An outsourced bookkeeper can help you protect your data.   Any business that has lost their accounting computer data has a higher chance of business failure.   By using Dashboard Accounting to outsource your bookkeeping, you can be confident your data is backed up and secure. 

There are many different backup methods available.  When choosing the right option, consider these questions:

• Will the data be available when you have a hard disk failure
• Will the data be available in a disaster, such as a flood
• How long will it take to have your data restored
• Is your data secure
• How often is your data backed up

You may need a combination of backups to solve your needs and protect your data.   

Outsourcing bookkeeping to a company is a huge value.   We take away the complexity of determining if your data is safe and secure.   A professional bookkeeping company like Dashboard Accounting does nothing but maintain great people and systems in the United States that do bookkeeping for companies in Cleveland, Akron or anywhere.  There is a good chance Dashboard Accounting can lower your costs, improve your bookkeeping and eliminate the bookkeeper churn headache.

Dashboard Accounting is beneficial to the company that:

• Cannot afford to staff an accounting department, but recognizes the necessity of having one.
• Does their bookkeeping their self, but wants to free up time and needs help
• Has a bookkeeper but is unable to manage them.
• Needs to utilize their financial information to assist with decision-making.
• Wants to reduce costs by outsourcing the bookkeeping.

What Dashboard Accounting can do for your company:

• Function as the Accounting Department for your small or medium-sized company.
• Complete bookkeeping tasks on a daily basis.
• Assist in interpreting your financial data.
• Assist with current year budgeting.
• Assist with forecasting and strategic planning.
• Assist with tax planning and tax filing.
• Ensure a secure environment for all financial data

Dashboard Accounting Services Include:

Accounts Receivable Processing

• Record sales invoices
• Invoice customers
• Send customer statements

Accounts Payable Processing

• Process vendor invoices
• Process approved vendor payments

Payroll

• Record third party payroll
• Prepare payroll
• Prepare payroll tax returns

Reconcile Balance Sheet Accounts

Controller Services

• Supervise and review bookkeeper
• Quarterly phone consultation
• Monthly financial report package
• Monthly “Dashboard Report”
• Quarterly management letter

Control Review

• Review management internal control
• Review standard operating procedures
• Review backup procedures

When looking to outsource, not only should you look at small business bookkeeping services, but make sure you use a small business accountant.

Dashboard Accounting offers outsourced bookkeeping and Accounting for small business owners around the Cleveland/Akron area.  Call Dashboard Accounting today to see how they can help you drive your business forward!

Dashboard Accounting

330-908-0888

www.DashboardAccounting.com

Are you looking for bookkeeping help in Cleveland or Akron?  Have you considered outsourced bookkeeping?

Outsourcing is not a new concept.   Currently, the following services are often outsourced:  Payroll, Pension Management, Taxes, Property Management, Mass marketing campaigns, Legal services and Insurance Services.

The construction industry is an example of a business model which outsources many tasks:   Electrician, Painter, Plumber, Carpenter…   In this arrangement, the General Contractor still has the responsibility for the project’s success.   You cannot delegate responsibility. 

This is often forgotten when a small business outsources bookkeeping.  Outsourced bookkeeping does not relieve the business owner of the responsibility for the company bookkeeping.   You cannot transfer ultimate responsibility. 

The rewards for outsourced bookkeeping can be high as long as the relationship and process is managed.   

Benefits to outsourcing are:

• Operating cost reduction or control
• Reducing current/future capital expenditures
• Flexibility to increase or decrease volume efficiently
• Quality improvement
• Obtaining current and ongoing expertise. 

What are the keys to outsourced bookkeeping while maintaining responsibility?  The keys are:

• Define what you want to outsource
• Review vendor’s certifications.   Do they have CPA’s on staff, Are they in the software they support. 
• Does the vendor have the proper business insurance?
• How will the workflow be handled?
• When will your books be completed/how often?
• Does the company assist you in interpreting your results?
• Does the company have proper segregation of duties?
• Are the appropriate security measures in place to protect your data?
• Is you work completed outside the US? 
• Are written procedures provided for the workflow?

