QuickBooks Setup Contractor Do-It-Yourself Construction Bookkeeping

Fast Easy Accounting Do-It-Yourself 

Construction Accounting Store Is Open For Business

Most Contractors Setup QuickBooks Desktop Version In One Of Three Ways:

#1 EZ Step Interview inside QuickBooks Setup
#2 Asked Their Tax Accountant To Setup QuickBooks
#3 They Attended A How To Setup QuickBooks Class Or Seminar

And QuickBooks Does Not Work The Way They Want It Too!

The Answer:

#1 Click Here To Buy An Entire QuickBooks Setup For Your Specific Contracting Company

#2 Click Here To Buy Just The Chart Of Accounts For Your Specific Contracting Company

If QuickBooks is not working and how our Do-It-Yourself Solution may be the answer you have been searching for long and hard.

Our QuickBooks Setup and Stand Alone Chart of Accounts Store For Construction Contractors has packages with 200 to 1100 accounts specifically designed for Contractors all across the USA Including Alaska and Hawaii and cover a wide spectrum of contractor accounting needs.

#1 If You Used The EZ Step Interview In QuickBooks, You Have A Size Problem!

The Chart of Accounts In The EZ Step Interview Is Designed To Sell QuickBooks, Not To Use QuickBooks

1. Fixed Asset Accounts to track Vehicles, Tools, Equipment and Accumulated Depreciation.
2. Other Asset Accounts to track Security Deposits, Notes Receivable, and Retention.
3. Credit Card Accounts to track Purchases, Payments, and outstanding balances.
4. Other Current Liabilities Accounts to record Loans, and Customer Job Deposits.
5. Long Term Liabilities Accounts to track Vehicle / Equipment Loans, Back Taxes, Lines of Credit.
6. Equity Accounts to track your Net Worth and Owners Time On Jobs for Job Costing purposes.
7. Income Accounts to track Sales, Change Orders, Reimbursed Costs, Overhead & Profit, Markup, Refunds, Mileage, Consulting, Discounts, and more.
8. Cost of Goods Sold Accounts to track Direct and Indirect Costs, Labor, Material, Other Costs, Subcontractors, Disposal Fees, Fuel, Vehicle Repairs, Small Tools, Depreciation and more.
9. Expense Accounts to track Marketing, Technology, Travel and Entertainment, Shop Rent, Personal Development Seminars, Books, DVD, Online Training, and many more expenses.
10. Other Income Accounts to track money that comes into your business but not directly related to the type of Contracting work you do. For example Gain on Sale of Assets, Trade Discounts, Fee Income, Bonus From Customer, Scrap Metal, Interest Income, and Rebates.
11. Other Expense Accounts to track money that goes out of your Contracting Company but not directly related to the type of work you do. For Example Loss on Sale of Assets, Credit Card Interest, Loan Interest, Penalties, Late Fees, and more.

#2 If Your Tax Accountant Setup QuickBooks You Could Be Losing Profit Dollars!

Tax Accountants Are Wonderful People With One Purpose; Prepare And File Your Annual Income Tax Returns

Tax Accountants Typically set up QuickBooks Chart of Accounts to map directly into their tax software which makes it easy to download from the bank which can destroy a Contractor's Company because nothing ends up in QuickBooks where it is supposed too and causes Contractors to make bad decisions based upon bad Financial and Job Costing Report.

Tax Accountants Can kill more cash flow and profit in your construction company in less than an hour using a messed up QuickBooks file to prepare your construction company annual tax return than you can make up for in sales and hard work six months, if not six years. Saving you money on your tax bill is not what they are paid to do; they are paid to fill out tax returns.

This is not a bad thing; it is just business 101, people and companies do what they are paid to do. Tax Accountants do not understand construction because that is not what they are not paid to do. Helping you save money on your tax bill is not what they paid to do; they get paid to fill out as many tax returns as possible in the shortest amount of time during the harvest season between January 1 and April 15th.

Tax Accountants are good people and have their place; however, the should never be doing anything with regular accounting or worse yet contractors bookkeeping and accounting.

Construction Accountants are good people too and should never be preparing annual tax returns because nobody can serve two masters. Either be a tax accountant and serve the interests and desires of tax collection agencies or be a construction accountant who understands the difference between Construction Accounting and Regular Accounting and serves contractors like you.

#3 If You Attended A How To Setup QuickBooks Class Or Seminar

There is an old adage "Those who can't do teach." In some cases this is true; however, some of the best instructors I have ever had came from a Project Management, Math and Science backgrounds. Unfortunately when it comes to accounting most skilled accountants can earn up to 5X more than their counterparts who teach accounting.

There is a massive difference between what happens in an accounting textbook or handout and the real world. The biggest problem is most classes and seminars teach regular accounting because Regular Accounting is roughly 80% of all accounting. Construction Accounting is roughly 15% and manufacturing accounting at roughly 5%. Again instructors go where the demand is highest.

Construction Accounting is not the same as Regular Accounting

All Accounting Uses The Same Accounting Equation

Assets = Liabilities + Equity

Business Owners - Need three basic reports, Cash, Profit and Equity

Cash On Hand................(Bank Balance - Un-cleared Checks) = Cash

Profit And Loss Report.........................(Sales - Expenses) = Profit

Balance Sheet Report..........................(Assets - Liabilities) = Equity

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Regular Accounting - Is roughly 80% of all accounting and Accounting for businesses in the world. Its main purpose is to provide basic financial reports for annual tax returns and some very rudimentary management decisions:

1. Accounts Receivable

2. Accounts Payable

3. Profit & Loss

4. Balance Sheet

It Is Practically All that is taught in schools, colleges, and universities.

