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Smart bookkeeping advice to save you money!
Ask any small-business owner what they would like to improve about their business and you will always hear the same answer – more time and more money!
There are now many ways that smart business owners can improve both of these aspects, without needing to overcapitalise or restructure.
Software is king
Some people still insist on using Excel spreadsheets for their bookkeeping, failing to recognise that if you then take this to your accountant, all of that data needs to be punched in to whichever accounting system is used for the tax returns. This costs you extra as the accountant has to build this data-entry time into the cost of preparing your tax returns and financials.
With some of the basic cloud-based bookkeeping programs starting at just $15 to $20 per month, when our clients do a cost analysis of the extra time their accountants spend preparing the return versus using a bookkeeping program, they would find themselves in a better position. This doesn’t even take into consideration the time cost of setting up an automated system.
There are now many ways that smart business owners can have more time and more money, without needing to overcapitalise or restructure.
It’s always best to speak to your accountant before you sign up for a new program. They may be able to offer you a discount, a free trial for a month or simply advice on the best package.
Stay up-to-date
By staying up-to-date with your business’s reconciliations, expenses and income, you can continually analyse and assess where you are spending your money, where you should be spending it and where your highest margin income is being derived from, and focus on these areas.
It sounds daunting, right? It doesn’t have to be. All of the good, cloud-based bookkeeping software programs offer bank data feeds now to automatically pull through your transactions, and you can even set rules so that repetitive transactions are automatically dealt with, no extra input needed from you.
Software add-ons, the universe’s gift to small-business owners everywhere
Add-ons are our favourite part of this brave new business bookkeeping world.
Put simply, add-ons are additional software packages that integrate with your bookkeeping program to perform an absolute plethora of tasks. From customer database management to inventory tracking, allowing customers to pre-order coffee online, automating a warehouse order, marketing, budgeting, diary management, saving receipt copies and EFTPOS functions.
You sign up for a monthly subscription, there is usually no need to load any actual software onto your computer or worry about updates, and the different software typically all speaks to each other. Add-ons can save you tens, if not hundreds of hours per year.
Get someone who is faster & better than you
A dedicated bookkeeper is going to do a job at least twice as fast as you can do it. They know what they are looking at, they know the software, the current legislation, the ATO system and they pump out hundreds if not thousands of BASes per year. Unless you are a bookkeeper or accountant by trade, stick to what you are good at – growing your business.
You can hire a bookkeeper on a casual, project or contract basis when times are busy or you have a deadline, which will give you the time to focus on other revenue- producing activities within your business. You will easily find someone who wants to earn a few extra dollars, or most accounting firms offer a dedicated bookkeeper on a monthly or project basis (and at a negotiable rate if you sign up monthly).
Lisa Morgan, Maddern Accountants
