Creations · South Africa
Planning the cost of outsourced accounting
Decide which work stays inside your business and which work you need an accounting firm to handle. That decision is the basis of a useful cost comparison.
What the work covers
Use this scope to identify what you need. Your proposal will confirm the services, records, reporting frequency and fees for your business.
- An agreed list of entities and reporting periods
- Defined bookkeeping and reconciliation responsibilities
- A list of reports, submissions and review meetings included
- Separate treatment of historical cleanup or migration
- Clarity on software, external costs and work outside the scope
What to prepare
Tell us which records are available and where there are gaps. We can then distinguish ongoing work from any initial catch-up.
- Approximate monthly transaction and bank-account volumes
- Number of entities and employees
- Current VAT, payroll and income-tax obligations
- Reporting deadlines, software and outstanding bookkeeping
Timing and responsibility
Timing depends on the records, approvals and work required. Tell us about any deadline at the start. The engagement should identify the person handling your work, the review responsibilities and any external specialist needed.
Map the work before comparing providers
List the tasks your business performs today: collecting records, capturing transactions, approving payroll, reconciling balances, preparing reports and filing returns. Give each task an owner. Outsourcing can cover the full agreed workflow or support an internal team at specific points.
Compare the proposed external fee with the internal time, software and review responsibilities that remain. Do not assume every staff task or subscription disappears when an accounting provider is appointed.
Separate transition costs from recurring work
Historical cleanup, system migration and reconstruction of opening balances can make the first period different from later months. Request a separate scope for these tasks and define how the ongoing service starts.
A useful comparison sets out the monthly fee, separately quoted annual or specialist work, software and third-party charges, and your own approval and document responsibilities. This creates a budget based on the actual workload rather than an unsupported savings percentage.
How the work progresses
- 01
Review the requirement
Discuss the records, systems, deadlines and decisions the work needs to support.
- 02
Agree the scope
Confirm the deliverables, fees, responsibilities and any initial catch-up work.
- 03
Prepare and resolve
Work through the records, raise queries and obtain the required approvals.
- 04
Review and hand over
Provide the agreed outputs and identify outstanding matters and next steps.
Questions before you start
Why is there no single price for every business?
Transaction volume is only one driver. Multiple entities, payroll, incomplete records and reporting complexity can create very different workloads. A scoped quote makes those differences visible.
Should historical cleanup be included?
It should be identified explicitly. Ask which periods are covered, what records are missing, and whether cleanup is a separate assignment from the ongoing monthly service.
What should the proposal say about extra work?
It should explain what falls outside the fee, how additional work is authorised and whether external charges or software costs are included.
Related services
Let’s define the next step.
Tell us what you need, what is outstanding and when it matters.