AuthorConner Schryver is the founder and CEO of Bookkeep & Prosper 
This guide to the top 10 accounting mistakes and solutions is the launch board to getting your accounting on the right track.
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January 2025
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The unexpected shutdown of Bench Accounting has left many of its customers scrambling to transition their financial operations. The news came abruptly, with Bench announcing on December 27th that its services would cease immediately, leaving users with limited access to their financial records until March 7th. For many small business owners, this development was not just inconvenient—it was a wake-up call.
As the founder of Bookkeep & Prosper, I wanted to share my reaction to Bench’s closure, the lessons it teaches us about choosing financial service providers, and how to ensure your business is protected from similar disruptions. What Happened with Bench Accounting? Bench Accounting was a well-funded, venture-backed company that combined automation and AI-powered tools with bookkeeper support. They offered an affordable entry point for bookkeeping services, which made them an appealing choice for small businesses. However, this shutdown suggests that financial instability was likely at the heart of their sudden closure, despite having raised significant venture capital. Employers.com has since acquired Bench’s assets, but the transition has left many users questioning their next steps. Key Lessons for Business Owners 1. Beware of Unsustainable Pricing Models Bench offered its services at a low cost, which is appealing for businesses looking to reduce expenses. However, pricing that seems “too good to be true” often comes with hidden risks. Companies operating on unsustainable business models may compromise on service quality, rely heavily on external funding, or collapse under financial pressure. At Bookkeep & Prosper, we’ve built a financially sound and sustainable model from day one. Our pricing reflects the quality, stability, and reliability of the services we provide to our clients. 2. Choose Stability Over Hype While innovation and technology play an important role in modern bookkeeping, they should complement—not replace—core financial principles and human expertise. Firms like Bench, backed by venture capital, can prioritize rapid growth over long-term stability. As a business owner, it’s essential to choose a bookkeeping partner that is focused on meeting your needs rather than satisfying investors. 3. Prioritize Financial Transparency and Timeliness The closure of Bench highlights the importance of having a dependable partner for accurate and timely financial insights. Without clear financial data, businesses struggle to make informed decisions about cash flow, growth strategies, and investments. At Bookkeep & Prosper, we prioritize providing actionable insights that empower you to make the right decisions for your business. 4. Conduct Vendor Due Diligence Before partnering with any financial service provider, take the time to evaluate their stability, business model, and track record. Ask questions like: • Are they profitable? • Do they have a solid reputation for reliability? • What happens if the service provider shuts down? How Bookkeep & Prosper Stands Out At Bookkeep & Prosper, we’re proud to offer:
Protecting Your Business Finances For businesses impacted by Bench’s closure—or for those seeking a more stable alternative—the key takeaway is this: your bookkeeping provider should enhance your business, not add uncertainty. If you’re searching for a reliable bookkeeping partner, Bookkeep & Prosper is here to help. Let’s work together to build a strong financial foundation for your business, giving you the tools to grow with confidence. Resources for Bench Users Read more about the closure and industry reactions in this article by Ryan Francis on Woodard. Want to learn more about how we can help your business? Contact us today for a free consultation. Let’s ensure your financial operations are always in good hands. Schedule a Discovery Call
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Creating a budget for your business might sound like a daunting task, but armed with the right tools and methodology, it becomes a powerful tool to guide your financial success. In this guide, we'll delve into the step-by-step process of crafting an effective budget that not only helps you achieve your short and long-term goals but also maintains its relevance as your business evolves.
