What is a Bookkeeping VA?
What Are The Tasks You Can Assign To A Bookkeeping VA?<\a>
- Data Entry
- Accounts Payable Management
- QuickBooks Management
- Accounts Receivable Management
- Account Reconciliations
- Assist in Financial Statement Preparation
Benefits of Hiring a Bookkeeping VA
1. Save time
2. Cost-Effective
3. Uphold financial transparency
4. Increase in productivity
6. Tax management
7. Handle legal concerns
8. Monitor KPIs
9. Year-end accounting
10. Be updated on your payments
11. Income sources
12. Organize financial statements
What to Look For When Hiring A Virtual Bookkeeping VA
1. Necessary qualifications
2. Industry-specific experience
3. Tech savviness
4. Availability
5. Trustworthiness
How to Manage Bookkeeping VAs
1. Use communication tools
2. Productivity Monitoring Tools
Have you considered outsourcing admin support virtual assistant, mainly bookkeeping VA?
Undoubtedly, overseeing finances, either for small or medium-sized businesses, can be daunting, time-consuming, and difficult to understand.
Thankfully, you can hire a bookkeeping VA to take this off your plate so you can focus your time and energy on doing crucial tasks to grow your business.
In this article, learn the numerous benefits of hiring a virtual bookkeeping assistant and how to hire and manage them remotely.
What is a Bookkeeping VA?
A bookkeeping virtual assistant is identical to a traditional bookkeeper in all but one aspect: they work remotely. They can be employed independently, but more often than not, they are often outsourced from a virtual assistant agency. Bookkeeping VAs are paid hourly and can be onboarded quickly compared to traditional in-office bookkeepers.
You can communicate with your remote bookkeeper through popular communication channels such as Zoom, Slack, or WhatsApp. They work well on their own with less supervision. They are also competent, reliable, and organized. You only need to provide them access to your documents, software, or tools, and they’ll be ready to start.
<\a>What Are The Tasks You Can Assign To A Bookkeeping VA?
Let’s take a closer look at what sorts of tasks you can assign to your bookkeeping assistant.
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Data Entry
Although data entry is easy, it can also be time-consuming and tedious. You can assign this to your virtual accounting assistant so they can help you with the following:
- Keeping adequate documentation of financial transactions
- Recording every transaction accurately
- Classifying accounts in their appropriate ledgers
- Summarizing records with precision
-
Accounts Payable Management
You can assign accounts payable tasks which includes the following:
- Expense tracking
- Vendor and invoice management
- Generation of purchase order
- Timely invoice payment
-
QuickBooks Management
A virtual bookkeeping assistant can assist you with QuickBooks management with the following tasks:
- Setting up auto-reminders and auto-payments
- Keeping books of account updated
-
Accounts Receivable Management
Your virtual bookkeeping assistant can assist you with accounts receivable tasks which includes:
- Making invoices
- Upkeep of customer records
- Monitoring collections
- Debit/credit notes
- Creating provisions
- Accounts receivable aging analysis
-
Account Reconciliations
Your virtual bookkeeper can help you in record comparison and ensuring that there are no errors therein. Some of the tasks you can assign are:
- Bank reconciliations
- Credit card reconciliations
- Vendor payment reconciliations
-
Assist in Financial Statement Preparation
Your bookkeeping VA can assist you in preparing financial statement such as:
- Balance sheets
- Income statements
- Cash flow statements
Benefits of Hiring a Bookkeeping VA
1. Save time 
Not only are accounting and financial management tasks tedious, but they are also time-consuming responsibilities.
As a small business owner, your attention is spanned across numerous processes and tasks you need to oversee, including client meetings and product or service marketing. In contrast to bookkeeping, you can definitely hire someone else to do the job. For such a reason, you should hire bookkeeping assistant to handle the financial aspect of your business.
A bookkeeping virtual assistant relieves you from the burdensome tasks of accounting work so you can focus on other, more important responsibilities. Moreover, you will have more time to juggle your job and personal life.
The best part of hiring a bookkeeping VA is they are proficient with the latest accounting systems, which speeds up their work.
2. Cost-Effective 
Not only will hiring a virtual bookkeeping assistant help you save time, but it can also help you save more money.
Because they are considered contractors, you need not pay for their employee benefits, insurance, employment taxes, office space, supplies, and other costs of hiring in-office workers.
3. Uphold financial transparency 
To manage finances effectively means you need to have a systematic and organized tracking of the inflow and outflow of money. Hence, you need someone to organize and present the data when necessary.
A virtual accounting assistant will ensure proper documentation, monitoring, and organization of daily cash flow and that these data are accessible whenever you need them.
You can study your finances and comprehend your business more thoroughly once your finances have been organized. More importantly, this will allow you to make game-changing business decisions.
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4. Increase in productivity
A surefire way of increasing your productivity is by onboarding someone with the talent and years of expertise to do the work where it is most needed.
The majority of virtual bookkeepers are highly-skilled and knowledgeable techniques needed for savvy accounting and financial management.
In addition, you can be assured that freelancing agencies or platforms only employ qualified bookkeepers, meaning they undergo rigorous screening and are later subjected to intensive training.
5. Payroll Management 
Another tedious task that confronts business owners is payroll management.
Managing payroll is a demanding task.
