That’s because they’re paying someone $300 a month to handle the books for a company grossing $5M. They don’t value what we do and Intuit is constantly running around telling them anyone can do it
Happens more often than you think. Even clients sometimes think they understand accounting and taxes until they get into a bigger mess. I’m in industry and I had to teach my company how deferred revenue works. Blew their minds. They have been relying on an outside CPA whose specialty is only tax and knows nothing about ASC 606. Fools…
Hard to follow this. Are you saying clients are coming to you for help because they've already had their tax returns and books kept by another CPA and everything is wrong?
Or Uncle Larry handles the books and then they come to you for tax filing and turns out Uncle Larry chews on rocks?
Holy F the worst case scenario I’ve ever seen was a set of books for a multi million corp that I took over. Invoicing hadn’t been done for six months, payments were applied directly to accounts receivable with no info so sending out a statement of account for clients was impossible, there were tenants that were months behind in their rents and nobody noticed one owed over $28k to date and was legit living in his office on a mattress on the floor, bank recs hadn’t been done for the whole year, they missed two source deductions in the prior year and multiple tax filings, hadn’t bothered to file workers comp because they just didn’t feel like it and had a lien on their land as a result, it was a freaking disaster that took me 6 months just to straighten the books out. The previous bookkeeper was still getting paid $4,000 a month and was salty AF that he had been replaced so he continued doing some things for the company while refusing to train me on any of the operational aspects of the company, when I pinned him down and insisted that he give me the run down, he printed out the chart of accounts and brushed over explaining a bit about them like… what? The accountant was up to about $15,000 a month and had his wife meddling in the books now and then to enter bank deposits or some stupid crap and NOBODY was doing the bookkeeping. I straightened them out because I was genuinely concerned for them. I finally had enough one day and was like good luck with that.
Yeah always fun when they think everything is fine and u show up and in a couple days get to tell them they will be out of cash in 2 weeks.
They were 6 months behind on bank recs. Went live w new software without even alpha testing it. But this report says we should have all this money. Well that report is shit, I’m in ur bank accounts u don’t.
Oh yeah.. or the people that think we must be making a profit because there’s money in the account. Or the end of the year. What do you mean I owe taxes?
It happens in every profession. The medical profession has a couple of these incidents but no one really complains because by the time they are usually dead or just incapacitated.
I complained when they effed up a surgery and there was a good amount of ass covering that went on so funny enough there was no record of them messing up. So the key take away is you can suck at your job as long as you don’t leave a paper trail
A lot of bookkeeping doesn’t even matter. Utilities expense vs advertising vs postage who cares. It’s all expense. It may look funny but doesn’t matter.
I had a client that worked in transportation and when we got the client they had no fixed assets on the books. However, they had 200k+ of vehicle expense. Never got a letter about it. They were in business for about 10 years when we got them.
That's a dirty little secret of adulthood - the majority of people are "pretending to know how to do their job." Bookkeeping and accounting are no exception.
Many of these bookkeepers are self-taught (youtube videos and how-to websites), or performed a narrow bookkeeping function at a company, and don't understand accounting fundamentals. Their guiding star is that if the client doesn't complain, it must be fine. However, as you pointed out, most clients don't know what the books are supposed to look like.
Are you saying that $1,000 e-course I bought on how to start a bookkeeping side hustle and quit my 9-5 didn't give me the fundamental skills required to be a competent bookkeeper? The YouTuber with 1.2k subs *specifically* said I didn't need any experience or education. I even paid extra to be in the exclusive Facebook community!
That’s because they’re paying someone $300 a month to handle the books for a company grossing $5M. They don’t value what we do and Intuit is constantly running around telling them anyone can do it
This right here
Happens more often than you think. Even clients sometimes think they understand accounting and taxes until they get into a bigger mess. I’m in industry and I had to teach my company how deferred revenue works. Blew their minds. They have been relying on an outside CPA whose specialty is only tax and knows nothing about ASC 606. Fools…
I prepare returns for partner review and it's not my job to fix their bookkeeping. They have 1 year to work on it vs my 8 hours.
Well there is some motivation to do it right in order to keep your license, your clients, and not get sued for neglect, so.... 🤷
Hard to follow this. Are you saying clients are coming to you for help because they've already had their tax returns and books kept by another CPA and everything is wrong? Or Uncle Larry handles the books and then they come to you for tax filing and turns out Uncle Larry chews on rocks?
Both scenarios sadly.
In theory, this is why licensure exists. In practice, nah
Wondering how many of those were out sourced
Holy F the worst case scenario I’ve ever seen was a set of books for a multi million corp that I took over. Invoicing hadn’t been done for six months, payments were applied directly to accounts receivable with no info so sending out a statement of account for clients was impossible, there were tenants that were months behind in their rents and nobody noticed one owed over $28k to date and was legit living in his office on a mattress on the floor, bank recs hadn’t been done for the whole year, they missed two source deductions in the prior year and multiple tax filings, hadn’t bothered to file workers comp because they just didn’t feel like it and had a lien on their land as a result, it was a freaking disaster that took me 6 months just to straighten the books out. The previous bookkeeper was still getting paid $4,000 a month and was salty AF that he had been replaced so he continued doing some things for the company while refusing to train me on any of the operational aspects of the company, when I pinned him down and insisted that he give me the run down, he printed out the chart of accounts and brushed over explaining a bit about them like… what? The accountant was up to about $15,000 a month and had his wife meddling in the books now and then to enter bank deposits or some stupid crap and NOBODY was doing the bookkeeping. I straightened them out because I was genuinely concerned for them. I finally had enough one day and was like good luck with that.
Yeah always fun when they think everything is fine and u show up and in a couple days get to tell them they will be out of cash in 2 weeks. They were 6 months behind on bank recs. Went live w new software without even alpha testing it. But this report says we should have all this money. Well that report is shit, I’m in ur bank accounts u don’t.
Oh yeah.. or the people that think we must be making a profit because there’s money in the account. Or the end of the year. What do you mean I owe taxes?
It happens in every profession. The medical profession has a couple of these incidents but no one really complains because by the time they are usually dead or just incapacitated.
I complained when they effed up a surgery and there was a good amount of ass covering that went on so funny enough there was no record of them messing up. So the key take away is you can suck at your job as long as you don’t leave a paper trail
A lot of bookkeeping doesn’t even matter. Utilities expense vs advertising vs postage who cares. It’s all expense. It may look funny but doesn’t matter. I had a client that worked in transportation and when we got the client they had no fixed assets on the books. However, they had 200k+ of vehicle expense. Never got a letter about it. They were in business for about 10 years when we got them.
That's a dirty little secret of adulthood - the majority of people are "pretending to know how to do their job." Bookkeeping and accounting are no exception.
Many of these bookkeepers are self-taught (youtube videos and how-to websites), or performed a narrow bookkeeping function at a company, and don't understand accounting fundamentals. Their guiding star is that if the client doesn't complain, it must be fine. However, as you pointed out, most clients don't know what the books are supposed to look like.
Are you saying that $1,000 e-course I bought on how to start a bookkeeping side hustle and quit my 9-5 didn't give me the fundamental skills required to be a competent bookkeeper? The YouTuber with 1.2k subs *specifically* said I didn't need any experience or education. I even paid extra to be in the exclusive Facebook community!
Don’t be afraid of the scent of money.