As a small business owner, you know that bookkeeping and accounting for your business should be in place starting from day one. It is one of the top tasks on your priority list, especially because it concerns your company's money. But with the various options these days—like hiring an in-house accountant and bookkeeper, freelancers, virtual assistants, and remote bookkeeping agencies—which one should you choose?
Although traditionally, companies hired in-house accountants and bookkeepers, modern times and the presence of technology has changed how things work. This article will highlight the nine benefits of partnering with a virtual bookkeeping firm.
1. Saves on Cost
Saving on costs is every business owner’s goal. If you want your online accounting and bookkeeping tasks to adhere to this goal, partnering with a virtual bookkeeper services company is the way to go.
With a virtual bookkeeping service, there is so much you can save. You do not have to worry about office space or wasted office resources for a physical bookkeeper and accountant. Also, you do not need to add more employees to your company’s operational costs. You can choose whether to hire a full-time or part-time remote bookkeeper or accountant, depending on how much work you need done.
2. Flexible and Varied Plans
Unlike hiring permanent staff with fixed pay, you can pick plans that match your budget and company needs with virtual bookkeeping companies. To get the best plan, first determine what assistance your company needs.
Of course, you need your books to be updated, so this must be included in the plan. Do you also need monthly financial statements, balance sheets, cash flow, and other financial reports? Do you need bank and credit card reconciliation, team meetings, forecasting, and unlimited support? Check out the offers in each plan and see which among them satisfies what you need.
To get the best plan for your business, comparing and contrasting offers is best. Many companies schedule discovery calls to know your exact needs. This way, they can customize their offers, and you can make the most of your investment.
3. Ready With Bookkeeping and Accounting Software
There are various bookkeeping, accounting, taxation, and optical character recognition (OCR) technologies an online bookkeeping service firm utilizes to give you superb service. These software should not cost extra; your partner agency should already have these.
Bookkeeping and accounting software like QuickBooks Online, Xero, Sage50 Cloud, and Freshbooks have these features for your convenience:
- Accounts receivable and payable tracking
- Payment integration into the accounting system
- Bank and credit card reconciliation
- Reports generation
- Time and project tracking
- Integration with different applications
Meanwhile, tax software will help you determine and compute the correct tax you need to pay in just a few clicks. Save and convert documents and receipts from images to text with the help of OCR tools.
4. Work With Experienced Professionals
Skip the hassle of posting jobs, scanning resumes, and interviewing candidates to hire the right accountant and bookkeeper. A partner agency will make sure that the bookkeepers and accountants they have satisfy these characteristics:
- Skilled in working with numbers
- Great attention to detail and an eye for accuracy
- Well-versed in different bookkeeping and accounting technologies
- Armed with bookkeeping and accounting certifications (e.g., Certified Public Accountant)
- Solid experience in the field
Aside from the qualifications, firms keep these bookkeepers and accountants competitive through continuous training. If new certifications and licenses come, firms ensure their staff get them first.
5. Trained to Work With Clients
Aside from the hard skills, agencies also equip their bookkeepers and accountants with soft skills. Service providers should double the quality of customer service when the work is remote. Your partner experts should ensure that all your concerns are always attended to.
Some key skills remote bookkeepers and accountants have are their ability to communicate with clients, superb critical thinking and problem-solving skills, ability to lead, a positive mindset and attitude, willingness to work in a team, and professionalism.
Even if your partner experts are not with you in the office, these skills are essential for your partnership to last.
6. Well-Versed With Sales Tax Laws
Whether your experts work remotely or in-house, sales tax laws are one of the financial areas that are most difficult to handle. This is because the rulings are subject to the prerogative of localities and provinces. Amending sales tax regulations can happen anytime. To make it more difficult, sales taxes aren’t the same for each location. Some places base their sales tax rate on the package's destination, while some base it on the source.
The advantage of remote bookkeepers and accountants is their experience handling many accounts. Their knowledge of sales taxes isn’t only from the books but from experience in handling sales taxes of their clients from different locations.
7. Income and Corporate Taxes
What are income and corporate taxes? The two are similar only in that they’re based on annual incomes: income taxes are taxes applied to personal annual income. Meanwhile, corporate taxes are the dues you need to pay based on your company’s annual income. Income taxes of your employees, if you already have some, are also responsibilities you need to take on through a payroll service. You can get these done swiftly with the help of remote bookkeepers and accountants.
Through the help of accounting and bookkeeping software, annual income and knowing the dues you need to pay can be easily computed. Many firms also offer to file your taxes either themselves or through partner accredited tax filing agencies.
8. Receive Financial Reports Conveniently
When partnered with a remote team, you do not need to go through all the hassle of getting dressed and waking up early to meet in a conference room. Do you prefer to get reports by email, skipping long meetings? You can opt to do so. You can also determine how often calls and meetings should happen. Plus, you do not need to dress up if it is inconvenient for you; reports occur online and with cameras off if you decide. Despite these differences, you still get the same balance sheets, financial statements, and payroll reports.
9. Everything Done Online
If you decide that a virtual bookkeeping service is right for you, signing up is just a few calls and clicks away. No hassle is needed to visit physical offices as all transactions are done online. There are various processes, but here is a sample of how Unloop caters to clients:
Step 1: Discovery Call
Book a Zoom call at a convenient time for you. You can do this by clicking our website's “Book now” button. In this 45-minute call, we’ll get to know you and your business.
Step 2: Pricing Call
This call usually lasts for 30 minutes. This is when we’ll lay out three proposals based on the needs you communicated during the first call.
Step 3: Onboarding
Finally, when you sign up for our service, we’ll begin work immediately to ensure your books are updated and your financial health is always monitored.
Unloop Remote Bookkeeping Services
If you are still on the fence about whether or not to outsource your online bookkeeping services, we hope that this article has helped sway you in the right direction. By outsourcing to a remote team of professionals, you can save yourself time, money, and headaches down the road. Not only will you be working with experienced accountants, but you will also have access to a wide range of bookkeeping and accounting software platforms that they are familiar with.
And if this isn’t enough reason to switch over, know that our team is also well-versed in sales tax laws across different states so that you don’t have to worry about any surprise audits.
Ready to get started? Contact us today for a free consultation!