STP 152 Book Keeping
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Jacob Hensley: if you're working in QuickBooks and you're not doing the reconciliations, you could have a lot of errors just stacking up and you would never know there's, there's no way. To know there's any issues. And unfortunately, many times those financials get, you know, sent to your tax accountant and they just kind of plug the numbers and, and send it on.
But you don't know that, you know, things are incorrect that that inaccuracy is there.
James Marland: Hello and welcome back to the Scaling Therapist Podcast. I'm your host, James Marland. I have Jacob Hensley with me from Freedom Business Solutions, why I brought Jacob on the show today is I was looking into getting more support with my QuickBooks. If you've heard me talk about QuickBooks or managing my own finances, you probably [00:01:00] heard frustration in my voice because. there it does something, things sometimes, and I don't know what it's doing and I either have to do research or figure it out, call somebody to get help, and it takes hours to do what is probably a five minute task. So I know I needed, that was not my strength. I needed help in the financial side of things and Jacob and his company help therapists with that.
So I'm bringing Jacob on the show to talk about what bookkeepers can do for you. Jacob, welcome to the show.
Jacob Hensley: James, it's a pleasure to be on. Thanks for having me.
James Marland: Sure. So, why don't you tell me, before we talk about what Book Bookkeepers can do for you, tell me a little bit about Freedom Business Solutions, where you're located and you know, your webpage.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah. Yeah. So Freedom Business Solutions. It's me and my business partner and good buddy, Austin Allwell. We are based out of northern Kentucky, just south of Cincinnati, Ohio. [00:02:00] And yeah, we, we started here in August of 2025. So we're fairly new at the time of this recording, but really just came together and decided that we wanted to help use our background and finance to help small businesses with those who are fighting the, the mental health crisis.
And so what we landed on was. Therapists and practices. And so that's our ideal client. That's who we're looking to serve. And yeah, that's what, what brought us together was really being involved in youth ministry. So there's a, a local high school here that involved with the retreat for the seniors of that high school grade.
And so, yeah, just seeing the need, need for that at that age group really brought it up in, in our conversations. And so that's why why we really got started.
James Marland: Straight and you offer, you know, we were talking about bookkeeping services [00:03:00] and I thought it would be great to just talk about. What is a bookkeeper? What do they do and how they can help your business grow scale or maybe even help your sanity? Like me, like, like I just, so, like I avoid it, you know? I avoid, sometimes I avoid my financial stuff, even though it's not egregious, it's not a lot. It's just, I know sometimes it's great and sometimes it'll bite you and be like I don't know how to do it. So, anyways. Let's let's start our conversation and maybe just give us a definition of a bookkeeper and let's start listing some of the things on how a bookkeeper can help you grow your business.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah. Yeah. I actually think it, it might be best to start out with a definition of something that everyone's a little more familiar with is the CPA
James Marland: Okay?
Jacob Hensley: so, yeah, so the CPA designation. Is really the, the cream of the crop in the accounting world. But it really encapsulates all areas of accounting.
So that includes [00:04:00] bookkeeping taxes, which is what the one that everyone associates a CPA with, and also audits, you know, if you have to have some sort of audit there. But what we, our background is both in tax and bookkeeping. And so what I think a lot of, practice owners and business owners in general don't realize is that the two are heavily connected.
So your books flow right into your tax return. And from there that's what gets filed to the IRS. So if you have bookkeeping errors you can easily have errors on your tax return. And so that's, that's. What we exist for is to be a holistic solution. So we enjoy both the bookkeeping and the tax side, the tax planning and strategy, but also making sure everything's accurate on the bookkeeping side and efficient so that it all works together and and is a smooth process.
And [00:05:00] we really like to sit in the seat of, really like a relationship rather than, you know, typical CPA firm, they're, they're heavy tax focused, and so they don't always have the time or the resources to look at the whole picture of what you're trying to do and where you're trying to go. But with a bookkeeper and a tax person kind of put together you can, you can get that holistic view and, and really avoid some mistakes that could be costly down the road.
James Marland: Yeah, you mentioned accuracy and you know, thinking back to some of my problems, it probably boils down to a little bit of accuracy, especially when there's two accounts that look the same. And so QuickBooks says this is the account it goes in, but it's not.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah.
