Nonprofit bookkeeping services
- Whole monthly scope, in hours (rounded)
- 13
- Coding and matching transactions (minutes a month)
- 300
- Reconciling every account (minutes a month)
- 90
The record-keeping periods these pages cite are the IRS's published figures; every fee, hour and rate is arithmetic on the numbers you typed, and no figure on this site is a published national price for bookkeeping, because there is none.
Nonprofit bookkeeping services do the same monthly reconciliation as any business engagement, with one difference that changes the whole ledger: money arrives with conditions. A grant restricted to a programme, a donation given for a building, and general funds have to be tracked apart, spent from the right pot and reported by fund, and a bookkeeper who does not do fund accounting will produce a tidy set of books that answers none of the board's questions. This guide is for the treasurer or director choosing a service, and the scope sheet on this site sizes the monthly work.
Open the What does a bookkeeper do each month: the scope sheet Free to use. No account, no card, no trial clock.
List the funds and the restrictions
Every grant and every restricted gift is its own fund with its own reporting date. The bookkeeper needs the list before quoting, because a nonprofit with eight restricted grants is a larger job than one with the same transaction count and none.
Agree the reports the board and the funders need
A statement of activities by fund, a statement of financial position, and per-grant spending against budget are the usual set. Each is a monthly deliverable, and a quote should name them; a generic profit and loss is not a nonprofit report.
Know which annual return the year is heading for
The bookkeeper's monthly totals decide whether the organisation files the Form 990-N e-Postcard, the 990-EZ or the full 990, and the thresholds are on gross receipts. Tracking receipts against the threshold through the year is part of the scope, not a surprise in the spring.
A quote the Nonprofit bookkeeping services does not explain?
Tell us which figure on a quote does not add up and we will tell you how the sheet arrives at it.
What an owner comparing bookkeeping quotes asks about the Nonprofit bookkeeping services
Does a nonprofit need a special bookkeeper?
It needs one who has done fund accounting and restricted grants before. The software is the same; the discipline of keeping restricted money apart is what differs, and a bookkeeper learning it on your organisation is expensive.
Can volunteers do the bookkeeping?
Many small nonprofits start that way. The point at which it stops working is usually the first restricted grant with a reporting requirement, because the funder's report has to reconcile to the books and a volunteer treasurer rarely has the time.
What does the bookkeeper hand over at year end?
Reconciled accounts by fund, the grant spending schedules, and the gross receipts figure that decides the return. The accountant or the person preparing the Form 990 works from those.