Many new business owners come to the conclusion that they can easily do their own bookkeeping themselves. After all, how difficult can it be, right?
They think that with all the great accounting software available today that it should be a piece of cake to take care of it themselves. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Bookkeeping is a technical skill that can’t be learned just by using accounting software. Yes, you may end up balancing the debits and credits, but did you post it to the correct account? Accuracy and attention to detail is crucial.
A bookkeeper will not only account for every transaction correctly, but will also keep track of:
- your sales transactions – so you’ll know exactly how much you’re making
- your expenses – so you can realistically keep track of them
- VAT returns – so your tax remittances can be accurately filed
- payroll deductions for your employees – so they can be accurately remitted
- all those little receipts that you have kicking around
Unfortunately, many small business owners with no accounting knowledge have paid dearly for attempting to do their own bookkeeping. They generally end up paying for this in:
- enormous accounting fees to clean up the bookkeeping mess
- severe penalties and interest from the government for incorrect and/or late tax remittances
- dealing with nasty government tax audits for filing incorrect returns
So ultimately, they end up paying more for this short-sighted decision than they would if had they chosen to hire a bookkeeper in the first place. Don’t let this happen to you!
While you should still hire an accountant at year end to prepare your taxes and review your bookkeeping for the year, a bookkeeper is an absolute necessity for your day-to-day bookkeeping needs.
Rather than thinking ‘can I afford to hire a bookkeeper?’, you should be saying to yourself,
‘I can’t afford NOT to hire a bookkeeper!’
There is a lot to gain from hiring a good bookkeeper because when you do, you’ll feel like they’re worth their weight in gold.
