Open Association of Landscape Industries
Handing over all bookeeping to the acountant.
Just wondered who has taken this step and decided to
pass over this lovely job to their accountant.
I am not sure how much it costs, but anything that
alleviates the stress and stain of running a business must
be a good thing if it enables extra energy to be focused on
the important side of the business - making a profit !
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John on -
Thanks Paul
I think my accountant has quite a few employees to do the book keeping,
so it shouldn't be a problem.
Paul @ PPCH Services said:It might be easier and cheaper to pay a dedicated book keeper for the book keeping and just use the accountant for your annual return. An accountant will be an expensive bookkeeper if you get my drift.
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Permalink Reply by Sally SIlva on -
Hi John, I agree with Paul. Our Accountant will charge around £65 ph to process your bookkeeping where as you could get a local bookkeeper for anything from £15 to £35ph depending on how much you want them to do. Of course the other option is get your family to help! In our case my husband does what he does best - the landscaping while I do the bookkeeping and admin! That way he pays me rather than the bookkeeper! We have a great accountant who gives me lots of advice if I get stuck but to be honest its pretty easy especially if you keep on top of it and it leaves my husband free to run the business.
Haven't checked where you are based but if you want any advice feel free to give me a call.
Sally Silva :)
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Permalink Reply by Classic Gardens on -
We give all our books to a bookeeeper at £12 per hr costs around £100 per year. He then passes them on to our accountant who charges around £300 per year.
By using a charted accountant they more than make there money for us.
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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Gary RK on -
John, I delegated the book keeping years ago to a qualified lady that came recommended from our Accountants. It was one of those 'liberating' moments in business :-).
Along with that, I also deferred payroll over to the Accountants and she liaises between all of us to get the hours, expenses in to them as well.
She deals with all the coding, data entry, jounals, online VAT returns, payroll entries etc (and occasionaly bit of 'credit control'). However, we make time available to review any issues or questions etc.
After her visit I am left with the latest managment reports (TP&L, Aged Debt, Open invoices etc) that I can sit down, review and if needed discuss with my Accountant. QuickBooks also has a great number of other reports/graphs that help me visualise our finances.
If you read my posts in the KBO, you also appreciate I monitor some key financial ratios every month to track our positon - the most important being cashflow so we can pay our bills and pay the guys every month.
Separately, I have regular physical meets with the Accountant (who in my oppinion is worth his money & a small business specialist) every 4-6 weeks, or sooner if needed.
That works for me.
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Permalink Reply by John on
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Thanks Sally,
The garden photo's on your site are really wonderful.
Sally SIlva said:Hi John, I agree with Paul. Our Accountant will charge around £65 ph to process your bookkeeping where as you could get a local bookkeeper for anything from £15 to £35ph depending on how much you want them to do. Of course the other option is get your family to help! In our case my husband does what he does best - the landscaping while I do the bookkeeping and admin! That way he pays me rather than the bookkeeper! We have a great accountant who gives me lots of advice if I get stuck but to be honest its pretty easy especially if you keep on top of it and it leaves my husband free to run the business.
Haven't checked where you are based but if you want any advice feel free to give me a call.
Sally Silva :)
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Permalink Reply by John on
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Thanks Gary,
I like to keep things as simple as possible, so that I can spend more
time working in the gardens doing the things that I am good at, and love doing.
Gary RK said:John, I delegated the book keeping years ago to a qualified lady that came recommended from our Accountants. It was one of those 'liberating' moments in business :-).
Along with that, I also deferred payroll over to the Accountants and she liaises between all of us to get the hours, expenses in to them as well.
She deals with all the coding, data entry, jounals, online VAT returns, payroll entries etc (and occasionaly bit of 'credit control'). However, we make time available to review any issues or questions etc.
After her visit I am left with the latest managment reports (TP&L, Aged Debt, Open invoices etc) that I can sit down, review and if needed discuss with my Accountant. QuickBooks also has a great number of other reports/graphs that help me visualise our finances.
If you read my posts in the KBO, you also appreciate I monitor some key financial ratios every month to track our positon - the most important being cashflow so we can pay our bills and pay the guys every month.
Separately, I have regular physical meets with the Accountant (who in my oppinion is worth his money & a small business specialist) every 4-6 weeks, or sooner if needed.
That works for me.