Regular Accounting Is Used In Fixed Environments - Where customers come to the place of business or at most you ship or deliver a packaged product. In essence, you are selling a product or a service from a fixed location.

Regular Accounting Has These Things In Common:

1. Sales - With 1-4 categories

2. Cost of Goods Sold - If they sell products with 1-4 categories

3. Expenses - Overhead required to maintain business operations

4. Breakeven - Is fairly easy to calculate because there is a direct relationship between income and expenses on every item. It is easy to run reports to determine which items are profitable and unprofitable and make adjustments quickly as needed.

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Construction Accounting Is Used In Mobile Environments - Which means having a contractors bookkeeping services system that can track the costs that contractors incur related to doing custom work in a mobile environment. Some of the costs include travel time, mobilization (packing the tools, equipment, labor and material at their warehouse, delivering everything to the job and unpacking it) before starting the work and then demobilization (reversing the entire process when the job is finished).

Construction Accounting Is Built Upon Regular Accounting and shares the same basic financial reports for operating and growing a business and preparing annual tax returns and some very rudimentary management decisions. Construction accounting adds many complex layers of reporting mechanisms to show the contractor where their best customer are within psychographic and geographic market segmentation boundaries.

Some Of The Reports Successful Contractors Use to operate and grow their construction companies and know which jobs to pursue and which ones to let go:

1. Accounts Receivable

2. Accounts Payable

3. Profit & Loss

4. Balance Sheet

5. Cash Balance

6. Job Costing Reports

7. Job Profitability Reports

8. Earned Value Reports

9. Work-In-Process Reports

10. Estimates Vs. Actuals Reports

11. Payment Applications

12. And more...

Below Are Two Diagrams For Construction Accounting Vs. Regular Accounting

Construction Accounting Has These Things In Common:

1. Sales - With 1-10 categories

2. Cost of Goods Sold - Has Direct and Indirect Job Costs with 25 - 200 categories with 1,000s of subcategories

3. Expenses - Overhead is extremely complex because some expenses in regular Accounting are actually Cost of Goods Sold in construction accounting

4. Breakeven - Very difficult to calculate because most projects are one-of-a-kind custom jobs. Proactive contractors have systems and cost libraries with pre-priced assemblies for bidding which works in conjunction with Strategic Construction Accounting to provide management with progress invoicing, job costing and job profitability.

5. Job Costing and Job Profitability Reporting - Is similar to the Company Profit and Loss report except that it is specific to each particular job and has different expense codes. These reports in combination with the Five Key Performance Indicators are what help the contractor understand which projects to pursue and which ones to ignore. They form the foundation of a Business Process Improvement Plan and Construction Business Strategy.

Shown Below Are A Short List Of Titles commonly used for construction accounting and regular accounting. The list is intentionally short in order to make the point without being completely overwhelming.

Construction Accounting Titles = 233

Regular Accounting Titles = 115

We Remove Contractor's Unique Paperwork Frustrations

For Construction Company Owners who do not need the full power of a QuickBooks for contractors and want 24/7 online access we offer Xero Accounting Online, and we have a custom setup for construction companies. Click Here For More.

This Is One More Example of how Fast Easy Accounting is helping construction company owners all across the USA including Alaska and Hawaii put more money in the bank to operate and grow your construction company. Construction accounting is not rocket science; it is a lot harder than that, and a lot more valuable to people like you so stop missing out! Call Sharie 206-361-3950 or sharie@fasteasyaccounting.com and schedule your no charge one-hour consultation. 

Profitable Contractors and Construction Company owners have known about the value of outsourced bookkeeping services and contractor coaching services like ours for a long time, and now you know about it too!

Thank You For Reading This Far, And I Hope You Understand we really do care about you and all contractors regardless of whether or not you ever hire our services.We Scan Your Receipts, And Invoices link the appropriate transactions to QuickBooks or Xero Accounting Online depending on the construction accounting service you are using and provide ongoing Cloud Based Contractors Bookkeeping Services by accountants who understand construction.

Our Contractor Bookkeeping Services System Is A System

Thinking About Outsourcing Your Contractors Bookkeeping Services To Save Time And Money?

Click On The Button Below To Download A Free Guide 

Business Process Management (BPM) For Contractors

Need Help Now?

Call Sharie 206-361-3950

sharie@fasteasyaccounting.com

Xero Outsourced Construction Accounting Services

QuickBooks Outsourced Construction Bookkeeping Services

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About The Author:

Randal DeHart, PMP, QPA is the co-founder of Business Consulting And Accounting in Lynnwood Washington. He is the leading expert in outsourced construction bookkeeping and accounting services for small construction companies across the USA. He is experienced as a Contractor, Project Management Professional, Construction Accountant, Intuit ProAdvisor, QuickBooks For Contractors Expert and Xero Accounting Specialist. This combination of experience and skill sets provides a unique perspective which allows him to see the world through the eyes of a contractor, Project Manager, Accountant, and construction accountant. This quadruple understanding is what sets him apart from other Intuit ProAdvisors and Xero accountants to the benefit of all of the construction contractors he serves across the USA. Visit http://www.fasteasyaccounting.com/randal-dehart/ to learn more.

Our Co-Founder Randal DeHart - Is a Certified PMP (Project Management Professional) with several years of construction project management experience. His expertise is construction accounting systems engineering and process development. His exhaustive study of several leading experts including the work of Dr. W. Edward Deming, Michael Gerber, Walter A. Shewhart, James Lewis and dozens of others was the foundation upon which our Construction Bookkeeping System is based and continues to evolve and improve. Check out our Contractor Success Map Podcast on iTunes and Follow Randal on Google+