As your online business grows, bookkeeping becomes a chore that you may want to outsource. Bookkeeping services help you manage bookkeeping, payroll, expenses, and more. You can choose a service that integrates into your cloud accounting software, or outsource your bookkeeping completely. In this article, we have hand-picked the best bookkeeping services for your online business.
Why You Need Online Bookkeeping Service for Your Business?
IRS requires all businesses to maintain books containing all their financial records. These books show your sources of income and business expenses. They also help in separating your taxable and non-taxable income.
Apart from taxes and legal requirements, proper bookkeeping also helps you measure your business’ progress and growth. You can see where the money is coming from, your major expenses, and discover ways to improve your business.
However, maintaining proper books requires time and effort. Many small businesses cannot afford to hire a full-time accountant or CFO right away.
This is where online bookkeeping services come in. They allow you to efficiently manage your business by spending less time on paperwork. As a small business, you can also save money that you would otherwise spend on hiring full-time staff.
Following are a few things you need to keep in mind when choosing an online bookkeeping service for your business.
- Cost – The cost of your bookkeeping service, what services you get, and your own budget.
- Features – What services you need? For example bill payments, invoices, income and expense reports, managing bank and credit card statements, payroll, and more.
- Integrations – If you are using a cloud accounting software like QuickBooks or Freshbooks, then your bookkeeping service should work with those apps.
- Ease of Use – How easy to use it is and how much time and resources it helps you save
That being said, let’s take a look at the top online bookkeeping services for small businesses and how they compare on these requirements.
1. Bench
Bench provides online bookkeeping services by professional bookkeepers. They offer monthly financial statement and expenses overview that gives you control of your money. Their at-a-glance visual reports help you see the big picture and give you actionable insights to grow your business.
They also provide a year-end financial package which contains all the information you need to file your taxes. They can work with your CPA or help you find one to painlessly file your taxes on time.
Bench doesn’t manage payroll, pay bills, create invoices, or file taxes for you. It is suitable for small businesses that need bookkeeping services while using other tools to manage payroll, taxes, and invoicing.
Pricing: Starting from $115 / month paid annually.
2. Bookkeeper.com
Bookkeeper.com offers an all-in-one bookkeeping services solution for small businesses. It manages your books using the most popular accounting software QuickBooks. Their team consists of certified accountants and QuickBooks professionals so you know you are in good hands.
Upon sign up, it connects your banking and credit card statements to Quickbooks. You get access to the customized chart of accounts, set up bills, invoicing, and payments.
They will make sure that your QuickBooks file matches your bank and credit card statements. At all times, you will be able to access categorized statements to quickly get an overview of your finances. Each month you will be able to review your financial statements with their team.
Bookkeeper.com also allows you to pay vendors and suppliers using checks. They will print and mail the checks for you. It will also monitor your invoices to make sure that they are paid on time.
Pricing: Starting from $275 / month.
3. FreeAgent
FreeAgent is web-based accounting software that makes your bookkeeping simplified. It connects with your bank accounts and allows you to track expenses, send invoices and estimates, monitor cash flow, and get a bird’s eye view of your income, expenses, and profits.
FreeAgent doesn’t do your Bookkeeping for you, you will be in charge of doing that on your own or add an accountant to your account. It also allows you to add multiple projects, multi-currency invoices, unlimited users and clients, and easily setup sales tax.
It is highly suitable for small businesses that need a low-cost accounting software where they can do their own bookkeeping.
Pricing: $10 /month for 6 months, then just $20 /month.
4. Bookkeeper360
Bookkeeper360 is an online bookkeeping service for small businesses. They use Xero accounting software instead of Quickbooks and help setup your books so that you don’t lose any data when they transfer your data to Xero.
They offer small businesses a dedicated account manager, financial statements, cash and accrual basis reporting, bills, invoicing, and payroll.
With their virtual CFO plan, they also offer technology advisory, HR services, daily bookkeeping, custom and KPI reporting, and dedicated CFO/CPA to manage your account.
Pricing: Starting from $199 a month.
5. inDinero
inDinero is an online accounting software, bookkeeping, and tax services, provider. They offer an all-in-one solution which includes bookkeeping, bills, payroll, and tax filing.
They use an intuitive easy to use software which quickly gives you an overview of your income, expenses, and profits. Behind the scenes, they have a highly dedicated team of accounting and bookkeeping experts that will work and manage your account.
inDinero’s onboarding team will help you set up your account, bank, and credit statements so that you are never behind on your bookkeeping.
Their pricing plans are based on the number of connected accounts and transactions. Their team will help you create a custom plan to fit your business needs. By default, all plans are paid annually but you can also request for a monthly payment option.
Pricing: $310 per month paid annually.
6. Merritt Bookkeeping
Merritt Bookkeeping offers cost-effective bookkeeping services to online business. They use QuickBooks to keep your books and integrate your bank and credit card accounts for up-to-date statements.
They have a flat fee of $150/month with no setup charges and they also offer free bookkeeping for non-profits and charities. The flat fee option means your cost will not increase if you have more transactions.
However, it is just a bookkeeping service and cannot do payroll, taxes, or invoices. You can use third-party apps with your Quickbooks account to automatically pay your bills.
Pricing: $150 / month.
We hope this article helped you learn about the best bookkeeping services for your online business. You may also want to see our comparison of best business phone services and best email marketing services for small businesses.
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Rahul says
Really helpful blog, Thanks for sharing!
WPBeginner Support says
You’re welcome!
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David Myth says
Nice to know about multiple bookkeeping services!
WPBeginner Support says
Glad you found our list helpful!
Admin
Jhon says
Thanks for sharing this amazing information.
WPBeginner Support says
You’re welcome
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Athel Corporate Advisory says
Very Nice blog. Thanks for sharing useful Bookkeeping services sites.
WPBeginner Support says
Thank you, glad you liked our list
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Bitaccounting says
thanks for providing me these sites list
WPBeginner Support says
You’re welcome
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Wesley Nunns says
Great information! Thanks for sharing such type of informative content. Keep sharing.
WPBeginner Support says
Thank you, glad you found our tutorial helpful
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Christophe Giets says
Hi,
This article is perfect because I am just starting as a Freelancer (got 4 projects so far and 2 more coming) and I would like to find a great tool to deal with my accounting.
I would like to :
– Keep track of my expenses
– Create invoices to send to clients
– etc.
Now in this article you have 6 services. In your article 23 top tools… you mention 3 others services (Mint, Freshbooks, Quickbooks).
And in an other article about starting your WP business you recommend Freshbooks which is not even mentioned in this article dedicated to bookeeping tools…
Could you enlighten be please ?
Ps : Great content, I am still in a learning process and many useful articles in here
WPBeginner Support says
It would depend on the date of those articles, as we find tools we feel would fit a need better we try to update the articles
Admin
The Bookkeeper says
Thank you for all of your informative . I find them clear and i need more articles. This is really helpful. Thanks a lot
WPBeginner Support says
You’re welcome
Admin
Thomas Duquette says
Thank you for sharing these sites!
Frank Tremmel says
Thank you for all of your informative articles. I find them clear, functional and motivating.
There is a typo. Directly under the section title for Bookeeper.com you use the name Bookkeeping
WPBeginner Support says
Hi Frank,
Thank you for notifying us, we have fixed the mistake.
Admin