Why your startup needs more than a part-time/outsourced bookkeeper

As an early-stage start-up, whether funded or not, the founder’s prime objective is to be frugal and extend the runway as much as possible. In this pursuit founders end up ignoring accounting. Let us admit, modern accounting softwares like QuickBooks and Xero have come a long way in terms of ease of use and the user interface/experience. But truth be told, it still is not a founders’ job. While there are bunch of part-time/outsourced bookkeeping services around, most of them focus only on the bookkeeping and/or the tax accounting part.

Some of the things part-time/outsourced bookkeepers don’t provide –

Analyzing cashflows and maintaining forecasts
Creating & reviewing financial reports
Preparing & evaluating financial models & projections
Updating documents for potential investors

David S. Rose, author of The Startup Checklist: 25 Steps to a Scalable, High-Growth Business, says you should consult with an accountant as soon as you’re ready to “start acting like a real company.” He says you need accounting expertise “the second you take in your first investment dollar, hire your first employee, sign your first lease, or sell your first product.” The devil, as they say, is in the details.Think about building your financial team this way: “ABC” for accountant, bookkeeper, and chief financial officer. There’s a reason why the “A” comes first.

We work closely with early-stage tech start-ups by providing them Finance as a Service — a financial concierge of sorts. We take care of bookkeeping, reconciliations, AR, AP, financial analysis and everything around this. Our services are tech enabled and we collaborate with our clients on real-time basis via collaboration tools like teams, slack, flock etc. Our engagement enables founding teams to focus on what’s important — the product and the business.

Some key advantages our clients enjoy: