Author: Jeri Ann

One of the founders of Sunstone Bookkeeping spent over two decades negotiating debt restructurings for medium-and large-sized companies.  Over time, it became clear that regardless of industry or location, the same factors tended to lead to the companies’ financial woes.

1. The company ownership had incurred debt that it didn’t need for a venture that detracted from the core business, and
2. The company ownership had depleted cash reserves on extravagances (the second corporate jet or vanity offices, for example).

Then, when the company faced a crisis, it was too vulnerable as a result of the poor financial decisions made by company ownership, and they had to seek outside help to avoid bankruptcy.

How does this relate to you and your family?  Think of your life as your “core business”.  Without a clear vision on what is important to your life, these same two factors can lead to your own financial woes:

1. Going into unnecessary debt by spending on things that detract from your life’s vision, and
2. Depleting your cash reserves on extravagances (expensive cars or lavish vacations, for example).

So how can you avoid these problems?  Take some time to create a clear vision for your core business, then create a plan to use your finances to bring that vision into reality.  Focusing on that vision will help you to avoid spending on things that don’t meet your true needs and desires.  And yes, it’s important to include little splurges in your plans – as long as you keep your focus on your vision.

Want to learn more about how we can guide you in creating the best vision and plans for your “core business”?  Contact us today!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“How do I keep from being hacked?!”

OK, as much as I am in huge favor of cloud-based bookkeeping and storage, nothing is perfect.  If you process financial transactions and send documents and data via the internet, there is always the risk of theft and ransomware and other cyber-badness.  (Hackers gonna hack, y’all.)

There are certainly steps to take to keep your data as secure as possible. Please, PLEASE, establish business practices that include protocols to change passwords regularly, install encryption software, not open attachments in emails from people you don’t know, and learn how to recognize a phishing email so you don’t give any sensitive information to a hacker.

Even if you take the right steps, though, sometimes those hackers will still get through and create massive problems.  Those problems include losing all of your business data, having your business data held hostage by hackers until you pay a ransom, or even having your business data (including your client’s data) sold on the dark web.

That’s it’s so important to have cyber liability coverage in the digital age.  You have insurance to handle problems with your business assets (buildings, equipment, inventory), and your digital information needs protection as well.

As every business’s needs are unique, and I am not an insurance broker, I will not make any recommendations on what kind of or how much cyber liability coverage you would need.  I will, however, encourage you to get in touch with an insurance expert to find out what your business’s vulnerabilities and options are.  Better to be safe than sorry.

 

 

We recently announced a new service offering at Sunstone Bookkeeping:  financial coaching.  But most folks are probably wondering what it’s about?  This week, we’ll go over what it does and doesn’t involve.

• It’s NOT a “quick fix”. Financial coaching isn’t a way to improve your financial life in an hour, a day, or even a week.

• • It IS a 90-day program to help you learn about your own financial history and make a plan for your financial future that works best for you and your family.
• It’s NOT a debt consolidation program. Financial coaching doesn’t involve contacting your credit card companies to negotiate your balances to lower payments.  In fact, it doesn’t involve contacting any finance professionals on your behalf; we don’t even need to know what banks you use if that’s your preference.
• • It IS a program that shows you how to discover why you got into the debt in the first place, and how you can chart a course out of debt and into a healthier relationship with your finances.

• It’s NOT a financial investment program. We are not licensed financial advisors, nor do we sell or recommend any financial products.

• • It IS a program to teach you steps to create financial success, so you have more options for investments and financial plans, if you choose to pursue them.

• It’s NOT only about your finances, contrary to the name.

• • It IS about how your finances fit into your life holistically, and how to use your finances to allow you to create your ideal life, present and future.
• It’s NOT a set of instructions to blindly follow to the letter.

• • It IS a program where you work with a financial coach who will guide you through the process of adjusting your financial life. While your financial coach will be there for regular weekly calls and email assistance during the 90 days to help you navigate the process, YOU will be making the decisions … because this program is about YOU.

Financial coaching is a guided program designed to help you:

• Form a vision for your life based on your dreams and values for you and your family
• Determine your current financial reality
• Formulate a plan to guide you from your current financial reality towards your vision
• Create a legacy of success for your financial future

So, now that you know what financial coaching is and isn’t, why don’t you get in touch with us to find out even more?

Sunstone Bookkeeping LLC is thrilled to announce a new service:  Financial Coaching.

 

 

• Do you look at your finances and wonder, “How did I get to this point? I should have more!”
• Do you feel overwhelmed by your financial past and can’t picture a stable financial future?
• Do you want to have more control and less anxiety over the money in your life?

 

If you answered, “Yes!” to any of these questions, then we’d love to work with you!

 

We’ll be providing details via the website on this exciting new service shortly, but feel free to contact us if you have questions or you’d like to more information.

I am inundated with all of these papers – receipts, statements, notes, forms, invoices, bills.  ARGH!  Do I really need keep all of them?!

 

Variety/sketch comedy shows were popular when I was growing up in the 1970s (uh oh, just admitted my age!).  One sketch I clearly remember was the harried husband constantly getting interrupted when trying to complete his tax form, surrounded by piles of documents, receipts and forms.  The audience would laugh as he frantically searched for just the right piece of paper to be able to justify a deduction while his wife would pepper him with random questions, hammer a nail into the wall to hang a picture, or noisily eat a bag of potato chips.

