Agility for your business
By having well-maintained books and processes, you will gain a clearer picture on your financial and operating position.
In addition, by having the added benefit of centralising your information into a cloud-based system means that you can access information on your business real-time, enabling you to make well-informed decision or pivot where necessary.
Relationships are also critical to good business practices. Having an outsourced bookkeeping team can enable you to streamline your accounts payable and receivable processes, minimising delays and keeping you in good standing with your customers and suppliers.
Peace of mind
A robust, well-resourced bookkeeping team should be able to deliver year-round coverage to ensure that your business’ needs are always met. This means that your business should not be subject to staffing ebbs and flows, such as annual leave, sick leave and staffing changes.
Fixed costs
With a seasoned bookkeeping team, you should benefit from being able to negotiate the scope of work and subsequent fees upfront. In a well-resourced bookkeeping partner, this means that your supplier can work on a fixed fee model that suits your business requirements
Your supplier should also be able to provide experienced and qualified staff in whom they invest training and ongoing development at their own expense. This means that you should no longer have to worry about bearing the ongoing internal costs of hiring, training and managing (and paying) bookkeeping staff because your provider will have it covered.
Scalability
An experienced bookkeeping supplier should be equipped to work with you in any number of ways – whether it be the full outsourcing of your accounts and bookkeeping functions, or taking care of a single component of the bookkeeping function; whatever suits your overall needs. And if your needs change, your bookkeeping partner should have the ability to scale accordingly and in a timely fashion.
Easier collaboration
The strength of your team working towards the common goal of your business is key. Regardless of whether you use outsourcing to complement your internal team, a well-established external bookkeeping team should act as an extension of your team. They should be able to provide tangible examples and referees that can attest to how they have helped alleviate time, divided focus and burden from the internal staff of other organisations
It is also critical that your operational bookkeeping translate seamlessly into the information that your Accounting Partner requires to meet your business’ compliance and reporting needs. Regardless of whether your accounting partner sits on the other side of the country, or next door to your bookkeeping partner, having your processes and information well-documented and organised into an accessible, multi-user, cloud-based environment means less time spent (and billed) sorting through the information
More security
The nightmare of all business owners is the impact of a fatal hardware/ software/ server crash. With so many businesses storing key information on spreadsheets and on desktops, the vulnerability to an unforeseen computer crash is fodder for business nightmares. Informed, modern, outsourced bookkeeping teams help to alleviate these fears. Supported through a cloud-based environment, your day-to-day financial operations are run and backed up in the cloud. Goodbye local hardware, software (or personnel!) crashes!
Check that the credentials and listed partners of your bookkeeping team match your expectations of a supplier that is constantly evolving, staying on top of the changing technology and qualified to assist your business get the most out of the available tech and software. Is your provider a Xero Platinum Partner? Are they well-versed with MYOB and Quickbooks and other legacy systems? Without proven experience with a variety of systems, it might be questionable as to whether they will be equipped to ensure that your everyday bookkeeping information is accessible at the touch of a button.
Specialised expertise
If you are going to outsource a function of your business, you will want to ensure that you have access to a talent pool of highly skilled bookkeeping professionals whose key focus is delivering accurate and timely results for your business.
The following should be queried when looking into a supplier:
- How often their Team Members actively participate in ongoing professional up-skilling.
- How the organisation ensures that their knowledge base is up-to-the- minute.
- What are the rigorous standards that they adhere to.
- Who oversees that their standards are assessed and met, ongoing?
Free up your headspace
Finally, no plan for success is complete without a roadmap to get there. Ensuring that your bookkeeping processes match your businesses’ needs are critical in enabling your operation to run as efficiently and effectively as possible. Experienced bookkeeping providers should be able to articulate how they would go about assessing, discussing, designing, and onboarding processes to (better) support your business, if needed.
A great bookkeeping team will ensure adherence to your approved processes, making sure that the right people are responsible for the right approvals and that the information they provide gets to the bookkeeping team in a fast and accurate manner. And the all-critical on-boarding process should allow for minimal to no downtime, so that your day-to-day operations are uninterrupted, and efficiencies felt from day one.
