When you’re a busy freelancer, the task of bookkeeping may be pushed to the bottom of the pile. But, effectively managing your finances as a freelancer is essential to the success of your business. Keeping good quality books can aid planning for the future and making better business decisions.
Connect with a specialist accountant
Specialist accounts, like ourselves, are able to give you advice and support to important things for you. Our advisors are able to offer you a free call back to ensure we can cater for all your needs, in an affordable way. Having an accountant might seem indulgent for your business expenses, but it can be very affordable – the small services will pay off in the future income.
Having an accountant that you can trust and understands your business, allows them to help you invoice and chase clients, pay your business expenses, categorise expenses, help with filing taxes and reviewing reports. The accountant can give you all this help, even if temporarily, to help give you a step up in understanding accounting and setting everything up for the future. Further, the accountant can pick up on, and fix, any mistakes before it is too late and your incur future costs.
Track your expenses and income
Freelancing provides flexibility, but also the amount of work you get is highly flexible. Therefore, it is essential to understand how much you need each month and how you will be getting it. This means you need to control where your money is spent, ready for the future – but do this from the beginning.
Another common mistake is waiting till the tax return is due to do all the preparation and sorting through the whole year’s expenses. This can be an incredibly time-consuming process, where you may also fall victim to mistakes and missing purchases. It is far more efficient to go through your finances on a regular basis and avoiding the headache. Having an accountant can help you set up the right method for you, ensuring you categorise and report all the necessary things.
A further aspect of having an accountant is that it can help chase your payments. As a freelancer, it can a struggle to get paid on time, which therefore impacts your own life, e.g. your bills. There are various communication tactics you can take, but it can take up a lot of time. An accountant will be able to organise this for you, helping you know what to say and when without needing constant reminders on the phone calendar.
Don’t ignore their advice
Your business is your life, and understandably you will know best. However, we’re very experienced in dealing with multiple types of companies and all the complications – therefore, our advice may be hugely beneficial for you. If your accountant warns you about something, then it is in your best interests to follow the advice. But at the same time, whilst taking advice is good, it is your business, so don’t be afraid of asking questions and understanding how to do something and how it will affect the business.
For the best success, it is also important to give what you expect to get. Therefore, by remaining organising and submitting things on time will aid your relationship. Making sure you stay in contact when necessary, therefore, they do not have to chase you up, in the same way, you would not want to chase them.
If you’re a freelancer in need of professional accounting services, look no further. We work with local and companies throughout the UK on a daily basis. For more information on how we can help, try our services tab.