Whether you deal in plastics manufacturing, sheet metal fabrication or commercial cleaning, your B2B company has to find a way to manage its books. For some businesses, this means an in-house accountant or accounting department, depending on the company size. For others, it means finding a qualified bookkeeping service to which it can outsource its financial record management. Where do you land on the to-use-or-not-to-use spectrum? Does you business outsource its accounting needs? Have you thought about it? Whether you’re on the fence or fully settled, it’s good to have a solid understanding of what outsourcing means.So with that in mind, let’s take a look at some of the advantages and drawbacks of hiring an outside company to manage your accounting needs!

Advantages of Outsourcing

For the companies who outsource their books, the decision means saving time and money, getting access to high-quality bookkeeping services and, in many ways, minimizing the risks typically involved with relying on in-house staff. Does outsourcing make sense for you? Here’s a closer look at the specific advantages it may offer:

Financial Savings

It’s no surprise that outsourcing work to an outside provider, versus hiring a full-time employee, saves you money. When you outsource, not only can you match the work hours/amount of projects to your needs, but also you can avoid typical employee expenses like benefits, insurance, payroll taxes, unemployment taxes, paid time-off, etc. You don’t have to provide work space, office furniture, computers or software, either. Even with the costs involved in farming out work, the financial savings are still significant.

Time Savings

Think of the weekly hours it will take to manage in-house bookkeeping staff—taking away from the time you can spend on business- and relationship-building activities more directly aligned with your company’s mission. Outsourcing alleviates this need. You don’t have to deal with the typical headaches involved with recruiting, hiring, retaining and overseeing staff because that’s what the service provider will handle. That means you’re free to focus resources on what matters most.

Expert Services

Third-party service providers specialize in the work they do, so they’re the perfect resource for getting projects done. What’s more, service providers have to constantly hone their skills to keep up with the competition, ever increasing the quality of their work. This means when you go to a bookkeeping service, you can trust that your accounting will be handled well.

Contractual Obligation

Service providers face higher liability than in-house staff, which makes them less of a risk for your business—they’re more likely to follow through on their obligations because they have more to lose if they don’t. Furthermore, dealing with the contracts or agreements of outside providers can be much easier than dealing with the hiring negotiations, employee management and other human resources issues involved with employees.