Outsourcing your bookkeeping is a great way to save your managed IT services firm both time and money. As an IT specialist, working with technology and cloud-based systems is something that you specialize in. However, you should be spending your time assisting clients, not slaving over tedious bookkeeping tasks.
Outsourcing your bookkeeping needs to a team of trained professionals comes with a long list of benefits for your managed IT services firm, including:
1. Consistent bookkeeping
Hiring an outsourced bookkeeping team means having a dedicated resource to manage your books consistently throughout the year.
They can help you track your expenses, create financial reports like balance sheets, income statements, cash flow statements, and can track your sales tax liabilities, pay your vendors, do invoicing and billing. Furthermore, they should also be able to help you track deferred revenue to ensure your revenue is recorded and recognized accurately. They will keep your books up to date, so you have a complete understanding of the financial health of your business.
Working with an outsourced bookkeeping firm will also give you access to bookkeeping professionals and accountants that have years of experience working with a wide range of businesses and industries. In addition, an outsourced bookkeeping team can help you manage your payroll and accounts receivables functions for staff members and contractors.
2. Proper SR&ED tracking
As a Managed IT Service Provider, you might be eligible for grants or other government tax incentive programs like SR&ED and IRAP. These programs require you to create specific reports for funders, and you will need an outsourced bookkeeper that understands your reporting requirements and can help you create them.
If you do qualify for the Scientific Research & Experimental Development (SR&ED) tax incentive program, you want to ensure that your bookkeeper understands how to track your SR&ED eligible expenses.
An outsourced bookkeeping firm like Enkel can help you keep track of your SR&ED eligible expenses and make sure they are recorded clearly. They can also liaise directly with your SR&ED consultant and year-end tax accountant for annual filing, ensuring you receive the credits that your business is entitled to.
3. Financial visibility
Outsourcing your bookkeeping can take away many of your problems, such as taking care of your day-to-day accounting and financial reporting that will allow you to understand how each project is actually performing compared to what you have budgeted and give you clarity on your overall profitability.
They can help you monitor the cash flowing in and out of your business, giving you the cash flow visibility you need to identify potential cash flow issues ahead of time.
4. Technological expertise
Outsourced bookkeeping teams usually work remotely and communicate with your team virtually.
This means that they utilize cloud-based technology to collaborate with your team and streamline your accounting process. They also know which accounting software and tools work best for your business and can help you implement these applications and migrate your data, all while managing your books.
Some common accounting tools include:
- Dext Prepare - This tool can help you capture receipts and invoices and store them safely in the cloud, leaving a clear audit trail.
- QuickBooks Online - This tool is excellent for managing all of your accounting records, project financials, and generating reports.
- Plooto - Plooto can help you make electronic payments to your vendors.
- QuickBooks Time - This is a great tool to help you with project time tracking.
Your outsourced bookkeeping firm can provide your team with all of the required training for these tools, while improving the efficiency of your bookkeeping processes.
5. Time Efficiency and cost-effectiveness
When running a managed services business, your focus should be on customer satisfaction and smooth service delivery, not bookkeeping.
When you decide to outsource your bookkeeping, you can spend less time on manual data entry and, therefore, less time keeping your books up to date. Your bookkeeper might still have some questions about how to code certain transactions, but they can save you a significant amount of time on having to either do your own books or having to train and manage your own bookkeeping staff.
Outsourcing your bookkeeping can also result in a reduction of payroll costs. You won't have to pay an employee to manage your books and, therefore, won't have to pay their deductions, vacation pay, and benefits. Plus, you won't have to deal with the hassle of employee turnover.
If you are looking for an excellent way to save your business a great deal of time and money, all while maintaining complete financial visibility and having access to the most up-to-date financial data, outsourcing is the solution you require.
At Enkel, we can help you manage your books and also provide other services such as payroll support and custom financial reporting. For a complete list of all the services we offer or for more information on how we can help your managed IT services firm, contact us today.
How We Select and Evaluate Our Software Recommendations
We thoroughly research and test the apps we include in our regular workflow for Client bookkeeping services. After deciding on criteria for evaluating the software and then researching the app itself, we tested the app, noting its strengths and weaknesses. We then work with the app for at least a few weeks before deciding whether to recommend it to our readers. We use the software as it was designed for its intended tasks. For a detailed walk-through of how we select and evaluate software, please see the details of our process.
