Hire a Bookkeeper or D.I.Y.?

When you run a small business, the question to ask yourself is not whether you have experience in bookkeeping or not. The question to ask is whether you can handle the workload of a bookkeeper while still successfully managing your business growth. The decision of hiring a bookkeeper can be very hard for a business owner as it comes with its own set of advantages and disadvantages.

Here is a pros and cons list of hiring a bookkeeper to help you make your choice.

Pros

Focus on the Growth of Your Business

Maintaining your financial records is a legally essential task. A small business owner generally deals with all aspects of their business, including managing payroll, logging expenses, paying and sending reminders for invoices and much more. Once the owner is caught up in this hassle, it can be nearly impossible to get out of it, let alone be able to concentrate on growing the business. Hiring a bookkeeper helps free up space to concentrate on your business. Managing the accounts and finances of a business is not an easy task. It requires time and attention to detail, because even the smallest of errors can prove costly.

Pro Advice

It’s simple really. Bookkeepers know what they are doing. Even if you do find the time to manage your accounts yourself, you are more prone to human error than a bookkeeper. They are qualified and trained professionals in their field. By hiring a trained professional, you, as a business owner, can focus on the development of your business with ease of mind. However, even with a bookkeeper, it is always worth it to double check and make sure everything checks out.

Don’t Have to Worry About Learning Bookkeeping Softwares

One of the largest advantages, especially in the digital world, is that by hiring a bookkeeper you take away the stress of having to watch endless mind-numbing tutorials on how accounting software such as MYOB and Xero work. These softwares make bookkeeping a breeze and makes keeping manual accounting logs a thing of the past! Bookkeepers also know how to work with other accounting related softwares to do online invoicing and more. This makes them incredibly valuable because they can do so much!

Get Your Accounts Dealt with on Time

The great thing about paying someone to handle your finances is that you don’t have to worry about getting behind on your finances and taxes. As a business owner your priority falls to the development of the business before the finances. However, without timely finance management, you may find yourself falling back. Hiring a bookkeeper means you can focus on the overall health of the financial side of the business and not have to stress about logging in all your receipts, invoices and taxes.

Different Outlook

Getting a trained professional managing your finances helps you gain insight from an outside source. As a business owner, it is nearly impossible to be objective. You might think everything is going peachy but from an outside persepctive, things might not be going as smoothly as it seems. It is also difficult to be able to keep track or make changes to your expenses etc. By hiring a bookkeeper you will get fresh eyes having an overall look at your finances. They may be able to suggest helpful financial tips and offer suggestions to offer cost saving solutions to improve the finances of the company.

Handling Taxes

Handling your books may be one of the most crucial tasks of a business. A small error can result in a big bookkeeping mess that can be difficult to recover from. Down the road, this can make it difficult for you to deal with taxes, come end of financial year. Bookkeepers are always well informed and up to date on federal and tax returns. They also follow business trends, potentially picking up other financial warnings that you may need to be aware of. Due to their comprehensive knowledge of the tax world, they may even be able to offer tips on securing a larger tax return.

Cons

Disconnection from finances

If you hire someone to be in charge of your books, you may inevitably end up skimming over your books. You will soon lose track of the details of your finances, making it tough to make changes when you need to. It also keeps you at a distance from monitoring the performance of your business. The way to overcome this is to hold regular meetings with your bookkeeper to keep yourself up to date and to ensure everything is running the way it should. Making sure there is open and healthy communication between you and your bookkeeper will put your mind at ease. Knowing they are transparent with what they’re doing, understanding how they are helping you and any suggestions which they might have to improve your business are all signs of a good bookkeeper.

Accountability

When you are responsible for your own books, you are comforted by the fact that you have checked over everything thoroughly and you trust yourself to take your business seriously. While hiring a bookkeeper can be extremely advantageous to your business, blind trust could be the downfall to your business too. While bookkeepers are well-versed with everything they do, there is still always potential for human error. To overcome this, you should regularly double-check everything, this way you can scan for damages before it is too late.

Expense

While hiring a bookkeeper may be a cheaper expense in the long run than doing it by yourself, it still counts as an outgoing expenditure. As a small business it may be hard to make that commitment at the start or you might not see the value of having one if you can save money by doing it yourself. The battle of money versus time can be a tough one, but you need to prioritise in order to determine the best option for your business. Have a long, hard think about what you value, where your company is going and what your future goals are.

Bottom Line

Not managing your books properly can result in legal fees or just overwhelmed and struggling if you are caught in an accounting mess. Your auditing and taxes can also be affected as a result of this. Therefore, while hiring a bookkeeper may be expensive at first, it will prove to be an asset when it comes to growing your business. If you are after a trained professional with expertise in bookkeeping, visit Shoebox or call us for more details. We cater to small businesses and offer affordable rates to ensure the success of your business.