Clean Books with No Spreadsheet Anxiety
Do you find yourself staying up all night trying to catch up your books? It’s a frustrating pattern, and one that’s hard to escape. Fortunately, there is an easier way. Working with Susan to get your books under control, and keep them that way, is an easy process. Reach out today to learn more and finally get your small business bookkeeping under control.
- CA License #96754
- Serving Shasta County Since 2007
Before Susan
Cash position: known
P/L current: each month. Every month. Without panic.
Bookkeeping Chaos Doesn’t Have to Be Your Reality
Most small business owners do their own bookkeeping using one of three following methods:
- DIY in a spreadsheet: This can work out fine for a while, but your business will soon outgrow this basic approach. Your books will always be behind and nobody will have a clear financial picture.
- Software you never fully set up: QuickBooks or Wave with a chart of accounts that doesn't match your business. Reports are generated automatically but mean nothing.
- A bookkeeper who files but doesn't advise: The entries exist, but nobody told you that your margins were shrinking. And nobody warned you about the tax bill building up. You only find out in April that there is a problem.
Bookkeeping is a core financial function, not just a data entry task. Only when it is handled with care and respect will you get the outcomes you need.
Years in accounting
Licensed CPA since
of clients work directly with Susan
Poor bookkeeping may cost you in several ways:
- Missed deductions you did not know existed
- Surprises with taxes that could have been planned for
- A bank loan denied due to an inaccurate P&L
- Time each month spent on something you should not be spending time on
- Penalties from the IRS for missed payroll filings or improperly classified expenses
Books That Are Clean, Current, and Useful
The goal is not compliance. It is clarity. Each month you will know exactly where your business stands without having to touch a single bank feed.
- Bank account, credit card, and merchant processor reconciliations. Your books always accurately represent your finances.
- Categorize transactions into a chart of accounts developed specifically for your industry. Not general categories that do not reflect how you make decisions regarding funds for your business.
- Deliver your monthly P&L and Balance Sheet along with a brief description from Susan regarding changes made and why they matter.
- If you are months or years behind, Susan can do the catch-up bookkeeping. Rebuild your books from original documents, not cobbled-together journal entries.
- Tax-ready books so you do not have to do last minute scrambling at the end of April. No emergency cleaning up and no retroactive reconciliation.
- We currently use both QuickBooks Desktop and QuickBooks Online to match what your business uses.
- Susan provides direct access between monthly closing. Contact Susan directly to ask any questions you may have, rather than dealing with a help desk queue.
- Small businesses that perform their own bookkeeping and get overwhelmed
- Companies growing quickly and require monthly numbers they can trust
- Owners changing CPAs and receiving disorganized books from a prior provider
- Businesses with multiple accounts, card types or revenue sources
A log-in to a portal you look at once and quickly ignore. Susan views your books every month and identifies issues, and works with you one-on-one to resolve them.
Three Ways to Work Together, One Monthly Fee
- You review & move on
- Monthly reconciliation & close
- P&L and balance sheet delivered every month
- Records are tax ready throughout the year
- Reconstructive work by month/quarter/year
- Reconciliation completed from original documentation
- Clean transition to ongoing monthly close
- One consistent CPA throughout the relationship
- QuickBooks configuration or training
- Quarterly or monthly review and close
- Identify potential problems before they grow into tax problems
- Available to answer questions on-demand
The difference between data entry and real bookkeeping
Many bookkeepers are able to accurately enter each transaction. Few understand what those entries indicate, identify potential issues before they compound, and comprehend how their books relate to their federal tax return. Susan understands all three, as she is a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA), not simply a bookkeeper.
When the same CPA prepares your financial statements and completes your tax return, the return will clearly show the actual income statement for the previous fiscal year. As a result, there are no errors due to the hand-off process. There is also no confusion regarding the finalization of your financial reporting when you have completed the year.
