Outsourced CPA vs In-House CPA

As I like to say, business is better when your books are together.  Accounting should be considered a major part of any business.  So whether you decide to hire an in-house accountant or outsourced accountant, it all depends on the current status of your business.

 

A Good Time to Outsource is when you are in the start-up phase or small to mid size, want to really focus on the actual business and growth of your company, you have little knowledge of accounting, want to save money on paying the typical benefits to a full time in-house accountant, you don’t really have the office space for an accounting team.

 

A Good Time to Bring In-House is when the business is growing financially, you have a better core understanding of your business, starting to expand your business, opening up new product lines or services, you need constant and frequent financial updates and reporting, you are willing to pay the added costs of hiring a full time CPA to your team which includes salary, benefits, office space, accounting software.

Merchant Fees Come in Mysterious Ways

Merchant credit card services are very popular with the majority of companies these days but not all merchant fees are accounted for the same way.  See below how some merchant fees are treated.

 

Paypal, One Shopping Cart, Payline and Square all deduct the fees from the deposits before they go into your bank account. This means you have to make an entry to add the merchant fees back to your sales and record the bank fees or create sales receipts and book the fee on the form. If you do not do this, then your sales are understated and your expenses are understated.

 

American Express Merchant, Bank of America Merchant and QuickBooks Payments aka Intuit Merchant Services all deposit the gross amount of the sale and the merchant fee separate. This is ideal because no additional entry is necessary. So if you have a choice, select a merchant that deposits the gross amount of the sale. We work with all types of merchants but some just require more bookkeeping work.