Accounting and Bookkeeping Checklist
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If you use QuickBooks®, use the "To Do Notes" to setup these tasks. They will show up as Reminders on your Company Snapshot. It will help you to quickly prioritize your tasks at the start of each day. You will find the To Do List feature under the Company drop down menu. Remember to also set reminder preferences so the list shows up in Company Snapshot. "Set Preferences" has a list of other reminders you can set to help you organize your day. |
- Design your billing procedures so that you invoice your customers immediately upon completion of the sale or service.
- If you don't track your customers on an individual basis because you have a cash register, prepare your Daily Sales Summary.
- If you use QuickBooks®, your customer is named "Cash Register Sales" or something like that. Enter your amounts from your daily till report using the Sales Receipt form. Make sure you post your bank deposit to the Undeposited Funds account.
- Make bank deposits on the same day as you receive the payments (or the next day if you are using the portable file organization system for your vehicle).
- Deposit the whole amount as it gives you an audit trail and makes doing your reconciliations easier. Do not take some cash for yourself. If you need cash, write yourself a cheque.
- If you must keep some cash back from a deposit and you use QuickBooks®, use the cash back box at the bottom of the Make Deposit screen. Record the whole cash amount received through the Undeposited Funds screen, then record the cash taken at the bottom. Make sure you complete all the fields, including the memo field explaining what or who the cash was for.
- Make sure you include the cheque number and date of any cheques you received on the deposit slip ... or you can use a payment log where your record this information. Also check that the address on the cheque matches the address on your invoice. You'll need this information when you go to enter the payment into your bookkeeping program.
- Upon returning from the bank, match and staple the bank deposit receipts received to the customer invoices. (Or you can do this task when you sit down to do your data entry.)
- Setup your small business accounting system so you update and monitor your cash flow forecast every day. I like to do it in the morning before the day's interruptions begin.
- Backup your data. This is a very important task ... so please don't skip it.
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If you are just starting out in bookkeeping, YOU should not be performing year-end procedural tasks for clients ... like the ones in the bookkeeping checklist coming up ... especially IF you don't understand the difference between GAAP/ASPE financial reporting standards versus tax reporting ... unless your work IS supervised by an experienced accountant. In the beginning, you should only be preparing the books up to the unadjusted trial balance ... with the books being handed over to a professional certified bookkeeper or accountant to perform year-end file preparation ... which involves recording entries that often are not indicated by source document. Your inexperience could cause a small business owner to go out of business. It may not happen initially, but occur after the owner is audited by CRA when all your errors come to light ... because your work is used to prepare the tax compliance returns submitted to CRA / provincial authorities. Remember, the small business owner is making financial decisions based on what the financial statements say. It is acceptable for you to book the adjusting entries the accountant gives you. |
Year-end Bookkeeping Checklist
This is a general year-end bookkeeping checklist list. Every set of books is different ... so year end procedures requires judgement. Any bookkeeping entries listed here should not be booked by someone doing their own books ... unless you have discussed this with your accountant ... or the accountant gave you the entries to post so you can close your books for the year.
I include this checklist only to give you an idea of what a certified professional bookkeeper or accountant will be doing. If you try to do this yourself, and don't have the proper knowledge, it will just cost you more to hire someone to try and figure out what you did and how it can be corrected. :0(
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Make An Appointment With Yourself To Complete Your Bookkeeping Checklist - Yes ... Actually Schedule It
If you work through these bookkeeping checklists and actually do these small business accounting tasks faithfully, preparing for year-end will not be an onerous task.
You can make it easier on yourself by actually scheduling time to perform these small business accounting tasks just as you would any other task in your business.
Making the appointment with yourself will make it more difficult to put aside the task. If you are consistent with the timing, it will become a habit very quickly. Each time you complete one of the bookkeeping checklists, they become easier to do ... especially if you stay on top of it.
Okay, now I have to come clean. Do I always get all these tasks done on the bookkeeping checklists when I say they should be done?
Ah, that would be a big, fat no. :0(
Sometimes I just don't have time ... but I do chip away at each bookkeeping checklist ... so that come year-end, I've got everything done that needs to be done.
Do you want your year-ends to be a breeze? Then you need to get around to doing these accounting and bookkeeping tasks throughout the year too.
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