James Marland: And then you end up with, you know, a random $35. Error when you reconcile because I don't work in QuickBooks every day. [00:06:00] I don't know where to fix it. I don't know where to find it. I know it's $35, but that down could be a lot of time. So talk about how act, how a bookkeeper can help a business grow by being accurate with the accurate books and accurate accounting.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah. Yeah, that's a, that's a great point. And, you know, just to start, it's, it's not worth your time, you know, kind, kind of going through that. So the, what the bookkeeper is able to do, and a lot of people don't realize this from QuickBooks or a bookkeeping perspective, but QuickBooks can really be the wild west of accounting.
So your, your typical accounting system has its debits and credits. QuickBooks does not run on that. It runs on your bank transactions just automatically feeding in and. It tries to make suggestions to tell you where to put it. But that's, that's not always the case of of where it should go.
And in fact, if, if you're ever in there [00:07:00] trying to code things around, if you ever see, it's a, a gray suggestion that's just a complete random guess from, from QuickBooks. So if it's, if it's green, it's, it's kind of an educated guess. If it's gray, they, they're just throwing it out there, so mm-hmm.
James Marland: just thought, oh, the QuickBook Mastermind knows better. If that's what it said it is, I guess that's what it is.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah.
James Marland: okay, and then you end up with things that shouldn't be.
Jacob Hensley: Right, right. And, and so those things can start to add up. And especially there's, there's times where your bank feeds break down. There's times where your bank feeds duplicate. And so because all of this is, um. really just kind of everywhere. That's what you do at the end of the month or what you're supposed to do is, is reconcile.
Uh, So that's taking your bank statement, your credit card statement, and comparing it to what the feeds came in and, and told QuickBooks. [00:08:00] So, essentially trying to, it, it bridges the two to match reality to what QuickBooks said, to what actually happened. And so that reconciliation process is where you start to find errors.
One, if, if you're working in QuickBooks and you're not doing the reconciliations, you could have a lot of errors just stacking up and you would never know there's, there's no way. And that's kind of why I say it's the wild West, because there would be no way. To know there's any issues. And unfortunately, many times those financials get, you know, sent to your tax accountant and they just kind of plug the numbers and, and send it on.
But you don't know that, you know, things are incorrect that that inaccuracy is there. So that's, that's the one side of it. And then, you know, just the other side is not all of your. Feeds that come in are always [00:09:00] exactly how the reporting needs to go. The first one that comes to mind is payroll. If, if you have W2 employees, then there's actually what's called a journal entry where you have to manually go in and make sure, you're, you're doing that journal entry at the end of every month, so again, not something you would know to do if you were just kind of coding and, and QuickBooks was telling, giving you suggestions of where things should go.
James Marland: so the bookkeeper reviews your transactions. And helps you with the making sure everything's in and entered accurately and then helps with the reconciling the end of the month so that have accurate months to go from.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah. Correct. Yeah. And I, I, that's something that, you know, I, I just saw somebody in our accounting space post about the other day, but, you know, for example, if you have a [00:10:00] plumbing issue at home, you're, you're typically gonna call a plumber. But you know, for some reason, and I think it has a lot to do with QuickBooks, is.
Advertising is as a small business owner that you can, you could just do all your books and everything's clean and easy. But really it's, it's kind of the same thing. You know, you want that headache and that stress off of your plate, especially as a therapist. It's, you know, something that if it's draining your energy, then, then you don't have enough there for your clients.
And not only that, but. It's, it's not worth your time. If, like you said, you know, you're running into errors now, you're trying to work with QuickBooks support.
James Marland: a half day like to reconcile a few accounts just because. It was either double entering or the, they weren't coming over. Then I would have to go get a CSV file. It's a comma separated value file, like some sort of spreadsheet to bring it over. But then maybe I put it in the wrong account.
Or maybe it just, I don't know. [00:11:00] Just, and now instead of one, you know, one error, you have 50 errors and yeah it would take a long time. I and you're right about the advertising it, that program tries to sell you everything. Like,
Jacob Hensley: Hmm.
