Real engagements, measurable results

With year end approaching, the client's books were badly out of order — unreconciled bank and card accounts, miscategorised transactions, duplicate entries and missing documentation. Their accountant could not prepare the annual filings from records in that state.

Our team reconciled every bank, card and loan account for the year, corrected and recategorised transactions, removed duplicates, posted the required adjusting and accrual entries, and prepared a clear list of open items for the client to confirm — all reviewed under Chartered Accountant supervision.

The client received clean, fully reconciled books and supporting schedules ready for annual filing, along with a monthly bookkeeping routine to keep the records in order going forward.

Invoices were going out late or not at all, customer payments were not matched to invoices, and supplier bills were paid without checks against purchase orders. The owner could see cash was tight but could not tell where money was being lost.

We took over day-to-day accounts payable and receivable: matched every receipt to its invoice, chased overdue balances on a set schedule, and reviewed unbilled work. On the payables side, we checked each bill against orders and contracts before payment and flagged duplicates and overcharges.

The review uncovered unbilled services and duplicate supplier payments that were quietly eroding margins. With leakage stopped, collections faster and costs under control, the client's profitability improved — backed by a clear monthly AP/AR report.

The business ran several branches but only saw one combined set of accounts. Owners could not see where costs were going, how much labour was costing each location, how cash was moving month to month, or what customers had actually paid each week — so staffing, spending and cash decisions were based on instinct.

On top of the regular bookkeeping, we built a recurring management reporting pack: a Cost Breakdown by branch and category, a Labor Cost Report showing wages and labour cost against revenue per branch, a Month-on-Month Cash Flow statement, and a Weekly Collection report tracking receipts against outstanding invoices.

Management now sees exactly where money is spent, which branches carry excessive labour cost, how cash is trending and which collections are falling behind — giving them the information to control costs, adjust staffing and keep cash flow healthy.