Do you ever wonder what you might be missing that you don’t know you’re missing?
We find things for our clients ALL the time. Often, we catch things that will help them out financially. These are the fun ones - it’s like finding them extra money.
We also catch things that need to be changed and could cause more issues down the road if they aren’t fixed.
A vast majority of the time, the clients tell us they wouldn’t have noticed this themselves (or at least not as quickly) and thank us. The fix can get them more money in their bank account or help them avoid headaches they didn’t know were on the way.
This is one of the major benefits of keeping up with your business finances and having checks and balances. Working with a professional bookkeeping firm for an extra set of eyes helps too, of course.
What are some of these things? Check out the list below. This is not theoretical. Each and every one of these items actually happened with one or more of our clients.
Checks received that weren’t cashed (found in a pile on their desk somewhere)
Invoices that were marked paid but were not actually paid
Checks written for the wrong amount
Invoice calculation errors resulting in grossly undercharging their customers
Autopay from their customers not going through (expired or declined card)
Bounced and returned checks
Website set to accept checks unintentionally
Not canceling autopay on loan after the loan was paid off
Bill received in error (actually for another company)
Payroll taxes not paid or double paid
Being double charged for a bill
Payroll information not coming over correctly when switching payroll providers (resulting in duplicate taxes paid, incorrect W2s, and all sorts of issues)
Payroll set up incorrectly - wrong states or wrong rates
Bonuses not running through payroll
Charging sales tax incorrectly or not at all
Filing sales tax incorrectly or not at all
This list doesn’t even take into account the benefits clients have gotten from having their financials together to help make business decisions and do tax planning, which can also have a significant impact on them financially.
Issues are not completely avoidable - but they are catchable, if you’re looking. Consider your current processes and if you aren’t keeping up with your books, can you start? The cost of not doing it could be greater than you think.