Your accountant needs closed, reconciled books and one complete package: profit and loss, balance sheet and trial balance with prior-year comparison; December statements paired with the matching reconciliation reports; a 1099 contractor list with W-9s already on file; fixed asset additions and disposals; loan statements showing the principal and interest split; and written notes on owner draws and anything unusual. What they do not want is a box of receipts, a login to unreconciled books, or a drip of attachments over three weeks. The difference between those two handoffs is most of your bill. Almost all of it can be maintained through the year rather than assembled in February, which is the version that costs an afternoon instead of a fortnight.
What this actually feels like
Every February the same email arrives asking for things you have to go and find. You send what you can, they ask a follow-up, and three weeks pass in which the return does not progress and both of you are mildly annoyed.
Then the invoice arrives and it is larger than last year, and nobody explains that most of the increase was the time spent reconstructing what you sent.
What it costs to do by hand
If the year was closed monthly, assembling the package is three to four hours of exporting and organizing.
If it was not, it is two to five days — because you are doing twelve months of closing compressed into the weeks when you have the least attention and your accountant has the least capacity.
The tax handoff package
Exactly what to assemble, what not to send, and the five questions worth asking while your accountant has the whole picture in front of them.
Read the guide →Input, skill, output
- QuickBooks — The full year, closed and reconciled.
- PayPal — Processor income rolled in.
- Stripe — Gross revenue and fees for the year.
- Tally it — Income and expenses summed.
- Sort 1099s — Contractors identified.
- Package — Ready for the accountant.
- Tax summary — Income, expenses and estimates.
- 1099 list — Every contractor and amount.
- Accountant packet — All documents in one bundle.
Who this is for
- You use an outside accountant to prepare returns.
- Last year involved more back-and-forth than you would like to repeat.
- You pay contractors and have to report those payments.
If none of those describe you, this is probably not your first priority — and the rest of the library may point somewhere more useful.
Common questions
Why is my accountant bill so high?
Usually because they are doing bookkeeping at tax preparation rates. A clean package means preparing a return rather than reconstructing a year.
Do they want my receipts?
Generally no. They need classified totals; you retain the receipts as substantiation. Send documentation only for large or genuinely ambiguous items.
When should I start?
Through the year rather than in February. The single highest-return habit is collecting a W-9 before the first payment to any contractor.
What if my books are a mess?
Say so early so the cleanup can be scoped and quoted deliberately, rather than discovered in March at the worst possible moment.
What is the 1099 threshold?
It changes between years, so confirm the current figure with your accountant rather than a remembered number. The preparation does not change.
See it on your own books, once
The First Close is one real month of your books, closed properly and configured to your chart of accounts, delivered inside two weeks. Full reconciliation against every processor, every exception flagged with the transaction behind it, and the narrative written. $497, refundable if the packet is not delivered, and it credits in full toward the first month if you continue.
Get Your First Close — $497 See a sample packet