What bookkeeping costs, and what moves the price

For basic ongoing bookkeeping, engagements commonly start around $1,000 per month with us. We also offer narrower packages for smaller businesses or businesses with simpler books.

Most of our clients need more than basic bookkeeping, so our ongoing engagements often land closer to $1,500 per month or more. Things like payroll, Washington B&O and sales tax filings, invoicing, bill pay, more complicated reporting, additional entities, or other ongoing accounting responsibilities can all change the scope.

That does not mean adding one of those things automatically makes your bill $1,500, and it definitely does not mean all of them together cost $1,500.

The price depends on exactly what we're responsible for, how much activity runs through the books, and overall how complicated the accounting process is.

Simple books cost less. More complicated books cost more.

Cleanup and special projects are always quoted separately.

Not every business needs us to own every piece of the accounting process.

We also offer packages that just cover the core bookkeeping work: categorizing transactions, reconciling the accounts, and providing monthly reporting without all of the extra pieces.

For a smaller business with straightforward books, that can be a much better fit.

If that sounds like what you need, ask us about it.

Regardless of which package you need, ongoing monthly work is quoted at a fixed monthly fee based on the work we're responsible for. We don't bill hourly for normal recurring bookkeeping.

Separate cleanup, reconstruction, systems work, and other defined projects may be priced as their own scope.

Two businesses can have the exact same revenue and have completely different accounting needs.

How much money your business brings in, by itself, doesn't tell us very much about how much accounting work is involved.

A sole proprietor with one bank account and one credit card needs a very different level of support than a contractor with five entities, multiple bank and credit card accounts, payroll, job costing, tax filings, and several systems feeding QuickBooks.

Those businesses should not cost the same.

What actually moves the number is the amount of work we're responsible for and how complicated that work is.

There isn't a formula where we count each item and spit out a number. This is simply what tends to create more or less work.

Basic ongoing bookkeeping is the core of every recurring bookkeeping engagement we provide.

At a minimum, that means categorizing the transactions, making sure each account is reconciled properly, and reviewing the balance sheet so the books can actually be closed.

That includes the accounts sitting behind the balance sheet, not just the checking account.

Depending on your business, we may be reconciling:

The goal is to get through the month with the accounting tied out and the books closed, not just categorize transactions and call it done.

These are common examples of recurring work our clients hire us to perform in addition to the core bookkeeping.

Each one is scoped around what you actually need, and we'll put the responsibilities in writing so everybody is on the same page.

Common examples include:

There isn't much we won't look at when it comes to the bookkeeping and accounting side of the business.

If what you need is less traditional, maybe a custom workflow around your CRM, data entry, accounting systems, reporting process, or how information moves between different tools, take a look at our Financial Systems work.

We're happy to help with that too. It just isn't the same thing as normal monthly bookkeeping.

Before we start a normal month of ongoing bookkeeping, what's already in QuickBooks needs to match the real-world balances at a bare minimum.

We don't want to build monthly reporting on top of history we already know is wrong.

One of the first things we'll do is look through the general ledger, trial balance, reconciliations, and supporting records to figure out where the books stopped matching what actually happened.

From there, everything that needs to be corrected between that point and the agreed current cutoff becomes the cleanup scope.

At the end of that process, we want the books brought current to an agreed date and the relevant balances supported by the bank statements and other records we're using to reconcile them.

Cleanup is always scoped separately after we've had a chance to look at the books.

A common starting point for pricing cleanup is the number of months that need work compared with what the ongoing monthly scope would normally cost, but every cleanup quote is adjusted for the actual condition of the books and what needs to be fixed.

We need to see the books before we're able to give you a responsible cleanup quote.

Most of the time, cleanup and ongoing bookkeeping are part of the same engagement.

Cleanup gets the books to an agreed starting point. The monthly scope is what keeps them right from there.

Normally, there is a one-time onboarding fee to get the engagement set up and establish a clean starting point.

If catch-up or cleanup is needed, that work is usually included in the initial scope. If you'd rather take care of the cleanup first before committing to ongoing bookkeeping, we can also quote it separately and handle it as a standalone project.

And if your cleanup is substantial, please don't assume that means we don't want to work with you.

If there are years of work, a large reconstruction, or something that needs to be handled over a longer period of time, we're happy to sit down and have that conversation with you.

We've helped businesses whose books were very far behind and very messy. We're comfortable walking into situations where there is a lot to fix.

Please don't let being embarrassed about the books, or feeling like you're too far behind, stop you from reaching out.

We've seen a lot.

Our job is not to make you feel bad about how the books got there. Our job is to figure out what's wrong, tell you what it will take to fix it, and help get the accounting side of the business back under control.

We want business owners to understand their numbers, stay in business, make good decisions, and have an accounting system they can actually rely on.

If the amount of work feels substantial, we're still willing to take a look.

Bookkeeping tells us what happened.

Advisory is what happens when you want us to spend more time helping you understand what the numbers mean and what to do with them.

That can include things like:

• KPI reporting
• Cash-flow planning
• Forecasting
• Budgeting
• Margin analysis
• Regular financial reviews
• Building controls around the accounting process
• Helping management understand what's changing inside the business

That work is not automatically included with basic bookkeeping.

If you need it, we'll scope it based on how much support you want and how often you want us involved.

Before we give you a number, we want to understand the business and look at the books.

We'll usually want to know:

If we can get access to the accounting file before we quote you, even better.

We'd rather look at the books first and give you a number we can stand behind than guess on a call and change it later.

If it's a fit, you'll receive a written engagement letter that lays out what we're responsible for, what you're responsible for, and what the monthly fee will be.

Ongoing monthly work is normally a 12-month agreement.

We know the workload is going to fluctuate a little from month to month.

You're not going to hear from us because one month had a few more transactions than another.

What you will hear from us about is when something significant changes inside the business and it materially changes the work we're responsible for.

If something significant changes, we'll have a conversation with you.

We're never going to just send you a larger invoice and tell you that's what you owe now because we decided the work was harder.

For us, that's about communication and having a high standard of respect for one another.

If the scope needs to change, we'll talk about it with you first. If the price needs to change with it, we'll talk about that too.

Nothing should be a surprise.