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If you are like most small business owners, keeping the books isn’t something you enjoy doing. You would rather be working on growing your business and on keeping your clients happy.

Despite the fact you recognise that efficient management of day to day finances is vital, GST returns, bank reconciliations and credit control can often be considered unwelcome interruptions to the business at hand.

Often the workload involved doesn’t justify employing a full time bookkeeper and that’s where outsourcing the work to a qualified and experienced bookkeeper becomes a cost effective way of getting the job done while you focus on marketing your business and servicing your customers.

But even if you do get someone in part-time to take care of things for you, here are a few tips that will make the numbers side of your business go smoother:

1. Understand why it is important in the context of your business

Before you get someone in to help it’s a good idea to think about what financial information you will need to track how your business is doing. 

Income vs. expenses, IRD obligations,  gross profit margins, KPI’s - reporting on these means you know exactly how well your business is doing, where your sales are coming from and where costs could be managed better.

This key financial information should be used when making strategic business decisions. For example you may find that one range of products or services is more profitable than others which might lead you to expand this product category or work out why it’s doing so well to see if there are opportunities that can be applied elsewhere within your business.

Good financial records will also be important if you ever need to secure finance.

2. Setup bookkeeping processes as a regular business activity

When you get someone in to look after your accounts for you, take their advice on how often they will need to work on your bookkeeping.  If it’s done regularly (rather than once or twice a year at GST or tax time!) it will be a lot easier and will save you a lot of stress. Once a month may be enough, or it may need to be done weekly to keep on top of things. Your payroll processes may also play a part in how often someone needs to come in.

As part of this, a process for retaining and storing receipts and bills paid, IRD returns, and bank statements will make end of year tax reporting easier and put you in a good position should you get audited (heaven forbid!) by the Inland Revenue.

Your bookkeeper may need to spend a little more time initially in setting up your bookkeeping software for your required reports and in establishing systems for your paperwork and bookkeeping processes so that things run smoothly in the long run.

3. Pick the right software for your needs.

Investing in software such as QuickBooks, Xero or MYOB makes managing your bookkeeping processes easy but it’s not a matter of one-size-fits-all so it’s important that you get good advice as to which one will best suit your particular business before you buy. Your bookkeeping provider will be able to recommend the right one for your business, taking into consideration such things as whether or not you have employees or if you need to keep track of inventory, amongst other things.