5 Reasons Why You Need a Book Keeper

After a tough few years many businesses are finding it hard to make ends meet and even the smallest investment can seem like too great an expense. But when it comes to your business finances, investing in the services of a professional book keeper is one expense that’s well worth the money. If you want to ensure that your profits are maximised by good financial management, then take a look at these five reasons why you need to hire a book keeper.

1. Make the Most of your Skills

Deciding to start a business unfortunately doesn’t automatically make you a financial genius. Whether you sell a product or a service, employing a book keeper will free up your time so you can concentrate on using your talents to grow your business. Even as a freelancer keeping track of invoices and payments or keeping up to date with tax can be very complex and time-consuming. It’s much more productive to spend your time doing the things that help your business make more money than to spend endless hours struggling with recording, invoicing, and tax when you could simply pay someone else to do it for you.

2. Improve your Cash Flow

Flexibility in cash flow can significantly impact the success of your business. If your bank account consistently runs low at the end of each month, you leave no room for unexpected expenses or purchasing necessary supplies, equipment, or inventory. This situation can leave your business in a bind until new invoices are settled. Hiring a bookkeeper can be a game-changer. They can effectively manage your invoices, ensuring they are well-organized and preventing your account from emptying after every round of expenses. What’s more, many of these bookkeepers are proficient in using software to streamline expense approvals. This will likely enable detailed record keeping of your expenses, which can help in managing the cash flow effectively.

3. Reduce your Stress

Ask any business owner or entrepreneur what aspect of their business causes them the most stress and nine out of ten of them will say their finances. Most people do not enjoy book-keeping and without proper training and experience, trying to manage your accounts effectively can be incredibly stressful and time-consuming. For most business owners, the best way to reduce their stress levels when it comes to finance is to hand over the responsibility to a trusted source so they can rest assured that their finances are being managed correctly. This allows the business owner to focus more on other aspects of their business, such as the packaging, marketing, and overall leadership of their day-to-day runnings.

4. Keep Organised

Running a business requires you to do all sorts of different jobs at once such as communicating with customers, courting new clients, keeping staff happy, and keeping up to date with stock or production. When you pile financial management on top of this it’s easy to see how mistakes can be made. If you find yourself missing payments, losing track of bills, or even paying the same bill twice then it could be time to ease your load and let a book keeper take over your financial management. But remember, when hiring such a specialist, ensuring candidate proficiency in Excel is highly important if you’re a modern business. Most companies these days use digital tools and having a book keeper who knows how to use them efficiently can further optimize business processes.

5. Cut your Costs

Poor financial management can actually cost you money, for example, you could incur fines and fees for late payments or even end up running the risk of liquidation if you’re unable to pay your creditors. One solution is to hire an employee to manage your accounts, but this is an expensive option and in the majority of cases a freelance book keeper is all you’ll need to keep your finances in check. In terms of value for money, a book keeper will have all the necessary skills to ensure you’re making the most of your cash, such as alerting you to tax benefits you may be missing out on or managing your invoices so you don’t have to spend your valuable time chasing non-paying clients.

Author Byline

Lucy Pitt is a freelance commentator who writes extensively about financial management, book keeping and finance advice for small and medium businesses.