Compressed margins. Incorrectly classified expenses for two consecutive years. An impending payroll deadline. All of these potential areas of concern are seen by trained CPA eyes during routine reviews of a company’s financial statements. These concerns can be overlooked by automated classification processes.
Should you receive an IRS notice or should an audit open against your company, Susan can act on your behalf. However, an IRS notice received by either a non-CPA bookkeeper, or other type of unlicensed tax return preparer cannot lawfully provide such representation.
As the owner of her small firm, Susan provides personal service to each of her clients. Each client has direct access to her. Your phone calls will always be answered by Susan herself. You never have to speak to another representative of her firm. You always reach Susan, and she always knows your file.
A fixed price determined by the number of transactions processed and their level of complexity. Pricing is discussed before you begin your agreement.
After a preliminary evaluation of your books, Susan will give you an estimate for getting caught up on past transactions.
Responding to your question(s) does not incur additional charges. The quoted price includes the amount of time required to complete the work, plus unlimited access to Susan.
How it works, from first call to clean books.
At the beginning of our process, you'll describe where your books currently stand. How far behind are they? What software do you currently use? Are you using multiple bank accounts? Susan will listen to your description, ask some brief follow-up questions, and provide you with an objective assessment of how long it will take to bring your books into compliance.
Within a week of your initial consultation, you'll receive a written proposal outlining what services are included, what your monthly fee will be, and what the estimated price will be for any one-time project (if necessary). There's only one number, and it's based upon your specific requirements, not tied to hourly rates.
Once you've accepted the proposed plan, Susan will gain read-only access to your accounts and will prepare all source documents to update your financial records. Depending on how far back the books need to go, most cleanup projects take from two to eight weeks.
Each month, Susan will reconcile your accounts, produce financial reports for you, and send you a short summary describing any changes since the previous month. When tax season arrives, your financial records will be ready for preparation without delay. Once again, you can focus on operating your business instead of worrying about your finances.
Common questions about bookkeeping with Susan.
Yes. One of the most common things new clients do when they first contact Susan is come in for a "Catch-Up". Susan will go back through all of your bank statements and original documents, and create usable, current financial records. The cost of this process is done as a single project prior to entering into a monthly retainer agreement.
All of our bookkeeping services are priced on a flat monthly rate which we agree upon prior to getting started. This price is determined by the number of transactions you complete each month, how many different accounts you want us to manage, and how complex those accounts are. Once you enter into a contract with us, you'll never receive an invoice due to additional emails. Each catch-up project is charged as a one time fee.
We primarily work with clients using both QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Desktop. There isn’t much difference between the two, so no matter which version you are using, Susan will be able to help. If you’re currently using a different program, we may still be able to accommodate your request. And, if you haven’t chosen a program yet, we’d be happy to make recommendations for you, and assist in setting up the correct software for your business.
You’ll be working directly with Susan. We keep our client base very small, so everything is always handled personally by her. None of your files will ever be passed down to a younger bookkeeper or outsourced to another company. When you speak with Susan, she’ll know exactly what’s happening within your file.
That’s perfectly fine. A large number of our clients begin with us providing them with monthly bookkeeping services, and then bring us in for tax preparation once per year. Even though we provide full-service bookkeeping, many of our clients already have a trusted tax preparer that they've been using for years. In those cases, we keep the books clean and hand over nice, organized records to their tax professional at the end of each year.
No. While Susan will provide all bookkeeping services directly to clients living within Shasta County (Redding included), she also provides remote or virtually delivered bookkeeping services for businesses located outside of Northern California. Most of the work involved with our regular monthly bookkeeping services are able to be done from anywhere, and we often communicate through email or send periodic reports electronically. In addition, if needed, we can answer many of your bookkeeping questions using phone or video conferencing.
Tired of handling all of
your bookkeeping?
Schedule a free 15-minute call. No pitch, no pressure. Just an honest read on where your books stand and what it would take to get them right.