View:
Sorted by:
Bookkeeping and Its Basic Purpose
Bookkeeping, when done properly, gives you an excellent gauge of how well your business is doing. Bookkeeping also provides financial information throughout the year so you can test the success of your [more…]
Basic Bookkeeping Terms and Phrases
Get a firm understanding of key bookkeeping and accounting terms and phrases before you begin work as a bookkeeper. Bookkeepers use specific terms and phrases everyday as they track and record financial [more…]
Organizing Bookkeeping Records for Your Business
Staying organized is critical to efficient and accurate bookkeeping. Organize your bookkeeping records by deciding what to keep, and how to find information quickly when you need it. Everything you do [more…]
Using Bookkeeping Tools to Manage Daily Finances
After you set up your business’s books and put in place your internal controls, you’re ready to use the bookkeeping systems you established to manage the day-to-day operations of your business. You’ll [more…]
The Difference between Bookkeeping and Accounting
Every business and not-for-profit entity needs a reliable bookkeeping system based on established accounting principles. Keep in mind that accounting is a much broader term than [more…]
The Multiple Meanings of “Free Cash Flow”
You'll encounter the term free cash flow in finance circles — but the term hasn't been officially defined. Furthermore, free cash flow doesn't appear in cash flow statements reported by businesses. Rather [more…]
Choosing an Accounting Method for Your Business
Different businesses make different accounting decisions. Some businesses choose conservative accounting methods while others choose liberal accounting methods. Accounting is more than just reading the [more…]
The Basics of Double-Entry Bookkeeping
All businesses, whether they use the cash-basis accounting method or the accrual accounting method, use double-entry bookkeeping to keep their books. A practice that helps minimize errors and increase [more…]
Key Basic Accounts for Balance Sheets and Income Statements
A bookkeeper tracks all the financial transactions of a business and is responsible for identifying the account in which each transaction should be recorded. Accounting provides the structure you must [more…]
Understanding a Bookkeeper’s Chart of Accounts
The Chart of Accounts is the roadmap that a business creates to organize its financial transactions. Essentially, this chart lists all the accounts a business has, organized in a specific order; each account [more…]
Balance Sheet Accounts: Current Assets, Long-Term Assets
The Chart of Accounts for a business includes balance sheet accounts that track what the company owns — its assets. The two types of asset accounts are [more…]
Liabilities and Owners’ Equity in Balance Sheet Accounts
The Chart of Accounts for a business includes balance sheet accounts that track liabilities and owners’ equity. Liabilities include what your business owes to others, such as vendors and financial institutions [more…]
Tracking Income Statement Accounts for a Chart of Accounts
The income statement portion of a Chart of Accounts includes revenue and expense accounts. The income statement shows how much money a business generated from sales and how much money it spent to generate [more…]
A Bookkeeper's Key Functions for Paying Bills
After recording purchase transactions for a business, the bookkeeper takes primary responsibility for making sure that the bills are paid for both the inventory and the supplies purchased. Usually, you'll [more…]
Accounting Basics: Reporting Cash Flows and Profit and Loss
When examining the financial statements for a business, the statement of cash flows and the income statement (also called the profit and loss statement) differ from the balance sheet in one important respect [more…]
Comparing Bookkeeping with Related Accounting Functions
Business managers must ensure that their company’s bookkeeping and accounting system is adequate and reliable. The steps in the bookkeeping cycle have corresponding accounting functions. It’s important [more…]
How Accounting Focuses on Transactions
Business accounting focuses on transactions. A good bookkeeping system unfailingly captures and records every transaction that takes place. Understanding accounting, to a large extent, means understanding [more…]
The Eight Steps of the Accounting Cycle
As a bookkeeper, you complete your work by completing the tasks of the accounting cycle. It’s called a cycle because the accounting workflow is circular: entering transactions, manipulating the transactions [more…]
Knowing Your Debits from Your Credits
Accountants and bookkeepers record transactions as debits and credits while keeping the accounting equation constantly in balance. This process is called [more…]
Examining a Balance Sheet Model for a Business
The balance sheet is one of the primary financial statements prepared for businesses. Examining a balance sheet model for a fictional company can help you to understand the content and structure of a typical [more…]
How to Set Up a Chart of Accounts for Bookkeeping
There’s no secret to knowing how to set up a Chart of Accounts for your business — just make a list of the accounts that apply to your business. Don’t panic if you can’t think of every type of account [more…]
Using Income Statements in Accounting
The income statement, also known as a profit and loss statement, summarizes a firm's revenues and expenses for a particular period of time. Revenues represent amounts that a business earns by providing [more…]
Using Balance Sheets in Accounting
The balance sheet is the second-most-important financial statement that an accounting system produces, after an income statement. A balance sheet reports on a business's assets, liabilities, and owner [more…]
Understanding the Basic Principles of Accounting
Accounting rests on a rather small set of fundamental assumptions and principles. People often refer to these fundamentals as generally accepted accounting principles [more…]
Key Financial Accounting Terms and Definitions
In a financial accounting class, and on the job as an accountant, you need to know some jargon. Following is a glossary of words and phrases crucial to the accounting profession. [more…]