 

Of course, the audience laughed:  It was hilarious!  Mainly because it’s true.  Particularly the part about all the financial papers piled up on whichever surfaces are nearby.

 

But those piles of paper are the proof of your business’s financial income and expenses and are important for tax filing and business reporting.  Believe it or not, as a bookkeeper, I’m actually happier when I have a pile of papers to sift through than when I don’t.  These papers are the essential elements of your business finances, so it’s important to hold to on every paper that has information on a financial transaction so there’s a record on hand in case you need evidence for the expense or revenue.

 

Does that mean we’re doomed to be constantly surrounded by piles of papers?  Thankfully, no.  You can scan them and store them electronically.  Even better, most accounting software applications have an attachment function so you can save a copy of the file directly to the transaction for easy reference if needed.  You can even use your phone to quickly take a photo of a receipt, and if you’re using a cloud file storage application, you can put the photo in the right folder in a matter of seconds.

 

So if you find yourself with a shoe box, or a packing box, or even a steamer trunk full of receipts and records, just remember that overflowing box allows your bookkeeper do the job of managing your finance transactions to help you run your business efficiently.  It may be slightly chaotic (and potentially hilarious), but it’s better than an empty box!

 

So, I know I should stay on top of my bookkeeping, but I’m not sure that it’s a great use of my time.  Should I hire someone to do it for me, or just do it myself?

 

Let’s be honest — you started your business because you love the industry you’re in.  And unless that industry happens to be bookkeeping, you probably don’t love the bookkeeping part of running your business.

 

However, bookkeeping is a vital part of keeping your business alive and thriving.  You absolutely must keep track of your revenue, your expenses, your asset purchases, your payroll, your tax payments — all of it.  To ignore the bookkeeping is to doom your business to certain failure and possibly doom you to legal problems as well.

 

The short answer to the question of hiring someone to handle your bookkeeping or doing it yourself is:  whatever method gets the job done efficiently.

 

If you decide to take on the books yourself, there are many tutorials and online courses for you to gain the knowledge and know-how of bookkeeping and your chosen accounting software.  Taking the time to learn the basics will save you lots of time and hassle, particularly on trickier transactions like payroll.

 

Hiring a bookkeeper or contracting with a bookkeeping firm will cost more than doing the work yourself.  But you will have more freedom to focus on helping your customers, growing your top-line, and doing what you love.  The benefits may outweigh the costs, particularly as your business grows.

 

But even if you pay someone else to do the work, you should still be involved in the bookkeeping process.  Have regular meetings with your bookkeeper to confirm that the bookkeeper has everything needed to keep the books up to date and accurate and to make sure you understand your business’s performance.

 

So for whichever method you choose for keeping the books — doing it yourself or hiring an employee or firm to do it for you — be sure to get started right away to get your business finances in good shape!

Computing in the Cloud – Clear Skies for Your Data

“So, I’m reading a lot about cloud-based storage and bookkeeping, but how does it work?  And is my data really safe?”

Folks tend to get nervous when they hear about “the cloud”.  An image of some nebulous (see what I did there?) ethereal world where data floats around aimlessly and can be accessed by anyone with a computer comes to mind (the recent scandals involving not-so-tame celebrity photos, for example) .

However, cloud storage refers to companies that own and manage servers that store data for the price of a subscription fee so users can access their data securely from anywhere with an internet connection.

What does this mean for you and your business’s financial data?  Many, many good things:

1. You are no longer bound to a single computer to access your data. Now I know you’re thinking, “But I’m part of the mobile computing age – I own a notebook computer!”  If you get a new notebook computer but are still using only hard drive software and storage, you still need to move the data from the old computer to the new one, which takes time and/or money.  With cloud-based bookkeeping and file storage, you are good to go almost as soon as you turn on the new computer.
2. Your software is always up to date. Installing a new software upgrade package is also costly and time-consuming.  Cloud-based bookkeeping software is updated regularly by the developers, so you’re always working on the latest version without waiting for installations.
3. Your data is secure in the cloud. That notebook computer you bought to be part of the mobile computing age can get damaged or stolen.  Your data becomes either completely inaccessible or, worse, accessible by a criminal.  Yes, you should always research any cloud-based storage company before signing on to ensure they use multiple layers of protection and offer security measures such as two-step verification or zero-knowledge encryption. But when you use a reliable cloud-storage platform, your data is safer there than putting it on a thumb drive in your briefcase (which, by the way, can also get damaged or stolen.)
4. You can share your data more safely. Let’s face it, you probably send emails with attachments like reports and documents full of sensitive information more often than you want to admit.  However, email interception and email database hacking has made the news often enough that my teenage daughter was worried about emailing photographs of her new kitten to her grandmother.  Cloud-based applications and storage systems allow you to share files with specific users on a read-only basis, and even with optional password protection.  Plus, you can track who has worked with the file and see when it was changed … much easier than trying to chase down the most recent file version by email.

In short, cloud-based bookkeeping and data storage should be embraced, not feared.  Save your worry for the clouds that could drench your laptop if you walk around carrying it without a case.