Why outsource your bookkeeping?

I know, as a chartered accountant, that the starting point is always ensuring that the bank accounts are fully reconciled. Which means that all the transactional activity within those bank accounts have been processed properly through the bookkeeping system.

When I was doing my training, most clients operated a manual bookkeeping system. Nowadays we have the advantage of digital cloud based accounting and bookkeeping systems. The new digital systems allow bank accounts to be reconciled in a far quicker and effective way. The processing of all the transactional activity through the bank accounts in those software packages can be done through ‘direct bank feeds’. However, not all banks are currently providing direct bank feeds. Even when the direct bank feed is available, processing the transactions still require intervention by a knowledgeable bookkeeper or accountant to ensure they are matched appropriately in the software platform and that everything is in order.

We see, on an all too frequent basis, businesses that are dealing with their own bookkeeping systems are not policing and maintaining the bookkeeping software package in an accurate enough fashion. Things are not maintained in a real time basis, although they could be. This failure leads to grave issues whereby some transactions are not processed through the bookkeeping software, which in turn leads to VAT being overpaid or underpaid, tax on profits is not correctly provided for when period account are produced, statutory accounts could be filed late because the bookkeeping is out of date and not getting maintained properly.

This process is something that we can train our clients on to ensure that they are maintaining the bookkeeping records correctly. That said, we understand that for business owners, like myself, that there are a lot of other priorities a business has to concern itself with, and the bookkeeping maintenance is often put to the bottom of the list. Spending time to complete bookkeeping can be seen as time that could have been used more productively to grow your business, increase revenue, and improve the profitability of your business. Here at ad+ Chartered Accountants, we understand that dilemma, and therefore we invest heavily to provide that bookkeeping function on behalf of our clients. We believe strongly that bookkeeping is a specialism, and it should not be played at. Although we have the digital bookkeeping technology at our disposal, and it is advantageous, it still needs the intervention of a knowledgeable bookkeeper or accountant to ensure the transactions are correctly recorded and classified.

Whether you want to outsource your bookkeeping function to ad+ to have the safety and assurance that it will be maintained properly, or you want to have a discussion with regard to whether you can improve the in-house maintenance of your bookkeeping, please contact us here at ad+.

Get in touch with David Charles to arrange your initial discussion with one of our Chartered Accountants to learn how we could help you.