Outsourced bookkeeping: In-house bookkeeping vs outsourced bookkeeping
Bookkeeping is essential for every business but employing a full-time bookkeeper can be expensive and cumbersome for many SMEs.
If you don’t currently have a bookkeeping system in place, there’s no time to lose. In this article, we take a look at the benefits of using an outsourced bookkeeping and accounting service and how it compares in terms of cost and benefit to hiring a full-time bookkeeper.
What is bookkeeping all about?
Entrepreneurs who don’t have an in-depth finance background sometimes underestimate the importance of bookkeeping, but a comprehensive set of books is an essential first step in understanding your company’s income, expenses and profitability.
Here’s how the bookkeeping process works.
- All the transactions your company does, be they revenues or expenses, need to be recorded in your set of financial records – also known as books.
- The process of recording financial details like these is called bookkeeping, and it needs to be carried out in a specific way so that your books can be understood by any accountant to comply with SARS requirements and accounting standards.
- The information from your accounting entries will be used to produce the three main financial statements that every business requires: the income statement, cash flow statement, and balance sheet.
If your bookkeeping process is chaotic or doesn’t follow industry best practices, the accuracy of your financial statements will suffer – and this can have bad consequences from the point of view of taxes and profitability.
Hiring a bookkeeper vs. using an outsourced bookkeeping & accounting service
Now that we’ve explored the reasons why bookkeeping is so important, the next question for any business owner is: should you hire a bookkeeper or outsource your accounting to a professional accounting service like Bletchleys?
Given the cost and HR implications of hiring a full-time employee, there are several excellent reasons why an outsourced solution is more efficient for most small businesses:
- It’s cheaper. The cost of outsourcing your bookkeeping requirements is almost certain to be lower than recruiting and hiring a full-time bookkeeper for your business. In fact, outsourcing your bookkeeping and accounting to Bletchleys will come at a fraction of the cost of a dedicated finance department in your business.
- Skills and reliability. Vetting a potential bookkeeping candidate can be tricky if you don’t have an in-depth accounting background. Rather than taking this risk, opting for an outsourced bookkeeping solution means you’ll have peace of mind knowing that a team of professionals is on the job.
- Focused expertise. Outsourcing your bookkeeping and accounting needs means that you have full-time knowledge and accounting expertise on your team, without having to pay for it on a 24-hour basis. You also have an offsite team who are fully focussed on accounting practices and not distracted by the busyness of other business.
- Avoiding HR headaches. Hiring a full-time employee or even a part-time bookkeeper comes with a raft of employer’s responsibilities and labor law compliance obligations. An outsourced service simplifies this process significantly – and unlike a full time bookkeeper they’re never sick or on leave.
- Access to leading tools. By choosing to outsource your bookkeeping and accounting needs you have additional access to the top tools and software that you wouldn’t necessarily be able to afford or spend time on keeping up with changes in laws and regulations.
Let us handle your bookkeeping needs
To ensure that your company’s financial records are kept professionally, you need an efficient outsourced bookkeeping solution that matches your company’s needs exactly.
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