Many small business owners ask, what exactly does a bookkeeper do? Have you gotten tired and frustrated with doing your own bookkeeping for your growing business? This is one of the necessary tasks that often frustrates small business owners. They don’t have enough work to justify hiring a full time bookkeeper, but keeping their own books takes up way too much of their time.
Fortunately, small business owners can outsource their bookkeeping tasks to a freelance bookkeeper, saving up to 40% of the cost of keep a full time bookkeeper on staff. Have you ever wondered, what does a bookkeeper do?
Let’s take a closer look at what you can expect if you were to hire a bookkeeper. The first thing you need to know is that a bookkeeper is not an accountant. If you need help with high level issues, a licensed accountant should be hired. However, if you need help with low level, day to day issues, a qualified bookkeeper is the right person for the job.
What does a bookkeeper do? Some of the common responsibilities of a bookkeeper include:
- Accounts Receivable – processes anything that relates to accounts receivable including invoicing customers, receiving payments, and initiating debt collection proceedings if necessary.
- Accounts Payable – this includes processing purchase orders and matching them against supplier invoices, entering bills as they come in and preparing checks to be signed by you.
- Cash Flow Management – a bookkeeper can prepare the necessary reports to keep you abreast of any cash flow issues before they become a problem.
Payroll , including forms needed for the IRS such as w-2,etc, & preparing the payroll checks for your signature
Of course, this is just a sampling of what a bookkeeper does. A bookkeeper will also act as a liaison with your accountant at the end of the year to ensure that all financial records are in order for tax preparation.
A bookkeeper is there to help you enter and properly categorize every bit of financial data that relates to your business, producing reports from the information. Whether you hire a bookkeeper to work full time at your place of business or a freelance bookkeeper, you will be able to specify exactly what you need.
If you plan to hire a bookkeeper to keep on staff, be sure the bookkeeper you hire is familiar with your accounting software. Most experienced bookkeepers will have at least a basic working knowledge of most accounting software.
If you are hiring a freelance bookkeeper, you should check several references. It helps to ask for a reference from a former client. You will likely get the most honest assessment of a person’s skill from someone that is no longer working with the bookkeeper.
If you are a small business owner and are becoming overwhelmed with the necessary, daily bookkeeping tasks, you really should consider enlisting the help of a qualified bookkeeper. There are many professionals available, some offering freelance services, that can help you and your business.
If you are ready to find out more about outsourcing your bookkeeping, check out our Lakewood Bookkeeping Services page!
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