Are you getting tired of your part-time bookkeepers? Wouldn’t you rather focus on growing your business than updating financial records? Why not outsource your bookkeeping and accounting functions? Bookkeeping and taxes should not be your top priority, outsource those tasks so you can focus on growing your business.

There are so many benefits of outsourcing, here are just a few:

• Reduce overhead, free up resources
• Avoid Capital Expenditure
• Improve Efficiency
• Offload non-core functions
• Get access to specialized skills
• Save on manpower and training costs
• Reduce operating costs
• Effectively handle temporary business peaks

Avoid the cost of chasing technology. Best of all, although you pay for the hours you need, you can reach them whenever you want.

In Today’s globalized and networked economy, outsourcing has never been as easy or made so much business sense. The question is not “Why outsource?” but rather, “Why not?”

Margo Masri (Certified Quickbooks Pro-Advisor)
Owner of Margo’s Bookkeeping Service
(We are QuickBooks professionals. We provide outsourced Bookkeeping services to NY’s five boroughs and Long Island. Our goal is to provide professional, affordable, and timely accounting services to small and medium business while adhering to high standards of quality and integrity. )

http://www.margosbookkeeping.com
margo.masri@margosbookkeeping.com

Another big difference between an accountant and a bookkeeper is usually, “About $140 per hour.” For this reason it is very important that you allocate your resources efficiently. You do not want to pay your accountant to perform bookkeeping functions. It does not make business sense.

Smart Businesses allocate their resources based on their needs

Fact: Accountants do not have the time to handle day-in day-out financial record keeping and reporting. What do they do? They hire Bookkeepers.

Bookkeepers perform a critical function for the firms and organizations they serve. Regularly challenged to maintain precise and accurate records, bookkeepers produce the vital reports that keep management up to date on the financial condition of their company.

Bookkeepers are responsible for maintaining the “business checkbook”, much like a personal checkbook. They record routine money transactions like customer payments into a “cash receipts journal” and checks to vendors into a “cash disbursement journal.” They also process payroll. At month end they transfer or “post” the “journal” totals to the “general ledger” in preparation for financial statements prepared by the accountant. They prepare monthly quarterly and year end financial statements.

Accountants are responsible for the design and management of the financial systems that bookkeepers use. They prepare tax returns at year end. Accountants may also prepare budgets for management and loan proposals for bankers; they may perform cost analysis for the company’s products or services.

Hiring a bookkeeping service can often be a good solution for the small business owner. A good service will communicate well with your accountant so when tax time rolls around, the accountant will need to spend as little time as possible on your tax return keeping your accountant’s fee to a minimum. Make sure you understand the reports you get back from your service. You want to make the most of the information to make productive decisions for your business.

Both bookkeepers and accountants are important to your business. Knowing the difference between them can not only assure you of receiving the best information on which to base your financial decisions, but can also save you hundreds of dollars per year in fees.

Margo Masri (Certified Quickbooks Pro-Advisor)
Owner of Margo’s Bookkeeping Service
(We are QuickBooks professionals. We provide outsourced Bookkeeping services to NY’s five boroughs and Long Island. Our goal is to provide professional, affordable, and timely accounting services to small and medium business while adhering to high standards of quality and integrity. )

http://www.margosbookkeeping.com
margo.masri@margosbookkeeping.com

As a business owner your time is best spent doing what you do well – working with customers. Time spent on bookkeeping problems add little or no value to your customer relationship. To remain competitive, it is imperative that a company rethinks its strategies, take a hard look at where they are creating value for their customers, then focus on those processes.

There are numerous firms that specialize in Bookkeeping, Why not hire a full-service firm staffed by highly trained specialists (certified Quickbooks Proadvisors); they can take control of your accounting and bookkeeping tasks so you can focus on what you do best, growing your business. Along the way, they will not only save you money, but spare you stress. Better yet, you get the expertise and support of a full-service company, not just the capabilities of a single employee.

The most successful businesses of today currently outsource all of there non core functions. If you are looking for ways to reduce overhead and focus on your core business, now is the perfect time to make the switch to outsourced bookkeeping.

Margo Masri (Certified Quickbooks Pro-Advisor)
Owner of Margo’s Bookkeeping Service
(We are QuickBooks professionals. We provide outsourced Bookkeeping services to NY’s five boroughs and Long Island. Our goal is to provide professional, affordable, and timely accounting services to small and medium business while adhering to high standards of quality and integrity. )

http://www.margosbookkeeping.com
margo.masri@margosbookkeeping.com

The attitude at many smaller detail operations is something like, “Hey, just so I’m payin’ the bills, I don’t really care about the books.” I believe this is not so much a disregard for good business practices, but more a normal apprehension or misunderstanding of correct bookkeeping practices.

Yet most successful business owners will tell you that they attribute part of their success to “staying close to the numbers,” (i.e., practicing good bookkeeping and regularly checking reports). There are several advantages to keeping good records of your income and expenses, including:

-the opportunity to determine the specific sources of income, for example, from different advertising campaigns. This allows you to make decisions about future advertising purchases based on historical performance

-the ability to monitor expenses, thus allowing you to make cost-cutting purchasing decisions
minimizing your tax liability by thoroughly tracking all legitimate expenses

-the ability to show profitability should the opportunity arise in the future to sell the business.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Take this information as an introduction to the world of proper bookkeeping for your business. I strongly recommend that you take the time and spend the money to sit down with a CPA or professional bookkeeper to help you set up your bookkeeping system. It is well worth the investment to make your job of record keeping easier.

For larger or busier operations, it may be worthwhile keeping a professional bookkeeper on retainer. Such an arrangement would involve the outsourcing those functions to a local bookkeeping services company. This really makes sense if your time can generate significantly more money per hour than you pay the bookkeeper. He or she can get the job done much faster than you and with fewer mistakes.

Regardless of the amount of help you seek, I recommend that you use one of the popular computer-based bookkeeping software systems that are widely available (ie: Quickbooks). It’s much easier to make a few entries on a computer rather than using a pencil and calculator.

Finally, stop trying to do it on your own! Get some help, even if it’s from another operator who simply has more experience.

Margo Masri (Certified Quickbooks Pro-Advisor)
Owner of Margo’s Bookkeeping Service
(We are QuickBooks professionals. We provide outsourced Bookkeeping services to NY’s five boroughs and Long Island. Our goal is to provide professional, affordable, and timely accounting services to small and medium business while adhering to high standards of quality and integrity. )

http://www.margosbookkeeping.com
margo.masri@margosbookkeeping.com