James Marland: it's like, buy, live, service buy get a loan.
Like every time it's like, get a loan, get a business loan. It's just trying to tell you things. I'm like, I don't want this. I just want like. I just want de just what you said, I want debits and credits. I
Jacob Hensley: Yeah.
James Marland: what I spent, where it went, who it went to, and how it, where did I get my money? That's all.
That's really, you know, the taxes and the other stuff. Yes, it's important, but I don't need to know how the sausage is made. But you're the um, there is something about the financial side that you're like, oh it's, it doesn't take that much time and I can do it, but really when you look down to it. It is taking a lot of time. And let's say you're like me and you're frustrated about it, [00:12:00] well, that's like, it's like time. You're eroding your willpower to do other things and enjoy other things. Like at the end of the day, I'd be like, oh, I'm so glad I'm done with that. I think I'm gonna go take a break, you know, a two hour break, day break get it done.
You know, the weekend. I would normally do it on Fridays, which I
Jacob Hensley: Hmm.
James Marland: if it's a good idea. To do something you don't like to do and wait till Friday 'cause you're just fre, you know, you're frazzled by the end. So, yeah, they giving an order to somebody who is an expert is a just one of those managerial skills that's, I don't know if it's the education system where it's like you gotta do everything yourself and you gotta be independent or if it's not hard, it's not worthwhile. So. You help people. Have you talked to people who have felt really relieved when you've taken over their services?
Jacob Hensley: Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. They have said it's an answer prayer is, is one of the things that, that [00:13:00] we've heard so far. So that was my,
James Marland: experience.
Jacob Hensley: yeah, my, my personal favorite. But yeah, you know, just, I think the initial thought is everyone is, they have a CPA relationship and um. you know that that's kind of like, okay, taxes.
Yeah, I can't, I can't do that as a business owner. But really your bookkeeping and, and taxes are one and the same if you're a small business owner. So that, that's another thing that we like to be able to do is if you have an existing CPA relationship, the bookkeeper relationship can, can work alongside it.
And we even kind of step in as a second set of eyes where. If there's certain inefficiencies or tax deductions that your current CPA is missing, then we would love to, you know, take a look at those things and kind of analyze. A lot of us get, especially in the finance world, we get caught up in just kind of doing the same thing as last year.
But if you don't have a [00:14:00] holistic look at the person and their goals and where they're trying to go, you know, you could, you could definitely be missing some things from a tax planning perspective. So we start with the relationship. We believe it all starts and ends with relationship. And something that we're trying to, to do in our industry is, is make it relationship focused, make it practice owner focused, really so that you know, it, it leads to the best results for everyone involved.
James Marland: Great. So you mentioned quite a few things. Accuracy, I wrote down sanity. You know, it saves your mind, extra eyes, holistic relationship. Is there other things a bookkeeper can do for you or another benefit of having a bookkeeper?
Jacob Hensley: Yeah, I would say just access to reporting. So at the end of every month you can really see how profitable you've been. You know, I think the, the gut reaction of a business owner is to, is to look at their [00:15:00] bank balance. But that bank balance doesn't necessarily tell, tell the whole story. you know, there's, there's things that come up, like tax payments and whatever else that.
They, they don't show up in that bank balance. But if you have your reporting, if you have a, a trusted person that, that knows tax planning they can help you get ahead of the game on that as well. And, and that's what we strive to do. So that's really the first thing that comes to mind is, is just kind of prepare for you know, g give you those reports to have a, a peace of mind of where, where things are going.
But also, let's say, you know, for your audience, we have a lot of people who might have side hustles or courses or other streams of income. A bookkeeper can also work through and separate those streams of income and expenses so that you can see where those efforts are are going. So that could be
James Marland: really profitable?
Jacob Hensley: exactly.
James Marland: did that [00:16:00] marketing expenditure move the needle? You also said one of the things that I think it it's easy to gloss over is the good data. The good data helps you make decisions
Jacob Hensley: Hmm.
James Marland: because without it, you're just can I hire somebody? Do I have enough money?
