Quickbooks is the leader in small business accounting software. If you’ve been on the hunt for a way to keep your small business’s financials in order, you’ve surely come across Quickbooks before. Is Quickbooks the best option for your small business? What are its capabilities? Is it simple enough for a business owner without specialized employees to use?
What Does Quickbooks Do?
Quickbooks is the most popular method for small businesses to manage their income, expenses, and overall financial health. The software is used to create invoices, pay bills, generate reports, and assemble tax records. They offer a series of plans based on the size of your business, ranging from $15 to $180 per month.
Your average small business owner is going to use Quickbooks to create invoices that can easily be printed or emailed within the software to share with the customer. The amount owed is tracked in the software and easily recorded when your customer pays it. Quickbooks is also commonly used to pay bills, keep track of upcoming bills, and ensure they’re paid on time. By managing your small business with Quickbooks, creating monthly and end-of-year financial reports is made simple since all of your records are in one place.
An extremely common reason business owners use Quickbooks is because of its payroll function. Employee hours can be tracked within the software, ensuring that your team is accurately compensated for their time. Quickbooks payroll features allow you to pay your team in check or direct deposit and calculate taxes automatically.
Do You Need an Accountant if You Use Quickbooks?
Softwares like Quickbooks are perfect for keeping bookkeeping automated. No stacks of paper ledgers, miscellaneous papers, and more to sort through. However, bookkeeping is just the part that enables accountants to improve your financials. Think of it this way, if someone was trying to lose or gain weight for their personal health, a common method for doing that is counting calories. But just keeping track of how many calories you eat does not affect the weight you lose or gain. You have to analyze your age, height, weight, and goals to determine how much you should be eating. And then take the necessary steps to meet that daily goal. Simply writing down what you did does not actually improve your situation at all, it just gives you a basis of information.
Similarly, bookkeeping is the perfect basis for improving one's financial situation. But simply having financial records does not improve your financial situation. You need a professional to analyze this data, present a solution, and guide you through implementing that solution. Accurate financial records allow CPAs to help your company increase its profits.
Using Quickbooks & Hiring a CPA
In short, Quickbooks is an excellent option for small businesses. It keeps clean, accurate records, and simplifies invoicing, payroll, and more. However, Quickbooks works best for small businesses in conjunction with a CPA. A good CPA will manage your Quickbooks account, create reports and various analyses out of those records, and advise your business from there. A CPA can advise you in areas such as managing expenses, identifying unnecessary fees, recommending affordable vendors, and other critical business decisions. Most importantly, a CPA will keep you compliant. Again, just because your business has accurate financial records does not mean it’s met all of the necessary regulations. An accountant will make sure you’re hitting every regulatory mark to protect your company.
Best CPA in California
Chris Haro, CPA and his team have over 20 years of experience in accounting and tax preparation services. Our financial experts work from two locations in California to offer high-quality services for businesses and individuals alike. We cover individual tax return filing, payroll, financial planning for individuals, bookkeeping, financial statements for small businesses, corporate tax return filing, and much more. Contact us today to get started!