If you find yourself working “in” your business instead of “on” your business, you’re not alone.  This is a critical mistake many entrepreneurs and business owners make.  They think it’s saving them money but when you account for the fact that they don’t have time to focus on more mission-critical activities like marketing, sales, research and product development, then you start to realise that being stuck in the detail is hurting more than helping.

Accounting is one of those activities that is vitally important to your business, but to be perfectly honest, many business owners don’t know how to properly manage.  On top of that, processes such as accounts receivable and accounts payable are serious drags on human resources and ultimately net revenues.

With this in mind, here are two reasons you might consider outsourcing your AR, AP and bookkeeping in general.

Outsource to Free up your time to refocus on other priorities

Cash coming in the door is very important but equally as important is business growth – chances are that YOU are the person responsible for growing the business!  To stay alive your business needs to focus on customer service, marketing, sales, research and development etc.

Handling AR and AP in-house is time-consuming and tends to pull YOU and also key staff members away from these more critical growth activities.  Additionally, given the nature of collecting debt, it tends to be a morale drain and that’s the last thing you want employees to deal with day in and day out.

Greater efficiency and better results with Professional Bookkeeping 

When you work with a professional accounting or bookkeeping firm to outsource things like Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable, they have a degree of finance and accounting expertise that in-house employees usually don’t have.  With this expertise, training and experience, your outsourcing partner can attain greater efficiency and results.  Your AR and AP can be improved and completed in a timely manner.

Businesses can talk themselves out of outsourcing AR and AP for a number of reasons:

  • It’s too much money
  • They want to build their own home-grown process
  • They want to maintain control

These are all legitimate concerns; however, a good accounting firm will keep you involved in the process while taking the burden off your shoulders AND they will provide an ROI for the investment you make for their services.