Small Business accountants?

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haydos85

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#133941 8-Nov-2013 15:55

Hi
Ive got a small business running a few fruit orchards. My income is small.
The last financial year 10% of revenue went to the accountant for end of year tax returns and financial statements. Not to mention 2 emails and 1 phone call, they charged an extra $80

Whats the best option to get the accounting costs down?
Anyone one know a cheaper small business accounting firm they have worked with? Is it better to find someone cheap who just works from home to do the taxes etc?

Thanks

Dynamic

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#929554 8-Nov-2013 16:05

The more work you do and the more organised your records are, the less work they have to do and the cheaper your bill.

For example if you give them a shoe box full of receipts at the end of the year that they have to go through one by one, and if they have to chase you for information, expect a huge bill.

For a smaller enterprise that I run, I just download the bank statements to Excel once a month and categorise the transactions. There is also free CashBook software that would let you do a good chunk of the basic work yourself.

If you are happy with the service level but unhappy with the bill, ask them whop you can reduce the charges by doing things yourself. They will likely recommend some software.

You can absolutely ask about their hourly rate ans shop around. Larger firms put more pressure on billable hours where a smaller firm may be more relaxed. I use a husband and wife team based in west Auckland. He's fully qualified and she's partially qualified. She does 3/4 of the job at her cheaper rate then he does the finish off at his higher rate and I'm happy with the result. This is partially because we got them in to show us how to do some of the donkey work including GST returns. They checked the first 2 returns we did and then left us to it until the end of the year. If you are near that location and are interested, I'll give you their contact details.

Cheers
Mike

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networkn

Networkn
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#929572 8-Nov-2013 16:32

There is a few discussions on linked in about this very thing, there were some reasonable recommendations there.

nunz

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#939563 23-Nov-2013 17:29

If you dont have to run inventory then:
I use cashbook complete. It costs very little and is from an Nz company. It allows me to import my bank records directly into it and run them for GST (I have my GST on a cash basis). THe GSt return is a single report at the end of each GSt period. That means my info is all in categories (COGS, PHone, capital purchases etc) and can be given to an accountant at the end of the year for EOY tax returns. I am absolutely cr*p at paper work etc and can manage to use this and keep up to date.

Small business Accountaing - SBA ( the franchise) and others do a fixed cost monthly service. worth a look too.

Zeon

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#939592 23-Nov-2013 19:25

Do u have much accounting knowledge? Often it can be done yourself. I taught myself how to do our books by asking a family member who is an accountant when I got stuck.

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