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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Brian www.mibservices.co.uk on -
In that case John, bring in accountancy help. A good accountant will save you a lot of money and produce monthly finance reports for your business, giving you figures to digest on a regular basis.
John www.acegardenservices.co.uk said:Thanks Gary,
I like to keep things as simple as possible, so that I can spend more
time working in the gardens doing the things that I am good at, and love doing.
Gary RK said:John, I delegated the book keeping years ago to a qualified lady that came recommended from our Accountants. It was one of those 'liberating' moments in business :-).
Along with that, I also deferred payroll over to the Accountants and she liaises between all of us to get the hours, expenses in to them as well.
She deals with all the coding, data entry, jounals, online VAT returns, payroll entries etc (and occasionaly bit of 'credit control'). However, we make time available to review any issues or questions etc.
After her visit I am left with the latest managment reports (TP&L, Aged Debt, Open invoices etc) that I can sit down, review and if needed discuss with my Accountant. QuickBooks also has a great number of other reports/graphs that help me visualise our finances.
If you read my posts in the KBO, you also appreciate I monitor some key financial ratios every month to track our positon - the most important being cashflow so we can pay our bills and pay the guys every month.
Separately, I have regular physical meets with the Accountant (who in my oppinion is worth his money & a small business specialist) every 4-6 weeks, or sooner if needed.
That works for me.
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Permalink Reply by Lawn lover on -
When I had my building company I had the accountant do the VAT-Books-Wages cost around £160 a month 5 yrs ago worth every penny with up to 14 staff in peak times.
With being small time now I do my own books, hate it
After reading this I am now going to source a book keeper.
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Permalink Reply by Andy Lawrence on -
Yep, I am among those who HATE paperwork.
Basically everything gets thrown to my accountant who makes sense of it. Costs about £250/£300 a year. Money very well spent as far as I'm concerned.
It more than pays for itself too as I don't care how good you are with your accounts, you will miss things you can claim which a good accountant won't.
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Permalink Reply by John on
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I don't mind calculating the weekly wages, the hours have got
to be added up regardless, so sticking them in the Basic Tools
calculator is as easy as emailing them to the book keeper. The
one downside is the year end problems, and the fun and games
downloading the new Basic Tools. But I can cope with this if I don't
have to do the book keeping as well.
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Premium SupplierPermalink Reply by Peter Woolnough on -
After reading this thread, I think I am going to find a book keeper and farm my paperwork out as like many on here this is the job i least like about running a business.
Just a few quick questions if I may,
Does the book keeper come to you and if so on what frequamcy to enter invoices and pay bills
or do you send them all your receipts etc and if so again on what frequency
I was just trying to get to the nuts and bolts of what i should be looking for in a book keeper
many thanks,
Peter
Gary RK said:John, I delegated the book keeping years ago to a qualified lady that came recommended from our Accountants. It was one of those 'liberating' moments in business :-).
Along with that, I also deferred payroll over to the Accountants and she liaises between all of us to get the hours, expenses in to them as well.
She deals with all the coding, data entry, jounals, online VAT returns, payroll entries etc (and occasionaly bit of 'credit control'). However, we make time available to review any issues or questions etc.
After her visit I am left with the latest managment reports (TP&L, Aged Debt, Open invoices etc) that I can sit down, review and if needed discuss with my Accountant. QuickBooks also has a great number of other reports/graphs that help me visualise our finances.
If you read my posts in the KBO, you also appreciate I monitor some key financial ratios every month to track our positon - the most important being cashflow so we can pay our bills and pay the guys every month.
Separately, I have regular physical meets with the Accountant (who in my oppinion is worth his money & a small business specialist) every 4-6 weeks, or sooner if needed.
That works for me.
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PRO MemberPermalink Reply by Gary RK on -
Peter, our book keeper comes to us, so all the info is in one place, every 7 to 10 days. She has her own schedule which reflects our key dates (Vat 1/4's, payroll run dates,PAYE/NIC dates, Supplier payment dates, Month-end, our invoicing dates etc).
If and when she has any 'spare' time she swaps from be reactive/historic based to proactive/budgeting based with my help.
I tend to 'code' any specific receipts for QB from my knowledge, especially when dealing with job costing (ie allocating costs to a job to check budgeted vs actual and ensure all costs are charged).
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