When people decide they want to work with an accountant, it’s because they want to gain clarity and confidence with their finances. They may want to save for the future, free up funds, or make their money go a little further each month.
When you decide to work with an accountant, most others will go through a thorough onboarding process as standard. However, at Arcus, we like to go one better than standard, and we pride ourselves on going the extra mile to make people feel secure and happy before we proceed.
To give you a taste of what we do, we’ll take you through OUR process, step by step.
How to Get Started with Strategic Accounting Support
Once you’ve visited our website and been reassured of how good we are at what we do, you’ll want to get in touch. You can do this easily through the Get Started page on our website. Don’t worry about filling in everything, but the more you do fill out the better we can help you right off the bat.
We like strategic thinkers, so we ask goal-related questions so that we can truly know what your business is aiming for and how we can keep you accountable as you achieve your goals. A lot of people will tell us they want to ‘get their books in order,’ but we want to know more about the why and when, so we can focus on the how.
We’ve had clients who said their books were fully up to date, but when we logged into their QuickBooks, we found unreconciled accounts, unposted transactions, or thousands of bank feed items waiting. It’s common for business owners to assume something’s handled, only to find out otherwise once we gain access.
Next Steps in the Client Accounting Onboarding Journey
After you’ve made initial contact with us, you’ll receive an expectations email detailing who we are, how we work, pricing ranges, and some other basic information. We point potential prospects to the Business Insight Tool so we can see if we’re the right fit for them before they jump into a video call with us, usually within 48 hours. This is so we can introduce ourselves, get to know each other, and start finding out a little bit more about you. Don’t worry too much about having tons of information at hand for this, as we’re not looking to find out specifics (what accounting software you use, have issues with, or your tax savings). It’s just to check whether personality-wise we’re a good match, and whether your basic expectations are met.
From there, we’ll send a Discovery Proposal, starting at $995. If you agree to move forward, we’ll email instructions so that we can access your QuickBooks Online account, your prior-year tax returns, and other important documents.
Financial Red Yellow Green Analysis for Business Health
In the call, we explain how we review your accounts using a red/yellow/green analysis and summary. While this isn’t a promise we will be working together, it will be valuable information that you can use with us, or another professional of your choosing – no pressure.
This discovery process is purely consultative at this stage and doesn’t lock you into working with us. It also doesn’t automatically guarantee results or a monthly service agreement. However, if the monthly service agreement is agreed then we’ll waive the standard onboarding fee, as a thank you for trusting us.
The analysis shows red issues, which need to be fixed immediately, yellow issues that need to be addressed in 6-12 months and green areas that we think look good. Regardless of how many greens you have, it’s always good to celebrate your wins.
What’s Included in Your Red/Yellow/Green Analysis
We send out a standard description of our services via Anchor (our proposal and billing platform) that details what you’ll get from working with us, including:
- An in-depth review of your accounting records, tax returns, and financial processes with actionable deliverables.
- Analysis of your company and personal tax situation to find tax planning and accounting opportunities.
To get started, we’ll need three years of business and personal tax returns and access to your QuickBooks online account (or your preferred cloud accounting software). Once we’ve received this source data, as well as a signed proposal, we’ll analyze it before booking a one-hour scheduled call with our founder, Curtis Hardwick. This usually happens within 10 days. He’ll reveal your Red/Yellow/Green scorecard and a summary, complete with action items.
QuickBooks Cleanup and Tax Strategy: Your Power Hour Review
This Power Hour is where we summarize our findings and get your feedback on what we’ve found.
These can be anything from preparing and filing a tax return, reconciling a QuickBooks account, obvious accounting errors, QuickBooks conversions, or tax planning opportunities. However, we work in phases, starting with the above proposal. If that’s accepted, then we'll sort out those issues quickly before preparing a monthly maintenance proposal.
This monthly maintenance could include tasks like a month-end closure for your accounting records (bookkeeping, bank reconciliations, financial review statements, etc.) We also include weekly, monthly, and quarterly meetings focusing on offering advice and strategic planning.
Monthly Financial Services and Custom Reporting
We offer three tiers of monthly services, including:
- Scaling (Starting at $4,995)
- Collaboration (Starting at $1,995)
- Guidance (Starting at $1,295)
All plans are paid through our subscription-based billing model, drafted on the 1st of each month. We make sure all clients sign a Master Service Agreement, which includes our 30-day cancellation terms. This will include our planned process improvements, which can drastically improve how your accounting records are handled, or introduce you to various automations to easily assist with your potential pain points.
Our custom reporting helps you get the information you need to make decisions moving forward and includes KPI tracking through simple numbers, concepts, and principles. The important thing to note here is that we’re in your corner, partnering with you, helping you answer any questions.
Annual Tax Compliance and Quarterly Tax Planning Services
If you partner with us to handle your financial well-being, we take care of a lot of the tasks that roll around each year.
- Your business and owner's tax returns
- Quarterly tax planning, which usually takes place in July, October, and December.
- Year-end payroll filings (W-2s, 1099s, etc.)
We can even move you up or down our service tiers depending on your needs during that season.
We’ve worked with numerous clients on absolutely everything to do with accounting and more, and we love what we do.
Ready to better understand your business finances? Get in touch today.