Step 1: Define Your Objectives Before diving into numbers, it's essential to clarify your business objectives. Are you aiming to increase profits, expand your reach, launch new products, or streamline operations? Identifying these goals serves as a compass for your budgeting journey. Step 2: Leveraging Insightful Tools One tool that proves invaluable in this process is Fathom, a comprehensive financial analysis platform. Let's take an example of increasing gross profit by $100,000 over the next year. By adjusting variables like pricing and volume, Fathom helps you visualize the necessary changes to achieve your goal. Step 3: Gather Historical Data Historical data from your accounting system provides a foundation for your budget. Fathom seamlessly imports data from QuickBooks or other systems, creating a comprehensive overview of your financial history. Step 4: Set Realistic Revenue Goals Estimating your revenue involves considering your historical performance and forecasting future trends. Whether you're maintaining steady growth or aiming for aggressive expansion, this step helps you chart your financial course. Step 5: Plan Operating and Non-Operating Expenses Creating an accurate budget means factoring in both operating expenses (like salaries, rent, and supplies) and non-operating expenses (interest payments, taxes, investments). This step ensures your budget captures all financial aspects. Step 6: Calculate Net Income With revenue and expenses defined, you can now calculate your net income. This figure is vital in assessing your business's profitability and financial health. Step 7: Allocate Resources for Success Allocate resources strategically to achieve your goals. Consider departmental needs, surplus funds, and any upcoming projects. This step ensures your budget aligns with your objectives. Step 8: Create a Flexible Roadmap Incorporate flexibility into your budget by planning for various scenarios. Create best-case, worst-case, and moderate-case scenarios to anticipate potential challenges and opportunities. Step 9: Ongoing Forecasting Regularly review and adjust your budget to keep it relevant. Incorporate actual data and monitor your progress against projections. An ongoing forecast ensures your budget remains a dynamic and accurate tool. Step 10: Collaborate and Communicate Maintain open communication with your team, consultants, and financial experts. Regularly share budget updates and collaborate on adjustments to ensure everyone is aligned with your financial goals. Step 11: Continuous Improvement Use each budgeting cycle as a learning opportunity. Analyze past budgets, identify areas for improvement, and refine your budgeting process for greater accuracy and effectiveness. Crafting an effective business budget might seem complex, but with the right tools, methodology, and a commitment to ongoing refinement, you can harness its power to drive your business toward success. By following these comprehensive steps, you'll not only create a budget but also cultivate a financial strategy that propels your business to new heights. If you're ready to embark on a budgeting journey that transforms your business, schedule a discovery call with us to explore how we can help you achieve your financial goals. To learn more about how we can help you determine and reach your business goals schedule a discovery call!
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What are reconciliations? Reconciling is where you tie your accounting back to a source of truth. Most reconciliation is reconciling bank accounts. So, you are reconciling all the transactions you have made over the course of a month or whatever the accounting period is back to the actual statement from that financial institution. Now, it does not necessarily always have to be bank accounts, but that is the most common. You might also do this for your loans, make sure you have recorded the right amount of payments on your loans and the interest and that it is all done correctly. You may do this for your merchant accounts, whether you are using Shopify or Stripe, you want to reconcile that the balances at the end of the month held in Stripe or in Shopify or wherever else match what the actual statements show. So, let us dive in and take a look at how this works: Now, you will typically see it here on QuickBooks. This is going to be your typical landing page on QuickBooks online. You will be in this, Get things done tab right here.   Now, what you will want to do is navigate down to the Bookkeeping tab  and from here, select Reconcile, and this will be the opening screen, but you just go ahead and say, Get started.  And then you can say, Let’s get reconciled.  So, this should be the screen. Once you get through those opening screens for the first time you use the functions, you will land on this screen.  So, you can see here that they do provide an option for you to watch Stuart’s video on how to reconcile. I am going to walk you through that myself. So, you can go ahead and close that right there.  Now, what we should see here is that you will be in account selection here. So, in your chart of accounts, right, which is what they are showing here, these are all the different items that QuickBooks allows you to reconcile.  We should see several different bank accounts. We are going to go ahead and reconcile the checking account and that is where we are going to start.  So, typically what you will see here is that, if you have never reconciled before you will not see any reconciliations here, and now if you have, it will tell you when the last reconciliation that you performed was. So, in this case, I just went in here and added this last reconciliation as of April 30th, 2022.  