Bookkeeping service
Bookkeeping Setup and Migration
I set up QuickBooks® Online from scratch, or move you off desktop software or spreadsheets and bring your history with you. Either way the chart of accounts is tailored to how your business actually runs, so your reports answer the questions you ask.
- Fixed project fee · agreed up front
- QuickBooks Online
- Denver metro + remote nationwide
The file that came out of the box
The numbers are all there. The answers aren't.
Everything reconciles. Then a question comes up that the reports cannot answer. Here is why.
What goes wrong
Someone else's structure
Your chart of accounts came out of the software, or from an accounting firm that applies the same one to every client's books. There is a reason those firms work that way. One structure everywhere lets a team move between client files without relearning each one.
The cost lands on you
Those accounts describe how that firm operates, not how your business does. So when a question matters, you have to export to a spreadsheet and work it out by hand, the way you did the last time you asked.
The file built for your business
Set up around how you actually make money
Accounts chosen on purpose
Every account exists because you need to see something. I choose them for your entity type, your industry, and the way work actually moves through your business.
Reports you can steer by
You have goals for your business. The chart of accounts decides whether your monthly report shows progress toward them, or only tells you what you spent.
Built to last
A file built to fit does not get outgrown in two years. It grows with the business, and your history stays comparable the whole way.
What's included
What you get, plain and simple
This is the setup engagement, start to finish. Monthly bookkeeping is a separate service.
- A needs assessment before you subscribeI look at how your business runs and what you need the books to do, then recommend the right subscription tier. You start on the plan that fits rather than guessing.
- Your QuickBooks Online company file, created and configuredSubscription provisioned, file built, and the features you will actually use switched on.
- A chart of accounts tailored to your businessAccounts chosen for your entity type, your industry, and how work moves through your business.
- Your lists and history brought acrossCustomers, vendors, products and services, and your historical transactions imported, so the file opens with your business in it rather than an empty shell.
- Bank and credit card feeds connectedI walk you through linking your accounts. Anything that will not connect gets imported manually.
- Fixed project feeI quote a fixed fee before any work starts. A migration is priced after a books health check. Integrations and payroll setup are quoted separately. What setup usually costs
Built for your profession
What your chart of accounts has to get right
A general ledger works the same way everywhere. Your chart of accounts should not. What differs is the handful of things that actually get you in trouble, and those are specific to how your business runs.
Law practices
IOLTA and operating accounts set up separately from the first entry, with client funds recorded as a trust liability rather than as income, so nothing is commingled.
Consultancies, design & engineering firms
Cost accounts structured to separate project work from overhead, so job costing is available when you want it rather than a rebuild when you need it.
Agencies & creative firms
Retainer income kept separate from project and hourly work, with delivery costs split from overhead, so client-level tracking can be added without rebuilding the chart.
SaaS & IT companies
Gross subscription revenue and processing fees given separate accounts, with a clearing account so each net payout ties back to the charges inside it.
Select real estate & property managers
Gross commission, splits, and referral fees each given their own line, so what you produced and what it cost never arrive netted together.
Whatever your industry
Before I kept books, I examined them. As a Federal Reserve examiner trained in commercial credit, I reviewed the financials of hundreds of businesses across most bankable industries to see whether they held up. Yours is likely an industry I have reviewed. Not listed above? Ask on the first call.
Proof
From spreadsheets to QuickBooks® Online, built around the work
Before. An engineering firm running project work and admin growth on spreadsheets, with no reliable view of which projects made money.
After. A file built from scratch, with the cost accounts aligned to the projects, so job profitability was a number in the file rather than an estimate.
"Project profitability used to be my best estimate. Now it is a number I can look at."
– John M.
How it works
Four steps, from first call to first month
Free 20-minute call
You tell me where things stand, I tell you whether I can help. No pressure, and no obligation on either side.
Books health check
I review what you have, walk you through what I found, and quote a fixed fee for the work. If a migration turns up cleanup needs, you will know before anything starts.
Build and migrate
I create the file, build the chart of accounts around your business, and bring your lists and history across. You connect your bank feeds and approve the chart. I do the rest.
Ready for month one
I show you the completed file so you know where everything sits and how it fits together. The build is done, and the numbers start doing the work.
Ready for books built around your business?
A chart of accounts that fits how you work. Your history brought across. Reports that answer the questions you actually ask. Let's get it built.
There is no wrong month to start. Waiting just adds more history to move.
Rather send a message?Explore more bookkeeping services
Monthly Bookkeeping
Bookkeeping off your plate every month, and numbers you can act on.
Catch-Up & Cleanup
Books brought current and reconciled, at a fixed price agreed up front.
Job Costing
Costs on the job that caused them, and margin per project every month.
Cash Flow Forecasting
Cash you can see coming, so payroll and big bills stop being a question.