Let me share a horror story with you………
Company XYZ hired a bookkeeper who they thought was qualified. One of the bookkeeper’s tasks was to process payroll. The bookkeeper did not know very much about payroll, but she tried her best. In processing payroll one week, she miscalculated the overtime on an employee’s paycheck. When the employee came in to complain about the missing pay, the bookkeeper just prepared another check for the amount she thought was correct. The amount was still not correct, and the employee began talking with other employees, who had had similar experiences with vacation and sick leave calculation. The employee sought out a labor law attorney who ended up filing a class action suit against the company.
Fortunately, even horror stories can have a happy ending.
During the course of the lawsuit and ensuing Labor Dept. investigation, the company brought in the Queen’s SWAT team who discovered numerous accounting problems. The Queen cleaned up the accounting department and was able to provide accurate accounting records to the attorneys and investigators, ultimately leading to a resolution of both the lawsuit and the investigation. The Queen trained the bookkeeper on correct accounting steps to follow the best protocol in accounting, and followed up and monitored the progress. This company is still open for business, and has not had any payroll or accounting issues since.
In small companies, the “office manager” or “assistant” is often tasked with bookkeeping duties. People skilled at administrative tasks are not necessarily qualified to be doing the bookkeeping, and even the smartest and hardest workers will end up missing important pieces. In the long run it will cost more for the cleanup than to hire a qualified bookkeeper in the first place.
Here is a checklist of things to be aware of for you to avoid such a horror story for your company:
Is your “bookkeeper” working solely on their own with no oversight or review by your CPA or an outside accountant?
- Do you not know how to go into QuickBooks (or your accounting program) and prepare reports or retrieve information?
- Does the “bookkeeper” tell you to not go into QuickBooks because they don’t want you messing up things?
- Is your “bookkeeper” unable to take a vacations or days off because they have no backup?
- Is the “bookkeeper” unable to answer your accounting questions?
These are all signs of potentially serious accounting issues. Call the Queen now and she will make sure your accounting department is being run accurately and efficiently.
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