And what they will show you here is your beginning balance. And now what is your new ending balance and what is the ending date? Now you will find these on the actual statement. So, let us pull up this statement for May of 2022. Typically, you will be able to see this as a PDF that you can download from your bank account, or you may have a paper statement somewhere. Now, this is not a true statement. This is just a report I made to help us facilitate this video, but you will typically see a couple of key items here. You will see the start and end dates. In this case, we can see for all of May of 2022. Now we will also see here that they are going to show a beginning balance here. And so, we can see the beginning balance there and we can check to see that it matches what we have in QuickBooks. Now we will also see here that they are going to show a beginning balance here. And so, we can see the beginning balance there and we can check to see that it matches what we have in QuickBooks. So, let us do that first. Now, back in QuickBooks, we can see that the beginning balance does match, that is $4,349.46. And that does match right here, $4,349.46.  Now there will be an ending balance too. And typically, these are shown at the top of your statement, but in this case, we just are showing them here on the balance side of things. So, we have starting balance right here, and we have ending balance right down here. So, I am going to go ahead and copy this ending balance, and I will add it to our reconciliation sheet.  Now that we are back here in the reconciliation screen, I will go ahead and add that ending balance and the ending date; I can go ahead and select May 31st.  So that is the end of the statement. Now what we can do now is just go ahead and select Start reconciling.  Now, if you would like to have a little bit more space on your screen, there are a couple of options here. One is this expansion button here or the hamburger icon.  If you select that, it is going to collapse the sidebar menu, or you can select it again to open that menu back up. Now you can also collapse this upper section here. If you want to be able to see more of the transactions and you can also expand that down with this little arrow, we will go ahead and leave it open.  As we do not need to have that much space for the purposes of this video. Now, what you will see on this screen is that we have added the statement ending date, we have the statement ending balance, and we have the cleared balance. (So cleared balances are the balance you have marked as cleared and the transactions are in and showing that).  Now on your statement, you will typically have total money out and total money in as well. And so that is an easy way to show what those two amounts are as QuickBooks is going to calculate it right here, as we select transactions. Now, I do not have that showing on our particular statement, but that is something you will typically see on your statement and so, if the balance is off, you can take a look at these numbers once you have selected all the transactions and say, “I do not have enough payments” or “I do not have enough deposits coming in or out of my account and that is where I need to look for errors.” In this case, what I will typically do is select all the transactions to see where we land.  And as we do that, or we can just go one at a time. And so, you can see here as we select these transactions, so these are transactions we have already entered into QuickBooks, so QuickBooks has these recorded, and now we are checking them against the actual statement. So, you can see here on 05/04, we had a check, and it was for fuel to Chin's Gas.  Now, if we check the statement, you can see here on 05/04, we had a check for Chin's Gas and Oil, and that was for a fuel expense.  Anyway, this is all categorized in QuickBooks, your bank not might have this much detail in here, but they should have the amount, whether it was a check, and they may have some information on who it was to. Some statements, also show check images towards the end of the statement and so, your bank may do that as well. And if you do have more questions about who the check was for, you can typically log into your bank account and look at a scanned image there as well. But we can see that this transaction is in here. It is for $62.01. And now looking back at the reconciliation screen, you can see here, the payment $62.01.  Now you can go line by line and as you select them you can see the amounts update, the deposits are updating, and the payments are updating right here. And you can see the difference that you still have between the statement ending balance and the cleared balance, which is the balance that is incorporating all of these items we have selected. Now, what I will typically do is go ahead and select all of the transactions. And there may be some already preselected in here, on your behalf by QuickBooks and that is fine. I will just make sure that the total amounts match what we show on the statement and that the difference here is zero. So, you will know the difference is zero when it says zero, and there is a little green check mark.  Now we can still see there could be a case where these deposits and payments did not match up in terms of the totals here for the month. But in this case, I know it does and so we have matched the cleared balance and I can go ahead and click select to Finish now.  You will have the option here to attach a statement, depending on which level of QuickBooks subscription you may have, but you can attach the statement right to the reconciliation, that way if your CPA or any of your financial professionals need to review that in the future, they have the statement right there and they can review it. Now let us take another look at doing another reconciliation and this time maybe one that is not quite so clean: So, we have another statement here. This one is for June of 2022, and we have a starting balance. I will go ahead and copy that starting balance. And I am just highlighting it and using command C on a Mac or control C on a PC. Now I will add that to the ending balance, and we can see that the beginning balance matches. So actually, what I needed to copy was the ending balance down here, which is $1,201. Go ahead and copy that. Now I can add that ending balance and I can add the ending date. And so, this statement is for June so I will go ahead and select June 30th, 2022, and I can Start reconciling.   