You can use the skills of a virtual bookkeeping assistant to handle such account-related tasks if you want to focus more on your business than these sorts of tasks.
6. Tax management
As the years progressed, the tax code became more complex. The need for a bookkeeper to assist businesses in organizing their financial records, filing tax returns, and saving time grows proportionally every time the law changes.
The IRS is not known for offering payment extensions. For business owners, it is imperative for them to figure out their tax dues and ensure that payment is made on time.
A virtual accounting assistant can assist you with your taxes. They are also knowledgeable about the most widely used tax prep software. Hence, you can be assured that you are informed about your dues to make a timely payment.
7. Handle legal concerns 
One of the most challenging parts of being a business owner is staying abreast with the latest tax laws and regulations.
Worse, being out of current with these regulations can negatively impact a business.
Hiring the assistance of a virtual bookkeeper can help you keep track of the most recent changes in regulations. Also, they are better at reading the fine print and reporting them to you.
8. Monitor KPIs 
The effectiveness of a function inside your business is fundamentally measured by key performance indicators (KPIs).
Income statement, cash flow statement, and cash disbursement schedule are the top key performance indicators for a company to comprehend its financial situation, which can all be handled by a virtual bookkeeper.
9. Year-end accounting 
You can also get year-end accounting assistance from a virtual bookkeeper.
To ensure that there are no mistakes or duplicate entries, a virtual bookkeeping assistant can help you reconcile the figures to match your bank statement and ensure that it coincides with the financial software display.
10. Be updated on your payments
If you have a history of making late payments, a virtual bookkeeping assistant can help you in managing your invoices for suppliers and creditors. They will also closely monitor your balances to maintain the business’s flow. Moreover, a bookkeeping VA can help you with your bills, obligations, returns tracking, and more.
11. Income sources 
As your business grows, so does your clientele. Hence, trying to manage numerous accounts by yourself can be pretty challenging.
A knowledgeable bookkeeping VA can assist you in managing your clients’ accounts by using various tools that can readily tell you the value they add to your business.
12. Organize financial statements 
The success of a business greatly depends on its ability to organize its financial statements. This means that a business must keep its financial records updated.
A bookkeeping VA can help you manage your company’s financial records. In addition, your knowledge about the financial standing of your business will enable you to steer your business toward a brighter future.
What to Look For When Hiring A Virtual Bookkeeping VA
1. Necessary qualifications
Ensure that you hire a skilled bookkeeping virtual assistant, regardless of whether you want to recruit someone with additional qualifications or not.
They should be proficient in using the most recent accounting software and comprehending complex financial data.
2. Industry-specific experience
Bookkeeping is different in every sector and nation across the globe. This implies that your hired bookkeeping virtual assistant must be conversant with accounting standards specific to your industry.
3. Tech savviness
Technology makes life and works easy, and that does not exclude bookkeeping.
Although most virtual assistant bookkeepers are familiar with basic accounting programs, it is crucial to work with someone who is also updated and well-versed with the technological developments in the industry.
4. Availability
Virtual bookkeepers may work with several clients. Hence, you must confirm that the candidate you wish to hire has the availability that can meet your company’s needs.
Ensure that your timetables are aligned. This implies that if you want to avail yourself of their virtual bookkeeping service, you must inform them beforehand and reserve a time.
5. Trustworthiness
You simply cannot trust anyone. There are some people who pose as an expert-turned-out-con-artist just to earn fast cash.
You must only give your financial information to someone you can trust, including seasoned bookkeepers with an excellent reputations or those who have received stellar recommendations from peers in your industry.
How to Manage Bookkeeping VAs
As we have mentioned earlier, technology has made almost everything easier. Cloud-based software has made managing bookkeeping VAs simpler.
Here are some resources to get you started:
1. Use communication tools 
Online communication tools allow you to instantly message someone even if they are on the other side of the world. Two of the most popular IM apps are Slack and Telegram.
Zoom, Google Teams, and Microsoft Teams allow you to do video calls for meetings and presentations. These programs provide sophisticated capabilities, which include file sharing, message searching, archiving, deletion, and editing.
In this manner, working with your internal team will be easier for your remote assistants.
2. Productivity Monitoring Tools 
Monitoring your remote bookkeeper’s output can be challenging.
You can keep track of their work using productivity monitoring applications. This will help you track time and increase efficiency. In addition, this will help you:
- Keep track of the precise time spent on tasks assigned.
- Keep track of the time spent by VAs using tools and websites
- Know the websites visited during work hours
Final Thoughts
We understand that you only have a limited budget in the early seasons of your business. However, if you allow this limitation to be at the forefront, plus not delving deep into the benefits of hiring a virtual bookkeeping VA, chances are, you are at risk of compromising the efforts you have put into growing your business.
Let a virtual bookkeeper take off a load of accounting for your business.
Find the best virtual bookkeeping assistants at Virtual Assistant Talent!
Talk with one of our consultants today!
References:
https://www.wishup.co/blog/9-benefits-of-a-bookkeeping-virtual-assistant/
https://vasupportnow.com/the-main-benefits-of-hiring-a-virtual-bookkeeping-assistant/
https://mytasker.com/blog/12-benefits-of-a-virtual-bookkeeping-assistant
https://invedus.com/blog/benefits-of-virtual-bookkeeping-assistant/