You can fulfill your responsibility while outsourcing by evaluating the answers to the above questions and reviewing your results on a regular basis. 

When you think through this process, it is easy to see that outsourcing bookkeeping to a company is a huge value.    A professional bookkeeping company like Dashboard Accounting does nothing but maintain great people and systems in the United States that do bookkeeping for companies in Cleveland, Akron or anywhere.  There is a good chance Dashboard Accounting can lower your costs, improve your bookkeeping and eliminate the bookkeeper churn headache.  Plus they are offering up to 2 free hours of consultation just to see if there is an opportunity.  Why not book your free book keeping assessment today?

If you are a small business owner and you have been trying to do your own bookkeeping, you may find yourself in a situation where those documents come from the IRS or from the state taxation office and you really do not know what to do.  It might just be that you filed the wrong form or you did not know you needed to do something – and even if you do not owe money, you can still get financial penalties for skipping a report or missing a deadline.

If you have good bookkeeping help with a reputable bookkeeping firm you should be able to ask them to handle the issue for you.  1st, your virtual bookkeeper can call everyplace and figure out what the issues are.  Next they can help you organize the forms you need and lastly they should be able to help you through the process of resolving the issue.

Of course, if you have an internal bookkeeping staff, they should be doing this for you.  But if you are working with an outsourced bookkeeping firm you might not know that they can often do it for you as well.  This saves the small business owner a lot of time and will probably save them a lot of money too  – by addressing the tax issues quickly and getting them resolved.

Ever feel like a fire fighter?

As a small business owner, you may feel like you’re running non-stop – putting out one fire after another – without the time to really focus on the details of your business.

It’s easy to get behind and let the smaller tasks, like reconciling your bank statements. You know, the ones piling up on your desk. Trouble is that some of those smaller tasks on your accounting to-do list can turn into a real disaster if you don’t stay on top of things.

With Dashboard Accounting, there’s no reason to get behind.

When you need bookkeeping help – even part-time bookkeeping can make a huge difference for the health of your business.

Look at your bank reconciliations, for instance. If you’ve got a pile of envelopes from the bank filled with bank statements that deserve your attention, outsourced bookkeeping is a solution to consider to get it done – to protect your business.

Reconciling your business checking account each and every month allows your outsourced bookkeeper to keep your bank account, accounting, and taxes up-to-date.

Having Dashboard Accounting reconcile your account each month is one more level of protection against theft, loss and costly accounting errors.

Each month, we’ll help you:

• Identify lost checks, lost deposits and unauthorized wire transactions.
   
• Detect and prevent excess (and unnecessary) bank charges, ensuring all transactions are posted correctly by your bank.
   
• Detect and prevent embezzlement of funds from within your company.
   
• Keep you up to date on how your business is doing (You can’t really know where you are financially unless all accounts are reconciled, then properly accounted for on your financial statement.)
   
• Allow you to manage your cash better.
   
• Protect yourself from any unauthorized, fraudulent or forged checks presented to your bank and paid by that bank. (You can relieve your business of any responsibility for the shortfall of funds on your part, and transfer that risk to the bank. With the increase in crime, this reason to reconcile alone should be enough!)
   
• Ease your stress, knowing your bank accounts are reconciled, balanced and that all accounts, checks and disbursed funds are properly accounted for.

 Something as simple as checking over your bank statement against your activity can help protect you from risk and make your business stronger. No need to handle it yourself when you can outsource the hassle to the professionals at Dashboard Accounting. We’re here to help!

If you’re like many small business owners, you handle payroll yourself. Maybe you don’t trust using small business payroll services. Perhaps you get pleasure in personally handling the money, when each of your employees gets paid. Maybe you’re trying to save a few bucks by keeping it in-house instead of using a small business bookkeeping service.

Cutting paychecks once was much easier. But thanks to today’s laws… deductions and the IRS… the simple task of paying your staff has evolved into a time-consuming nightmare.

In fact, many payroll do-it-yourselfers don’t even realize how much time they spend on payroll alone. Recent studies showed that small business owners spend an average of eight hours a month performing payroll functions.

