Complete Guide to Bookkeeping Services Dallas
In today’s fast-paced world, bookkeeping is an essential service for business owners. As one of the most business-friendly cities in the United States, you will find a wide variety of bookkeeping services in Dallas, ready to serve businesses in every industry and niche.
What Is Bookkeeping?
Bookkeeping is the organized recording of a business’ finances. Every time money comes into, or leaves, a business, it is recorded. This record can be as simple as a notebook and pen or an Excel spreadsheet, but it is usually entered in one of many different bookkeeping softwares available.
For small or micro businesses, this recordkeeping is something the business owner, or a family member, can handle. If there are only a few transactions per day or per week, it is not a big time commitment.
Larger, busier businesses may have a hard time keeping track of everything their businesses do. High sales volume, bank loans and payments, and employee payroll can make bookkeeping complicated very fast.
Who Needs A Bookkeeper?
Every business needs a bookkeeper of some sort. The records are very important to keep track of how much money the business is making. For a small business, the bookkeeper may also be the business owner.
For business owners and CEO’s who are too busy with other tasks, or who just aren’t “numbers people”, a professional bookkeeper is the best path. This person, or team of people, can be employees in the business or outside contractors.
What Are Outsourced Bookkeeping Services?
Outsourced bookkeeping services are performed for the business by an outside contractor, rather than by employees. This can have multiple advantages: greater flexibility for both the bookkeeper and the business owner, a greater range of available financial services, and greater expertise for a more affordable cost.
To outsource effectively, the business owner or CFO must have a clear picture of the work that needs to be done. For instance, the business may keep their sales records in-house, but want help filing sales tax and handling employee payroll. This must be clearly communicated to the bookkeeper before work starts.
What Services Are Included?
Dallas bookkeeping services vary by the firm. Most will include standard services such as the following:
- Journal entries
- Accounts receivable and payable management
- Quarterly income tax preparation
- Sales tax recording and remittance
- Employee payroll and payroll taxes
- Quarterly and year-end financial statement preparation
Some bookkeeping firms will specialize in serving industries with specific financial rules, such as construction, insurance, or international companies with locations in Dallas. Each company will have its own financial needs, and it is important to find a bookkeeper with that specific knowledge.
Some outsourced bookkeepers may offer additional financial services as well. These can include CPA-level tasks such as:
- yearly corporate and individual income tax preparation
- Financial statement analysis
- Financial advisory and planning
- Fractional CFO services
While there is a clear difference between a bookkeeping service and a CPA firm, there can be some overlap in the services they offer.
Finding a Dallas bookkeeping firm with a mix of services that fits your needs is key to choosing the right service for you.
What About Cloud-Based Bookkeeping Like Quickbooks Or Xero?
If you’ve read this far, you may be thinking: “Quickbooks makes it so easy for me; I can do my own bookkeeping”. If this is you, hooray! We’re happy for you. Cloud-based accounting software makes bookkeeping easy for many business owners. There are many reasons, though, that business owners with Quickbooks, Xero, or another cloud-based service, might still choose to outsource.
The biggest reason to choose to outsource is the higher level of service you can receive with a specialized bookkeeper. Bookkeeping service companies are familiar with major accounting softwares, and can work with your program or integrate your books into theirs. An individual business may choose to buy a smaller level of service from a cloud-based software, whereas a dedicated bookkeeping firm can afford to buy a larger package and share that benefit with all their clients.
5 Reasons To Outsource Your Bookkeeping Services, Dallas
Why, then, would you choose to outsource your bookkeeping to an outside service?
Greater Availability Of Resources
A bookkeeping service has more resources available for their clients than individual businesses would alone. Since they are specialized, they have more buying power for expertise and software. They can share this with not only your business, but also other businesses they serve.
For example, an individual business may not want to invest in an entire payroll system for their employees, and may muddle along with a low-level system, or no system at all. A bookkeeping service, however, can purchase a payroll software that they can utilize for several clients. This streamlines payroll for everyone, and makes all the businesses better.