So, we are on that same screen. Now we have got our statement ending balance. We have the ending date, we have the cleared balance payments in our payments out and deposits in. So let us go ahead and select all of the transactions as we normally would to make sure to see if a quick way if we are already ready to reconcile. So, in this case, we are not ready to reconcile, as you can see we have selected all the transactions, but there is actually a difference here. And so the cleared balance is not matching the ending balance.  So, what we need to do is go and investigate the statement. Now there are a couple of different ways we can do this. What I am going to do is show you there are different ways to troubleshoot this part. Now when you do have errors and you need to go and check: The first thing we will do is go back to the statement. So, in the statement here, right, we have all the transactions. So, what we would typically do is go line by line and go back through and actually check these off one at a time, as opposed to checking them off all at once. Now, I am not going to do that during this video, that would be time-consuming, and you do not need to see me checking off item by item, but there are a couple of things we can do, to check quickly. Now you remember I copied the total amount that we were off by, so if we are only off by one transaction item, one thing you can check is you can do a search of a document. So, if you are looking at a PDF document that has searchable rights, not just a picture, then we can look for that specific amount. Now on a Mac, I am going to press command F or on a PC, and we are going to do command-control F and that is going to pop up a little search window up here.  I am going to go ahead and paste the amount in there, and then I will press enter.  And that is searching the document for this amount. What we can see here is that there is a check here for Hicks Hardware on 06/08 for $228.75. Now, if we go to look for that amount in QuickBooks, that was on 06/08. So, if we scroll down to 06/08, you can see that there is a deposit of $868.15, and there is an expense of Legal & Professional Fees to Pam Seitz for $75. But there is not actually that check to Hicks Hardware. So, we can see that that transaction is missing. So, we need to add that into QuickBooks.   Now, how can we do that? There is a button up here. It says New.  If there's a plus button and it says New in this menu, that is a great way to do most of the transactions you are going to need to do on a regular basis for your accounting. Now, I will tell you this, if this menu is collapsed, a plus button will pop up right here in the middle of the screen, and you can still access this menu.  So, when you select that menu, there are going to be different options popping up here in terms of different areas to make a transaction, or to access something within QuickBooks.  Now, if you select it over here, it may present basically in the same way (the New Menu). So, this was a check, so we are going to go to the vendors, and we are going to select Check.  Now, check dates are typically before they are deposited, but in this case, we are going to go ahead and use the same date we had on the menu. Now we need to choose a payee, and this was for Hicks Hardware.  So, we can see it there. This is coming out of the Checking account.  So, you do need to select which account. So, if it was coming out of savings, you need to select Savings otherwise, it will not match up.  In this case, we can see there is actually a purchase order here that we had added to QuickBooks. And so we can add that in, but I am not going to do that. For example, I am going to go ahead and add the check number, I think it was 5, let us double-check that. I am glad I did. That was from the previous month. We can see this is check number 75. So let us go ahead and update that amount. All right.  So, the check number is 75 and the category is going to be Maintenance and Repair. And the description I will just put in here, Supplies for Repair, I will put in that amount, $228, 75.  These appear in different ways in QuickBooks and memos are great to have. I would suggest always having a memo and descriptions can make it easier, especially if you wanted to make this itemized, you can put in here, you know, paint, plaster, whatever else you needed to add. And then you could have a memo that sort of replies for all but if you want to itemize it, that is a great way, but I will typically add a description in both locations. And now if you have an image of the check or a receipt, you can also attach that here. Where you could have scanned it, or you can take a screenshot and add it right here.  And that is a great way to make your books have all their receipts matched, and then you do not need to actually save the receipt physically. You can just have it here attached in QuickBooks. So, we have made this check. It is for 06/08. The same date is for Hicks Hardware, check number 75. We will go ahead and Save and close.  And now we will see when we scroll down, that there is a new transaction here that has not been selected. Let us go ahead and select that transaction.  And now we can see that we have that transaction selected. The difference is zero, the statement ending balance, and the cleared balance match, our payments out, and our deposits in match what we have on this statement. And we are ready to be finished. Now, if you ever need to leave the screen and come back, you can select this down arrow here on the top. And you can say, Save for later.  And then you can come back to that reconciliation later and resume it. But for now, we are just going to finish. You can also Close without saving, but we do not need to do that.  We will finish now, we have reconciled this account.