That’s 12 full days a year — over two working weeks! Wouldn’t that be better spent generating sales, prospecting new business opportunities, improving products or services, or servicing customers?

Instead of working on payroll, you could be generating more business so you actually can make payroll. Instead of cutting checks, you could be collecting them – from fresh sales.

In today’s competitive economy, it makes sense to outsource bookkeeping help and payroll, with small business accountant solutions that meet your business’s needs. Letting go of this one task will quickly let you to spend more time doing what you do best… like running your company.

Here’s why you should outsource your payroll:

• Save money – Use your staff more efficiently by letting professionals handle payroll and the associated legal details. This allows you to better contain your overhead, removing expense of specialized employees.
   
• Save time – Outsourced payroll services eliminate the hassle of customizing, updating and maintaining your own payroll system. No more data entry… no more researching updates or stressing about new laws… no more worries.
   
• Worry-Free Tax Filing – Eliminate the risks of calculating and filing your own payroll taxes. Have professional CPAs do it for you. Federal, state and local payroll tax laws always seem to be changing, becoming more complex. Your time can be better spent than researching new rules and updates.
• Easy-to-Understand Payroll Reports – You get a wide variety of user-friendly and accurate payroll reports. For a tiny fee, we can even include union reports, certified payroll, workers’ compensation reports and much more.
• Let the pros handle it - Our professional staff allows you to focus on the core competencies of your business. You get true accounting professionals working for you and with you.

When you’re ready for book keeping service — whether you need bookkeeping Akron or bookkeeping Cleveland — there are many bookkeeping firms and bookkeeping businesses from which to choose. At Dashboard Accounting, we specialize in virtual bookkeeping and outsource small business accounting services, giving our clients the complete financial picture and expert advice — all at a price that makes sense. We’re also QuickBooks certified, and can train you on small business software tax, payroll, and serve as a general accounting software consultant. For more details, go to www.DashboardAccounting.com.

Continuing on with the top ten mistakes made by small business owners

Forgetting to track reimbursements

Often owners will tell their employees to pick up items they need and then reimburse the  employees once they see them. These reimbursements are often paid with their personal funds, either cash from their pockets or their personal credit card. With this being the case, many owners normally forget to write it down or forget to mention it to the bookkeeper, so it goes undocumented, causing the owner to lose money in the end.

Not properly classifying employees.

Every company has different employees that have to be classified differently due to how they are paid and taxed. There are contractors, subcontractors, commission based, on-staff employee, ect. Certain forms must be filled out for each different type. If the wrong classification is done, it can cause headache and can be costly due to fines.

Dashboard Accounting is available and offers bookkeeping help to small and middle sized businesses. Contact Dashboard Accounting with any questions you have. Dashboard Accounting offers their book keeping service to the northeast Ohio, including Akron and Cleveland.

Why would you use an Outsourced Book keeping Service?

First, when you hear the word outsourced, you are thinking overseas.  Don’t.  Outsourcing book keeping or any other service just means you are not hiring an employee in your business to do the work.  Outsourcing is when you hire someone, or another company, to do the work for you instead.  In the right relationship, you will save time and headaches because you are not hiring, training and replacing a book keeper.

Think about his scenario.  Your company needs part time bookkeeping help.  You place an ad, interview lots of very nice people, get a few final candidates, reinterview those bookkeeper candidates, do a background check (they have access to your financials remember) and then you make an offer to the best candidate and hope they accept.  Then you do the paperwork, set your new part time book keeper up on payroll, begin paying his taxes and start the training process.

Are you done?  No.

Now you have to train that new hire in how to be a Quickbooks Pro.  You might send them to some courses, help them learn about small business tax issues, etc. etc.

At then end of this, hopefully you are happy.  If not, you have to get up the courage to fire them and start over because this is too important of an area to let be sloppy.

For the sake of this article, lets assume you like them and move on.  Now you are very happy with your new part time bookkeeper, but he or she now has a new set of skills and great experience, so they get bored and someone else makes them an offer for more money – and they accept.

Now you have to start all over – and what happens to your book keeping in the time it takes to do this whole process again?  How much money will you lose during the transition?