Should I invest in this building? How much are my programs costing me? You know, I have. Multiple media programs. Like I have a Canva, the Adobe Express, I have Adobe, whatever their Adobe platform is. I have D script, you know, I have all these things. How much is that costing me? And it, you know, could I or should I shed them for some reason?
You know, like, like you don't see that without those extra set of eyes. And if you don't have the. me for maybe six or eight months. Couple years ago, I wasn't reconciling my books it was very difficult until I got a little bit of help. But anyways, why? I didn't [00:17:00] know should I buy this program?
You know, I didn't know should I, you know, should I bring on a virtual assistant to hire to, to help with social media? So I just didn't know how much money I had and I couldn't predict the future. So, yeah, good data. Good data helps you make good decisions.
Jacob Hensley: Definitely. Yeah. And that's a best practice with bookkeeping is. Tagging that vendor who you're, who you're paying because then you can, you can pull reports and, and see, you know, okay, I have this subscription, this is how much it's cost me, you know, over the past year has it increased, or all those things.
Yeah, that good data, like you said, leads to, to good decisions, and that's where really sitting in the, the bookkeeper role. As you start to grow and as you start to have more complexities, especially with team members and payroll that's where you, that holistic solution of someone that can [00:18:00] grow and scale with you and kind of get more in the details of those questions.
I'd say your, your kind of baseline. Bookkeeper is, is the one who's making sure everything's accurate. But once the complexity grows, then you want somebody who's gonna step in and, you know, meet with you once a quarter, once a month just to talk about, you know, what do these numbers mean or what are some red flags?
What should be you be looking out for? And that's, that's definitely something we strive to strive to do is kind of be there with practice owners every, every step of the way.
James Marland: Yeah, you were talking about what do I gotta look up for? Or what do I have to look out for? You know, how many people aren't saving money away for their taxes? Yeah. You know, and what if you earn, what if you doubled your income in over the last two years? Well get that. Guess what? Your tax bill's gonna be more.
Jacob Hensley: Mm-hmm.
James Marland: And it, like, you're not thinking about that. Or preparing for the future. [00:19:00] It's gonna be a big surprise. And business owners don't like big surprises, especially when there's a dollar amount or a bill, on the side of that. So having those people who can see the future and like they know the tax system and how things are paid can help you, prepare for those things and see the hidden things like the story, the numbers are telling. That you might not see because you're, do, you're, you know, you're in the business doing things.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah, James, that's such a great point you make, especially about the taxes. You know, if your income moves drastically up or down in a certain year. Unfortunately, the the typical CPA process is you'll get your return filed by April 15th. And you'll get an an hourly bill for, for that from your CPA on top of the IRS bill on top of your state bill, if that's applicable.
So all those things [00:20:00] plus your, your estimates for the, the next year, all of that is due April 15th. So if you had a high income year and you decided to reinvest a lot of that cash back into the business, maybe hire somebody. You could have a surprise waiting for you come April 15th. So having somebody that can step with you along the way and build that tax return and that tax bill throughout the year is a huge asset to have on your team, especially for a growing practice or someone who's, who strives to be a growing practice.
That's, that's really why we, we opted for an all in, we're, we're kind of like a subscription almost. So. You know exactly what our fees are throughout the year, and you can know exactly what your tax bill is gonna be throughout the year. So again, more peace of mind, just allowing you to, to sit in that role as, as practice owner, but also as a therapist if you're, if you're still seeing clients.
James Marland: Yeah you bring out a great point there at the [00:21:00] end where this, having somebody to take care of these things lets you in your strength, where you're produced the most for the business.
Jacob Hensley: Hmm.
James Marland: produce the most for the business? Fighting with QuickBooks? Or hiring a staff or seeing more people or developing an online course or some other income stream, like where do you generate the most value for the business?
And 99% of the time, maybe even a hundred percent of the time, it's not making those reports and making sure everything's accurate. hiring somebody to do that so you can do more value add to your company.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah, you're, you're speaking my language there. There's a, a great book called Buy Back Your Time about by Dan Martel, and he gives this quadrant four quadrant chart of essentially tasks that light you up. And that make you money. And so your [00:22:00] goal is to keep going up into the right, just finding those tasks where you're really hitting your stride, you're hitting your kind of God-given meaning and purpose, and the rest you can hand off to someone else who that's, that's in there up until the right as well.