And, so now we have done two months of reconciliations. you have seen what it looks like when there is a transaction missing and a little bit on how to add one. Now, if you need to know more about how to add different types of transactions in the future, different types of expenses or payments or receiving payments, we will cover those in separate videos. This is just to give you a basic overview of how to do your reconciliations, how to match up what you see on the bank statement with what is in QuickBooks, and how to adjust for any transactions that may not match, or that need to be added in QuickBooks. Thanks for watching. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns and what we can review for you in the future.
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Help! How Do I Start My Business?10/24/2020
For many would-be entrepreneurs, the hurdles of starting a business can seem overwhelming. Fortunately, with the amount of information available on the internet, understanding the legal and practical steps to get your new business up and running is easier than ever.
To help you out I’ve compiled helpful articles from a few companies leading business service and business advice industries. How to start a business in 17 steps - From Quickbooks
Quickbooks - helps you manage all aspects of your business
Quickbooks is the industry leader in providing bundled accounting, payroll, accounts payable, accounts receivable, and point of sale software. The essentials of starting a small business: paperwork, legalities, and tax requirements - From Melio
Melio - The Simplest Way to Pay Vendors & Contractors
Melio offers an innovative and cost-effective way for small businesses to coordinate remote bill pay with multiple approvers. The Complete, 12-Step Guide to Starting a Business - From Entrepreneur
Entrepreneur - Start, run, and grow your business.
Since 1977 Entrepreneur Magazine has provided valuable advice, profiles, and “top” business lists to its subscribers around the world. Starting a Business - From the IRS
Internal Revenue Service - An official website of the United States Government
The Internal Revenue Service or IRS is a bureau of the Department of Treasury and responsible for collecting taxes and administering the Internal Revenue Code. Need a Business Idea? Here Are 55. - From Entrepreneur
Entrepreneur - Start, run, and grow your business.
Lastly, here are 55 business ideas from Entrepreneur Magazine. The first step is finding something to sell!
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Accounting principles are the rules and benchmarks in the accounting field that a company should follow while reporting the financial statements. In the USA the Financial Standards Accounting Board (FASB) and the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) have endorsed the U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). Compliance with the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles requires that accountants and bookkeepers follow the Basic Principles of Accounting. It may feel as if your accounting procedures are functioning for you. However, when the moment arrives where you need accurate reporting, not standardizing your financial statements will cost you time and money. So, why are the Basic Principles of Accounting important? Following these principles standardizes accounting procedures and ensures that a company’s financial statements are complete, consistent, and comparable. This impacts business owners the most when applying for business loans, selling their company, or buying another business. Most financial institutions require GAAP compliant financial statements as part of their debt covenants and investors are wary of investing in non-GAAP compliant companies as revenue numbers can be misleading. It may feel as if your accounting procedures are functioning for you. However, when the moment arrives where you need accurate reporting, not standardizing your financial statements will cost you time and money. Basic Accounting Principles (Rulebook governed by Financial Accounting Standards Board and controlled by the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles)1. Economic Entity AssumptionThe Economic Entity Assumption outlines the requirement that all business and personal transactions must be separated. This may be confusing if you are a sole proprietor and you are thinking about filing your business and personal taxes as one entity. However, for accounting purposes, the business and all business transactions need to be separate from your personal transactions. If you don’t have a business checking account you will need to open one to keep your transactions separate. 2. Monetary Unit AssumptionThe Monetary Unit Assumption states that all transactions in your books must be in the same currency. If you headquarter in the United States then your transactions should be recorded in U.S. dollars. So, if you operate or have expenses overseas, those transactions must be recorded in U.S. dollars. The same goes for investments in cryptocurrency, etc. 3. Time Period AssumptionThe Time Period Assumption states that financial reports must show results for a specific period of time and that the period of time is clearly shown on all reports. The time shown for the three main financial statements does differ. For example, the Income Statement and Statement of Cash Flow report financial data over a period of time i.e. week(s), month(s), year(s) while the Balance Sheet is a cumulative report and shows data as of a specific date. 4. Cost PrincipleThe cost principle requires that financial transactions are recorded, forever, as the original and historical cost. What this means is that we do not adjust for inflation or appreciation. So, you might wonder how you ever record the increase or decrease in value of an asset, say an office building. First, you record it at the original purchase price. Then, when the asset is sold, and if there is appreciation on the property, it can be recorded as a gain on sale of assets on the Income Statement. 