When you think through this process, it is easy to see that outsourcing bookkeeping to a company is a huge value.  Your CPA may suggest a company but they are usually way overpriced.  A professional bookkeeping company like Dashboard Accounting does nothing but maintain great people and systems in the United States that do book keeping for companies.  There is a good chance Dashboard Accounting can lower your costs, improve your book keeping and eliminate the book keeper churn headache.  Plus they are offering up to 2 free hours of consultation just to see if there is an opportunity.  Why not book your free book keeping assessment today?

Whether you believe it or not, bookkeeping is a significant part of a business. Of course it might not be the most exciting part of the business or the glamorous, it is however the heart of the company. Many small businesses do seek bookkeeping help, while others choose not to. There are many mistakes one can make but here are the Top Ten.

Not Saving Receipts-

Here there are two main points to look at. One, some business owners think that as long as they have their statements (Bank and Credit Cards) they are ok and do not need their receipts. Statements do not count. The reason is the statements are not like the receipts; statements do not give you a breakdown of the items you purchased. The IRS needs to see the receipts to they can make sure it is business related and not personal.

The other point is some do not keep receipts under 75 dollars. Yes, it is true that the IRS only requires receipts of 75 dollars and higher. However the lower receipts might prove to be useful come tax time. Everyone wants to ensure that they receive everything back that they are entitled to; keeping those receipts would help ensure that.

Doing it yourself-

Many small business owners choose to do their own bookkeeping. Outsource bookkeeping might be the smartest action a small business owner can do. The reason is, as the owner of a small business, your time is the most valuable. There are so many other details you could be focusing on, but you’re spending your time on your bookkeeping. Also not only does it give you more time it will give you peace of mind, knowing that your books are being kept by professionals who know the ins and outs of accounting. Hiring an accounting outsourcing service will prove to be beneficial with the fact that they have the skills needed and the ability to do the job quickly and efficiently.

Dashboard Accounting is available and offers bookkeeping help to small and middle sized businesses. Dashboard Accounting offers their book keeping service to the northeast Ohio, including Akron and Cleveland.

Most small business owners hope to at least break even, right? Trouble is that one bad calculation on your part can turn your profits into losses in a puff of smoke. “Now you see ‘em… now you don’t!” Like the magician who forgot to load the rabbit, you’re left standing there holding an empty hat, when your audience (your staff) is counting on you to deliver.

Virtual bookkeeping can help your small business can do better than that.

When times are tight, an outsourced book keeping or outsource CPA service can give you the bookkeeping help you need, while helping you run your business at greater efficiency. It helps make your “break even” and your profitability easier to manage.

A basic break-even analysis is the number of units you need to sell in order to make a profit of zero. When your total revenue equals your total costs, you’re at break even. That’s the sweet spot – anything over that amount is the gravy that makes business profitable and worthwhile.

To make this easy for you, plug in your fixed and variable costs and other details into the free calculator tool at the Dashboard Accounting website,  www.DashboardAccounting.com (see “Resources” for “Financial Calculators” for the Sales Volume Break-Even Analyzer).

But use your best judgment here. As wonderful as our free calculator tools are, they may not give you the complete picture… especially if you don’t have solid data to feed into the equation. (It helps is you use bookkeeping firms or at least part-time bookkeeping to make sure your data is up to date and accurate.)

For instance, one area often underestimated without a small business accountant is your fixed costs (versus variable costs). This is the sum of all costs involved in producing any product at all. This fixed-cost number should include the salary you ought to be paying yourself. Also remember that the fixed cost amount does not change as sales/production volume increases or decreases. Consider it your core expenses.

Professional small business accounting is highly valuable to your business growth. Once you have a solid break-even analysis, your expectations become clear. You can create realistic goals… and then have “stretch goals.” You’ll know your “at least” amount you can afford to sell… and then your specific requirements for increase from there.

When you outsource bookkeeping, you’ll have professionals helping you to gather the details you need so your calculations are based on fact — and not on hunches and “guesstimates”. It gives you the edge you need – for less than you’d expect to pay for the quality support you receive.

For more information about accounting outsourcing service, and great calculators and other business tools, check out www.DashboardAccounting.com.