lists of what is going on, as well as a total.
When looking at bookkeeping apps and trying to choose one, it is as well not to make price your primary concern. Many apps will do the job, they just don’t do it fully and that can leave you spending the same amount of time checking the work, as it would have taken you to do it in the beginning.
What you need is an app that has integrated all parts of the bookkeeping system, not only what you need now, but what you may need in the future if your business grows.
We at Probookkeeper offer a range of services to suit very need. We use Xero accounting software and can load all your data onto that for you. We can help you understand financial reports of all types and help you set up an account to run the Xero software for just about anything.
Xero software can integrate your payroll with your sales balance, your profit and loss statements, bank reconciliation and just about anything else. This lets you have everything you need in one package, all working together to give you easily accessible and understandable information at a fraction of the cost that an in-house bookkeeper would charge.