5. Full Disclosure PrincipleThe Full Disclosure Principle states that business owners, accountants, bookkeepers, etc. must include all pertinent information as related to the function of a business’ financial statements must be included with the reports. 6. Going Concern PrincipleThe Going Concern Principle requires that the business being reported on be considered to continue to exist and function into the foreseeable future. This essentially allows the accrual method of accounting be used. If the assessment is that the business will not be able to carry on then the reports must disclose that information. 7. Matching PrincipleThe Matching Principle requires that businesses utilize the accrual method of accounting. This means that expenses are recorded at the time the corresponding revenue is earned. So, if you have supplies that were used to create the product you sell, you would not record the expense of those supplies until the product was sold and delivered. 8. Revenue Recognition PrincipleThe Revenue Recognition Principle states that revenue must be reported when it is earned, i.e. when the service is performed or the good is delivered. This means that if you receive cash in advance of for a good or service it should be recorded as unearned revenue, a liability on your balance sheet. 9. Materiality PrincipleThe Materiality Principle allows an accountant to use their professional judgment to determine if errors found in the books are insignificant or not. If they find them to be insignificant then they choose to disregard the error. For example, if there was a $1.00 sale that wasn’t recorded per the Revenue Recognition Principle the accountant could disregard it. 10. Conservatism PrincipleThe Conservatism Principle requires that when a transaction can be recorded in more than one way choose the method that shows a decrease in net income and/or a decrease in assets/equity and/or an increase in liabilities. Essentially, when faced with a choice in how to represent the business choose the way that shows more expense or liability than the way that shows greater profits or more assets. Bookkeep & Prosper Here at Bookkeep & Prosper we specialize in remote digital bookkeeping with services customized to serve your business. Response time is guaranteed within 36 hours or the next month of service is free. We take cyber security seriously using military grade systems for anti-virus, data encryption, and password management. Each month after closing out your books we will review with you the financial statements including the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Statement of Cash Flows so that you have a clear view of how your business is performing. If you do not yet have budget and budget review as a standard part of your business then we will work to create a budget over the course of the first year of service.
If you are reading this article then you want to get serious about your books. Why not start today by scheduling an introductory phone call with me, Conner Schryver, and see if Bookkeep & Prosper is a good fit for your company.
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Bookkeep & Prosper is Growing!7/24/2020 I write to inform you of some exciting news - Bookkeep and Prosper is growing! I would like to welcome my wife, Dana Schryver, to the business. Dana is a Certified QuickBooks ProAdvisor with an eye for detail. As we look to grow our business her added expertise will bring great value to our current and future clients.  Dana and I coming down from the top of Mount Carrauntoohil in County Kerry, Ireland. Dana will mostly work behind the scenes and the only difference you will see is faster, more up-to-date service. I will continue to be at the forefront of the business, overseeing all accounts, and remaining your trusted advisor. Bookkeep & Prosper Here at Bookkeep & Prosper we specialize in remote digital bookkeeping with services customized to serve your business. Response time is guaranteed within 36 hours or the next month of service is free. We take cyber security seriously using military grade systems for anti-virus, data encryption, and password management. Each month after closing out your books we will review with you the financial statements including the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Statement of Cash Flows so that you have a clear view of how your business is performing. If you do not yet have budget and budget review as a standard part of your business then we will work to create a budget over the course of the first year of service.
If you are reading this article then you want to get serious about your books. Why not start today by scheduling an introductory phone call with me, Conner Schryver, and see if Bookkeep & Prosper is a good fit for your company.
