All businesses have the same basic bookkeeping functions.  Money comes in from somewhere and it goes out to somewhere.  Properly identifying the source of funds and the reason for their outlay is the backbone of any accounting system.  After that, however, different industries have unique things that must be tracked.

We excel at several industries.  We have found that the following types of businesses lend themselves easily to using an outsourced bookkeeping service.  Additionally, we have bookkeepers who have become experts in those industries.  They are:

#1 Contracting (Powerwashing, Carpeting, Landscaping, Construction, Cleaning, Extermintating, Auto Repair, Restoration, Plumbing, Electrical, Painting)

Contractors all have similar patterns: they purchase job materials, give customers estimates, invoices and sometimes progress invoices, and do job costing.  Some of their activities may incur sales tax and some may not.  They may use 1099 vendors or employees, and they often have company equipment and vehicles to pay off and book depreciation on.

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#2 Property Managers/Landlords (Apartment owners, Commercial use Property Owners, Rental home owners, House “Flippers”)

These folks also have similar patterns: they have property assets, mortgages and loans, they collect rent, they must invoice for cab and utility fees, they have to track who is paid up and who is late, they have to track security deposits held in escrow, they have capital improvements, repairs and annual depreciation.

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#3 Consultants (Business Development, Sales Force Training, Personnel Management, Home Organizing, Interior Decorating, Event Planning, Systems Analysis, Graphic Design, Compliance Training, Translation Services, some Computer/web services.

Consultants are usually fee-for service, and may have numerous different levels of fees, or track different types of income.  They must track travel expenses and their time, they must invoice clients and sometimes do progress invoicing.

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#4 Animal Services (Horse Farms, Shelters, Boarding & Grooming Facilities, Sales or Show operations)

Often there are two “customers” in this industry:  the human client and the animal attached to them.  Invoicing must include both!  In addition, there are often many different streams of revenue, and it’s vital that they are accurately tracked if the business owner or shelter manager is going to be able to make smart decisions.  Often some of these activities are subject to sales tax and some are not, so it is important to set up the invoicing “items” to reflect that.

When sales are involved, the tax liability can be greatly increased or decreased depending on whether a third-party is involved and how the transaction is booked.  We work very closely with accountants on these types of sales so as to not incur unnecessary income tax liability, but to properly capture sales tax liability.

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#5 Specialty Sales/Niche Businesses (Sewing services, Piano Tuning, Internet Sales, Single Item Sales, Catalog Sales, and many other various business ventures)

What most of these have in common is that someone has to take the time to understand what they do; to ask the questions at the beginning to help the set up books that will give them good feedback on their business.  They have most of the same types of transactions as other businesses, except for the quirky things that someone has to take the time to understand.  We keep these folks happy because we provide one-on-one personal relationships between bookkeeper and client.

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What about the others? In the end, bookkeeping is bookkeeping:  money in; money out, and we successfully do work for all kinds of other businesses (see our client list!) but these are the ones that seem to be most attracted to our services and that we are most experienced in.