If you own a small window cleaning business, you are most likely earning enough to make ends meet but not enough to employ a permanent accountant. You still need a rudimentary book keeping system in order to file your tax and VAT returns and to know if you’re making a profit or not. Below is some more information about basic book keeping for small window cleaning businesses.
In the first place you need a receipt book and an invoice book. The receipt book is used when a customer pays you in cash and you have to provide him with proof of payment. The invoice book is for when you provide credit to a customer (only advisable with regular customers!).
The next important element of your bookkeeping system will be to keep all documents related to business expenses. If you buy a new bucket, keep the receipt. If you have the delivery vehicle serviced, keep the receipt. You must also have a wage register with the names of all your workers and let them sign for their weekly pay.
At the end of the day you will then need a cash book, an accounts receivable register and an accounts payable register.
Now use the receipt book mentioned above and enter all the money that you received during the day on the left hand side of the cash book. Use the expense vouchers to write down all expenses on the right hand side. There should be columns for the total amounts, and also columns showing the nature of the income or expense. Include a column on the expenses side for the total of the wage register. At the end of the month, when you add up all the different columns, you’ll know exactly how much you made in sales and how much you spend on things like cleaning materials, gas, wages etc.
If you had only cash transactions during the month, so nobody owes you anything and you don’t owe anybody anything either, the difference between the expenditure and income columns of your cash book will show the business’s gross profit for the month.
If your accounts receivable register shows that you had credit sales during the month, which haven’t been paid yet, that amount has to be added to the profit shown by the cash book, because if it had been paid you would have had more money in the bank. The same is true for credit purchases: if you owe money to suppliers at the end of the month, that amount must be deducted from your profit according to the cash book.
The above describes very basic book keeping for small window cleaning businesses. Although not sophisticated, it will give you a very good idea of whether your business is generating a profit or not.
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