What should you actually be spending on accounting? Based on our experience across businesses of all sizes, the answer is no more than 4% of turnover, or 4% of gross profit for product businesses (to understand this figure better, read our blog about accountancy costs for SMEs). For most small to medium-sized companies, staying under that number while ensuring a complete accounting service means just one thing: outsourcing.
Meet the internal accountancy function
To understand the real value of outsourced accounting, it helps to first understand what a full internal accounting function looks like. Historically, having your own accounts department was the preserve of businesses turning over around €5 million or more. That threshold has moved upward, largely because the cost of hiring qualified accounting staff has risen significantly. Building and staffing a full internal function now requires considerably more turnover to justify than it did even a few years ago, which means outsourcing is the right answer for a wider range of businesses than ever before. Here’s what that internal function typically looks like in businesses large enough to support one:
Financial Controller
The Financial Controller manages the team and the processes while also doing monthly management accounts and journals, checking reconciliations, making sure systems are working properly, reporting on KPIs, handling one-off tasks for management, looking at analytics, etc.
Financial Director
Operating at a higher level, the Financial Director focuses on company strategy, growth planning, shareholder reporting, and identifying opportunities to improve profitability.
Accounts payable and accounts receivable
These roles monitor the money coming in and going out, keeping a healthy balance between the timing of both.
Payroll
Payroll ensures all employees are paid correctly, accounting for hours worked, sick days, bonuses, gifts, holidays, and taxes. As you can see, a fully staffed internal accountancy function can easily run to three or four people. And even then, the business will still need an external accountant.
External accountant
The external accountant takes care of compliance – filing tax returns with Revenue, submitting annual returns to Companies Registration Office (CRO), and potentially managing auditing. To do this effectively, they need to work closely with whoever is managing the internal function.
Is bookkeeping enough for your company?
Most small to medium-sized businesses don’t have the budget for the full team, particularly if they’re in growth mode. So, many assume the best alternative is to hire a bookkeeper. But, while bookkeeping services are the ideal support for tasks such as managing accounts receivable or accounts payable, they provide only part of a service.
When a business relies solely on a bookkeeper, it’s still the business itself that has to act as the internal accountancy function. That means checking the bookkeeper’s work, making sure processes are running correctly, and troubleshooting when things don’t reconcile. That’s not an efficient or reliable arrangement, and it would be far better handled by an outsourced accountant who takes responsibility for making sure the bookkeeping is actually working well.
A bookkeeper working alone will post and reconcile as best they can, but without a qualified accountant reviewing their work, there’s no guarantee it’s all hanging together properly. The outsourced accountant can be the manager of that role, with the knowledge and expertise to say, OK, this is done right, but this isn’t done right. There’s a gap here. We need to fix that. There’s an extra journal required there.
Without that management accounting layer in place, how can you be confident your books are accurate and up to date? These are not small things. It’s precisely why larger businesses that can afford it invest in a complete accounts department; they understand that access to reliable financial information is a requirement, not a luxury. SMEs can achieve the same outcome through outsourcing.
The right accounting systems working properly
Another advantage of working with a good outsourced accountant is what they bring to your technology stack. Choosing the right accounting and payroll platforms for your business, configuring them correctly, and actually getting the most of their capabilities are three vital components of a good accounting setup. Many businesses end up on the wrong platform entirely, or on the right one with a setup that doesn’t reflect how they actually operate. As a result, the information coming out of it isn’t as useful as it should be.
A good outsourced accountant has worked with multiple systems and can tell you which one suits your business without you having to spend time trialling options yourself. They can implement and configure it, train your team, and ensure the right automations, bank feeds, and reporting structures are in place from the outset. The practical effect is better financial information, less manual work, and fewer errors. Your systems will work consistently rather than depending on whoever happens to be managing your books at any given time.
Working with an outsourced accountant and online systems also means the arrangement operates largely remotely and asynchronously. Financial data is held securely in the cloud, accessible to the right people at any time, from anywhere. And because you’re relying on a team rather than an individual, continuity is built in: the knowledge, the processes, and the history live in the system and the practice, not in one person’s head.
Outsourced accounting delivers internal and external accounting functions
Beyond accurate books, a well-run outsourced accounting arrangement gives you reliable financial visibility throughout the year, not just at year end. That means knowing your real cash position, understanding which parts of the business are performing, and having the information you need to make decisions when they matter. Too many business owners make significant calls – on hiring, pricing, investment, or cash management – without a clear financial picture to support them.
When an internal person manages your books without independent oversight, the potential for errors to go undetected is real. An outsourced arrangement introduces a natural separation of duties and an independent review layer, which becomes increasingly important as the business grows and transactions become more complex.
Outsourcing also means your accounting costs scale with the business. As you grow and your finances become more complex, the service grows with you. If you hit a quieter period, the cost adjusts accordingly. You’re never carrying more than you need, and you’re never caught short when things accelerate.
Finding and retaining a good qualified accountant in Ireland has become harder in recent years, with demand for accounting professionals consistently outstripping supply. In addition, SMEs are competing against larger firms and multinationals for the same (well-paid) talent. Outsourcing sidesteps that problem entirely.
Beyond’s outsourced accounting service
At Beyond, our outsourced accounting service covers both your internal and external accounting needs. Rather than a bookkeeper who handles only accounts payable and still requires your team to check their work, we take that function completely off your hands. In practice, this might look like a Beyond accountant allocated to your business for one hour per week alongside a bookkeeper working three hours per week. The result is a complete accounting function that includes proper processes, reconciliation review, and someone directly accountable. The fee is typically around half the cost of a single in-house hire.
Our service isn’t limited to accounts payable. We can provide accounts receivable, financial controller or financial director support, credit control, or a combination of functions. It’s essentially a full accounts department sized to what your business actually needs.
Take a look at our outsourced accounting service to see how we can help your company grow by providing a full accounts department at a fraction of the cost.
