A recent call I received from a law firm reminded me of the importance of having your Quickbooks data reviewed on a quarterly basis. The caller, a legal assistant who recently took over bookkeeping duties when the firm bookkeeper was laid off, couldn’t understand why their financial reports were way off.
A quick review of their Quickbooks data revealed that, for the last few months, she had been entering expenses twice in Quickbooks, once on the bill and again on the check. The resulting double entries were really throwing off their books. I discovered a few other issues, as well. For example, their checking account hadn’t been reconciled in 3 months.
Had they waited until the end of the year to bring in outside help, their financials would be off the entire year and the clean up process would have become much more costly. The moral of this story: A few hours spent on a quarterly review by an experienced accounting professional, such as your CPA or a Quickbooks ProAdvisor, will pay big dividends for you in the long run.