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 Reconciliation is an important part of the accounting process for ensuring the accuracy of your figures. It’s very easy for a business to imagine they have spent a certain amount of money only for the bank to reflect a very different story.  For years, the manual method of reconciliation has been used, where accountants or business owners look through the transactions reported by the bank and compare them to their own notes and numbers. This gets the job done but can be a long and laborious process – and of course, the longer it takes, the more chance there is for mistakes to slip in. Even for monthly account reconciliations there may be hundreds of transactions to check and cross-reference, and the dates the business records payments may not necessarily match the dates the bank uses.  With digital tools such as QuickBooks Online now being available, there’s a simpler way to keep on top of your business finances. Bank Feeds allow the software to connect directly to the financial institution where your accounts are held, giving the ability to download transactions right into the software. QuickBooks will try to match any transactions with the user-entered data automatically, effectively giving you semi-automatic reconciliation. Why only semi? Because some transactions may not match. This may be because they were recorded incorrectly, didn’t have tax applied, were an unexpected expense, and so on. By highlighting the transactions that don’t match, Bank Feeds make the process of reconciliation much easier. You can compare unmatched transactions from both your data and the Bank Feed and link the ones that do indeed match – if it’s something as simple as a transaction date being incorrect by more than a few days, you’ll be able to spot it easily. For other transactions that don’t match, you can investigate them further and take the appropriate action. Perhaps the name of the payee was recorded incorrectly, or a last-minute change in plan meant a transaction needed to change. It may be that a transaction is so new that it’s only been recorded in one system and not the other – but it’s much easier to find when the majority of the Bank Feed reconciliation process is automated. Automation reduces the chances of mistakes being made during reconciliation and reduces the time needed to complete the task. Bank Feeds offer improved accounting accuracy and free up time to work productively outside of the reconciliation process. Bookkeep & Prosper Here at Bookkeep & Prosper we specialize in remote digital bookkeeping with services starting at $315 per month. Response time is guaranteed with 36 hours or the next month of service is free. We take cyber security seriously using military grade systems for anti-virus, data encryption, and password management. Each month after closing out your books we will review the financial statements including the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Statement of Cash Flows so that you have a clear view of how your business is performing. If you do not yet have budget and budget review as a standard part of your business then we will work to create a budget over the course of the first year of service.
If you are reading this article then you want to get serious about your books. Why not start today by scheduling an introductory phone call with me, Conner Schryver, and see if Bookkeep & Prosper is a good fit for your company.
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QuickBooks Online, also known as QBO, is an online version of the QuickBooks accounting software that can be used through a web browser. This makes it extremely convenient to use, but convenience isn’t the only benefit. For an eCommerce business there is another major benefit that could save you a lot of time, worry, and expense.
The software provides options including standard bookkeeping facilities for recording sales and expenditure, up to managing payroll for employees and the preparation of tax statements, ledgers, and reports. But perhaps the most overlooked feature included in QuickBooks Online is the sales tax feature. 
In principle, sales tax is easy to work with – every sale you make will be subject to the tax, and you just have to make sure it is added to the price of the items you sell. However, there’s a catch.
Not every state or jurisdiction uses the same rate of sales tax, and not every product is liable for sales tax. Many services are exempt from sales tax too, and purchases made across international boundaries may be subject to an entirely different kind of sales tax altogether – or even none at all! By using the Automated Tax Center within QuickBooks Online, you don’t need to worry about it. QuickBooks will automatically ensure that the correct rate of tax is applied based on the customer’s address and the configuration of your products and services. 
But why is it important to keep track of the correct amount of sales tax?
First and foremost, it ensures that your customers are charged fairly. They wouldn’t want to overpay, and QuickBooks will make sure that they don’t. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly for your business, there is a legal requirement that the taxes you collect are paid on at least a quarterly basis. Failure to pay the correct amount – or failure to pay anything at all – can result in penalties that vary by jurisdiction but can ultimately lead to fines and legal problems. Therefore, collecting and paying the appropriate amount of sales tax is important for both you and your customers. Manually calculating these amounts is not for the faint-hearted, especially if you are selling to a different state or country. QuickBooks Online makes the process simple and straightforward, which allows you to focus on running your business the best way you can. You don’t have to worry about any sales tax issues as QuickBooks takes care of it all. Bookkeep & Prosper
Here at Bookkeep & Prosper we specialize in outsourced remote bookkeeping with services starting at $315 per month. Response time is guaranteed with 36 hours or the next month of service is free. We take cyber security seriously using military grade systems for anti-virus, data encryption, and password management. Each month after closing out your books we will review the financial statements including the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Statement of Cash Flows so that you have a clear view of how your business is performing. If you do not yet have budget and budget review as a standard part of your business then we will work to create a budget over the course of the first year of service.
If you are reading this article then you want to get serious about your books. Why not start today by scheduling an introductory phone call with me, Conner Schryver, and see if Bookkeep & Prosper is a good fit for your company.
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