So that's where everyone in, in their roles on the team can really be hitting their stride. And I think a lot of. Practice owners got into it with a heart for therapy, and that can totally continue to exist. But if you're, you know, in a, in a growing practice, somebody has to sit in that role of the, the business owner as well.
So yeah, that's, that's just something that comes to mind as you mention that.
James Marland: I love that buyback your time and it is amazing. That other people love the tasks. You don't like
Jacob Hensley: Yes, very well said.
James Marland: them. It thrills them. They're like, wow. A clean a books, you know, with everything lined up and everything is perfect and [00:23:00] pristine. Oh, I just can't wait to get in and line every, and like check the list and make everything's correct. I love all the details and that is just, you know. God bless those people.
Jacob Hensley: Yeah, and that's, that's exactly the dynamic that me and Austin have is. You know, I love being, looking out and kind of drawing in, and, and he likes to look in and, and look at, you know, who we're working with and look at all those details. And so that's kind of where we, we enjoy that back, back and forth and roles that we're establishing in our firm internally.
James Marland: Yeah. Great. The, this has been some very good conversation, especially for people who are on the fence about buying a bookkeeper hiring a bookkeeper.
Jacob Hensley: I'd say partnering. That's what we like to say.
James Marland: very good. That's a better word. Partnering. Because you're working together to achieve the same result. You're pulling in the same direction. and I know, you know, [00:24:00] there's probably a hundred little things like this that I was on the fence for. Do I, can I do this on my own, shouldn't I? But as I partner with a bookkeeper, I'm, I just was like, why didn't I do this, you know, five years ago? Why did I struggle so long thinking I could do it?
And like, same thing with social media, same thing with webpage. Like that is not where I'm adding the most value. creating content and getting out with people, meeting people that, that's where I add value. Not balancing my books. I need balanced books, but that's not where I'm going to add the value. So I hope people understand that. Jacob, can you as we're wrapping up here, can you tell people, you know, your website again, what you offer and who you wanna partner with?
Jacob Hensley: Yeah. Yeah. So our website is freedom business.net. And really the, the best way to find us would be through LinkedIn freedom Business Solutions, LC. My name is on there [00:25:00] is Jacob Hensley, C-P-A-C-F-P. And, yeah, we're, we're Freedom Business Solutions, and we exist to help practice owners who are mission focused and, want to uh, make a change and help out those uh, seeking to heal those with mental health issues.
So we're, we're happy to serve, serve that niche.
James Marland: Wonderful. Thanks for sharing your heart, and thanks for sharing your mission with the audience.
Jacob Hensley: All right. Thanks James.
James Marland: So, audience so friends, let me lean in a little bit here. You're probably doing too much. Okay. probably taking on some tasks that you shouldn't be doing, and you need to put yourself in a position where you can offer the most value, you know, to explore your gifts and to help the most people. It's probably not entering numbers into QuickBooks. So if you wanna put your mission in motion, it's time to shed some of those tasks hire that [00:26:00] staff, whether it's a bookkeeper, social media manager, webpage designer. Hire that position so that you can do your best work. And, uh, we'll be here to support you.
It's now time to put your mission in motion. We'll see you next time. ​
Thanks for listening to the show. I want to thank our pro-level sponsors for sponsoring scaling therapy practice.
I wanna give a special shout out to Profit comes first. They're a pro, pro level sponsor of Scaling Therapist Podcast. You can become a pro-level sponsor and also get your name mentioned by going to scaling therapist services.com and join the Scaling therapist services directory. Click the get listed button today, not only will you get mentioned on the show you can submit a monthly educational blog on your topic for the readers of the newsletter. So get listed today, scaling therapist [00:27:00] services.com/forward/join.
I wanna thank Jacob for being an excellent guest on the show, talking about ways to maximize your time by hiring somebody who loves to do the bookkeeping. You can find [email protected], It was so nice to meet Jacob and Austin at the A A CC in Nashville, and I hope to continue to see them. I also use their services. if you are looking for somebody to help you manage your bookkeeping services, give 'em a checkout. We'll see you next time.
