IT’S VERY POSSIBLE THAT at the end of financial year, you discovered your accounts needed a bit of rescue bookkeeping. One of the issues that leads to a business needing rescue work is not keeping your accounts up to speed, and also having an inexperienced bookkeeper set up or handle your books.

A way to avoid this is to hire an experienced bookkeeper or finance manager on a contract basis, or you can do a course to learn a bit more so you can manage them better.

Are there benefits to hiring two bookkeepers at once?

A contract finance manager will not only complete your bookkeeping and check it for accuracy and compliance, but they also understand the financial indicators that suggest the overall health and well-being of a business; and how to get there and maintain it.

A finance manager provides more services

The main drawback in hiring a finance manager to take care of your bookkeeping is that they cost more. A bookkeeper level one who specialises in data entry will charge between $18 and $25 an hour, while a finance manager will charge $60 to $90 an hour; a level four BAS agent charges between $40 and $75 an hour. Find out more about the pay levels and rates of pay for bookkeepers

But a finance manager is qualified to provide end-of-period reporting services, manage projects, and help with decision making; that’s in addition to general bookkeeping tasks. In other words, instead of hiring a bookkeeper and a financial advisor or accountant, you could just hire one professional: a contract finance manager.

Managing other bookkeepers

But now I’m going to contradict myself. Depending on your business, and the volume of transactions you have each month, it may be cheaper to hire both a level one bookkeeper (specialising in data entry only) and a finance manager to provide deeper analysis of your business’s financials.

Of course, hiring two professionals can be tricky, especially if they’re to work with each other remotely. It’s best to start with the most experienced hire first and work downwards in qualifications and experience. In this case, your finance manager can contribute to the hiring process, so the arrangement works smoothly.

What are your business needs? Do you need a professional who can identify areas of your business that, with a little attention, can help you grow and become more profitable? Then you need a finance manager; possibly even a separate bookkeeper, too, but start with a finance manager.

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We have bookkeepers, BAS agents and finance managers located across Australia, available to help businesses in need of rescue bookkeeping work. Visit our online directory of local bookkeepers and bookkeepers who work ‘in the cloud’ at National Bookkeeping for more information. You can also view the different bookkeepers’ rates or request a quote.

Read more about whether you should have your accountant’s bookkeeper do your books, or hire a junior of your own; also do you need a bookkeeper, an accountant or someone else?