Higher Level Of Expertise
Similar to the higher level of resources, using a bookkeeping service can also provide you a higher level of expertise for your business.
A bookkeeping firm can have specialized employees in a number of different industries so they can serve multiple niches. On the other hand, some bookkeeping firms specialize in one niche so closely that they can provide a much higher level of expertise to your busienss than you could possibly hire in one employee – at least for the same cost.
Reduced Errors
Because of the higher level of expertise, and the fact that the bookkeeping firm is a team rather than a single individual, you can expect a higher level of accuracy from their work.
Lower Operating Cost
Bookkeeping employees are usually paid by the hour – sometimes part-time and sometimes full-time. Their work is based on hours worked, rather than work completed, which can itself add to the cost of the work. Part-time employees may not have the added costs of benefits, but they are usually paid a slightly higher rate per hour than a full-time employee might demand.
Full-time employees are paid by the hour, and also must have a package of benefits that may include some form of insurance and employee 401(k) contributions. There are also employee payroll taxes for both part- and full-time employees.
In contrast to this, outsourced bookkeeping is usually paid by the deliverable, not by the hour. This means that the price you pay is directly tied to the value you receive. You will not pay more for dragged-out projects or wasted time – you pay for what you get and nothing more.
Customizable Packages
The other side to the “you pay for what you get” is that you can get, and pay for, exactly what you need. If you need a specific service, you pay for that thing. If you don’t need it, you don’t need to pay for it. Communicate with your bookkeeping service about what your business needs.
How To Choose A Bookkeeper In Dallas
When selecting a bookkeeper, you need someone who can fit together with your business. Not only do you need the professional expertise, but you also need to find someone who shares some of the ethos, and values, of your business.
Here are some questions you might consider as you find the right bookkeeping service for you.
- Can you speak to some of the service’s other clients? What is their track record?
- How well will your bookkeeper communicate regarding their work for me?
- Does the bookkeeping service specialize in your business niche?
- Does the firm carry the appropriate licenses and liability insurance?
- What information will the bookkeeping service need from your business?
● What are their information security policies?
5 Best Bookkeepers In Dallas
BooxKeeping
This firm focuses on small to medium size businesses in the Dallas area and across the country. While they serve a variety of clients across different industries, they specialize in accounting for franchises – helping franchised companies to standardize their accounting practices across multiple privately-owned locations.
As a bookkeeping service in Dallas and beyond, they can work with all major accounting softwares
Slaton Financial
Run by professionals with over 3 decades’ experience in accounting and finance, Slaton Financial serves the bookkeeping needs of businesses in the Dallas area and beyond.
Jones Square
Founded in 1993, Jones Square is a veteran in the field of Dallas bookkeeping. They serve clients from the greater Dallas-Fort Worth area and into Plano. They specialize in Quickbooks accounting software and use it for their clients.
ProLedge Bookkeeping
ProLedge serves micro to small businesses in the Dallas area. They help businesses grow through bookkeeping and Quickbooks service and analysis. Their target clients are businesses with 0-50 employees, so if your company is larger than that, this service is not the one for you.
Accountex
Based in Plano, Accountex is by far the most flexible bookkeeping firm listed here. Why? It sets itself apart by being the only purely digital bookkeeping service. It also serves a variety of different clients in the Dallas area and around the United States. They use both Quickbooks and Xero for their clients.
Why Choose Accountex?
Accountex is the most modern and flexible bookkeeping service in Dallas. Their online, fully remote services, combined with a winning tech stack, means that they can serve their bookkeeping clients in ways in person firms cannot.
They also have the choice of serving their clients with both Quickbooks and Xero. So many bookkeeping firms specialize in one or the other – finding a firm that can do both gives clients much more flexibility and power over their own financial records.
Accountex also offers a broader range of bookkeeping services than the other firms. They provide not only standard bookkeeping services and payroll, but also CPA firm level services such as accounting services, advisory and fractional CFO.
Accountex has superior customer service and truly represents the needs and wants of each individual client.
Contact them today to see how Accountex can help you.