5 Tips to Make Cleanup Projects Easier

Cleanup projects don’t have to be overwhelming

I’m sure you are thinking I’m insane right now. But, hear me out. I’ve been through a ton of cleanup projects and at first, they were horrible. They would eat up all my time. They seemed to never end. And, I definitely lost money on a lot of them.

With experience, I was able to create a workflow that made it all better.

I want to share some of these tips with you today. I dive into much deeper detail in the QBO Cleanup Master Course, but these tips will put you on the right path.

5 Tips to Make Cleanup Projects Easier

1. Prepare an initial diagnosis of the books.

Your diagnosis will help you estimate the time needed for your project, determine your pricing, and create a checklist to follow. {Download my FREE practice guide, Diagnosing the Books}

2. Clearly define the scope of the project.

You want to make sure you and your client are on the same page from day one. What time period are you going to cleanup? Do you need to make adjustments to prior periods? How much detail does the client want in the books?

3. Reconcile all bank and credit card accounts first.

Seriously – before you do anything! You want to make sure you have a complete picture of all the transactions before you start diving in to make sure they in the right place in the financials. If you don’t reconcile first, you could find yourself wasting time on transactions that shouldn’t even be in the books in the first place.

4. Don’t delete transactions.

Void everything! If you can’t void, manually void the transaction. The voided transaction will be a placeholder in case you need to go back to fix anything or see the history. It’s easier to undo a void than recreating the transaction because you mistakenly got rid of it. {It happens and it is OK! Just save yourself some time.}

5. Use a clearing account for all “problem” transactions.

Anything you spend more than a minute trying to figure out goes there. You want to group all the problem transactions together. It’s like you are making your own to-do list in that clearing account. Once you’ve worked through everything else, then you can focus on your final list of problem transactions.

Just following these tips will make any cleanup project a million times easier. I’ve developed my processes after years of trial and error and these are some of the top tips I’m always sharing in my classes. Let me know these tips work out for you. I’d love to hear about your successes!