There is a storm brewing on the horizon and I have to address it before it is too late in an effort to help save a few good marriages. Lately there has been a surge of contractor's spouses who have left and filed for divorce and a lot more are on the edge. Girlfriends do not have as many reasons to stay so they usually pack up and leave early.
I married a man who grew up in a construction family and spent many years working side-by-side with him in operating several construction companies so the article comes from the heart as someone who lived it until one day I said "Enough is enough! You need to get somebody else to do the contractor bookkeeping because I am done!" He developed a Contractors Bookkeeping Services System which saved our marriage and perhaps could help save yours too!
Here is what I see repeated many times over. Contractors cross the line and begin treating their spouses as indentured servants who should be grateful for a place to live, eat and sleep in exchange for maintaining a household and being an overworked, underpaid contractor's bookkeeper. They are become extremely frustrated and in some cases desperate.
In most cases you are not at fault; you are being hammered by customers who are doing everything they can to drive the price of everything and everyone into the ground in a twisted attempt to get something for nothing and I have a suggestion how to fix that later in this article.
Here Are The Dirty Dozen Issues Your Wife Is Facing:#01 You do not understand there is a world of difference between construction accounting and regular accounting.
#02 You start the business and ask your wife to "do the books" saying "It should only take 10 minutes a day and not knowing any better she agrees with you.
#03 Very quickly she begins to realize she is in trouble and way over her head because she doesn't understand construction accounting let alone how it can be done in 10 minutes a day.
#04 Her resentment toward you starts to build inside as she is faced with the prospect of feeling a failure because she let you down or perhaps feeling like she lied to you about being able to handle the contractor bookkeeping services. Now she is concerned you may begin to doubt her honesty and her worth as a person.
#05 She does not know that it takes 10,000 hours of training and practice to become a construction bookkeeper let alone another long grueling set of years of training and practice that it takes to become a construction accountant.
#06 Worse yet if she has any experience in regular accounting then she is lead to believe that construction accounting is no different that is recipe for disaster.
#07 She is deathly afraid of filling out the dozens of state, federal and local tax forms that need to be filed every year. What if there is an audit? What if she paid too much tax, too little tax, filed a return late? The taxes will not bankrupt you but the fines and penalties can and it will all be blamed on her.
#08 She has to constantly ask you and your construction workers for paperwork and you say "stop nagging me and the other employees" which causes hurt feelings for everyone involved.
#09 All day your spouse is being interrupted while trying to get the bookkeeping done. Friends and neighbors call or drop by to visit. Customers call about when you will be at their house to finish their job, suppliers calling for money, kids need lunch, rides to activities and on it goes.
#10 Frantic invoicing issues as you remember you need to send an Invoice to a customer to get paid and you forgot so you add that to her overloaded workday.
#11 You ask for Financial and Job Cost Reports and get upset when she says they are not ready. What she is really saying is "I don't know to generate accurate reports" which causes more tension and hurt feelings for both of you.
#12 When you do get Financial and Job Cost Reports your first response is to argue with them and blame your wife for not getting them right. You say "There is no way we are that far in debt" or "What do you mean that last job didn't make any money?" "I needed that new truck and now you are telling me we are out of money". Continual hurt feelings make her numb then she slides into depression which turns into despair and finally the love is gone.
I could go on for many more pages and never cover all of the reasons making your wife do your construction accounting was the reason they gave up asked for a divorce.
The answer is simple. We have helped save a lot of marriages by working with contractor’s wives and showing them how to do the things they are good at like managing the money, paying the bills, customer service and other management tasks and letting us take care of the contractors bookkeeping services.
Most of the time the contractor ends up making more money because everyone does what they are good at doing and they have 24/7 access to all of the reports they could ever want with our web based contractors bookkeeping services financial reporting tool.
About The Author:
Sharie DeHart, QPA is the co-founder of Business Consulting And Accounting in Lynnwood Washington. She is the leading expert in managing outsourced construction bookkeeping and accounting services companies and cash management accounting for small construction companies across the USA. She encourages Contractors and Construction Company Owners to stay current on their tax obligations and offers insights on how to manage the remaining cash flow to operate and grow their construction company sales and profits so they can put more money in the bank. http://www.fasteasyaccounting.com/sharie-dehart/