Why is my bill so high? 

Your first few bills will always be higher because of the extra time involved in setting up your QuickBooks account and in many cases, catching up with months worth of transactions. The later in the tax year you start the process, the more time is involved in bringing you current.  Once everything is brought current, you will see a significant drop in your monthly invoice amount as Scott and Amy get to know your finances and QuickBooks starts remembering how to categorize your transactions. Be sure to click the "View Invoice" button when your invoice is e-mailed to you each month. We keep detailed time records so you can see exactly what was done, when and by whom. Please feel free to contact us at any time if you have any questions or concerns regarding the services or the bill.

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What's next? 

Every client is different, so that answer varies. Generally, the process is initial consult, QuickBooks set-up appointment, then Scott and Amy will place you in the rotation with our other bookkeeping clients. You will hear from them via phone or email frequently at first, then less and less as time goes on.  It's important that you respond to their questions as immediately as possible. Generally, after the first two meetings, everything is done online, but if there is ever a need for another personal meeting or document pickup or drop-off, that is never a problem.  

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Why not just photograph my receipts with one of those apps? 

Those apps are terrific and do exactly what they say they will do—but not much more. Your accounting system does so much more than simply keep track of spending.  Your chart of accounts is sure to be more complex than the simple snap 'n' save apps. As a practical matter, some receipts are too long and the photos are never as clear as the scans. We use dedicated high-speed scanning equipment so the quality is superb and maximum efficiency is achieved. If you need to e-mail a document or receipt to someone, a high-quality pdf or image is just a few clicks away. And then there's the extremely limited reporting capability of apps vs. the state-of-the-art reporting available through QuickBooks.  While on the face of it, snap 'n' save apps sound great, they only do a very small portion of the job.

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What do I need to save? 

Good question. Our philosophy is that anything you can log in to see your statements (bank, utilities, auto finance companies), you don't need to save a paper copy. You should save all original contracts with original signatures, vehicle titles, original property and estate planning documents, and a few more, but pretty much everything else can be scanned, stored digitally and shredded. If you name your scans appropriately (we'll show you our foolproof online filing system), you're effectively filing it at the same time. And even the IRS has been accepting digital copies of tax backup documents (in an audit) since the mid-'90s.

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