This Podcast Is Episode Number 0189 And It Will Be About Office Manager Becomes Overworked Contractor's Bookkeeper Who Cuts Corners You are a small contractor and needs someone to answer the phone. You hire someone for the office. Calls are coming in and the Admin Assistant has some free time between calls you want to make use of that famous Standby Time so you ask them to do a little more. Being nice; you now give them the new title of Office Manager.  As the Office Manager; that person is in control of the bookkeeping, customer invoices, vendor payments and more. As the contractor, you are excited because you are handing off responsibility of the day to day activities. From your side; you have checked off the box called Office Manger DONE, phones DONE, bookkeeping DONE and material pickup and delivery person DONE. Everything is solved. Good now you can go back to work and start doing the work. This is the part you are good at and like to do.  Are you expecting Too Much from your Office Manager? Does the Office Manager understand Bookkeeping or is just trying to keep the checkbook balanced? Now add employees; are you expecting the Office Manager to understand the payroll? How about the differences between Construction Accounting and Regular Accounting?  Have you ever heard your Office Manager say: Don’t worry about it. I have everything under control. Great everything is working and you go back to work. Life is good and I am making money now.  Surprise – Surprise Now it’s November.  Did you remember to pay The Quarterly Payroll Taxes were due on Halloween. It’s another form of Trick or Treat. If they have been paid and you have money left over it is a treat. The Trick is if you forgot, or didn’t know about them – Do you have enough money to pay? Even the best of bookkeepers are not comfortable writing checks that they know will not clear the bank. Everything is going smoothly. Business is good and growing. More and more jobs are coming in.  Office Manager is handling everything until you ask. How much money did I make on the “XYZ” Job? Then you discover that the accounting reports are missing details.  Is the Problem the person sitting in the Chair (Office Manager | Bookkeeper | Delivery Person). Do they have enough time to do everything. What is the priority? Delivery of Material because it’s needed on the job RIGHT NOW - DROP Everything and go get “stuff” from the supplier and take it to the job. Is the Problem the receipts turned in and are not marked with the job name or never turned in at all? Is the Problem that the time cards are not real time cards for filled out with fiction and guess word days after the fact.  Are the time cards holding up payroll, billing customers (time and material) generally unreadable and show up five minutes before the employees expects their paycheck.  In other words – the Office Manager needs to STOP EVERYTHING to fix, chase down, find something or solve an issue FIRST before the next thing on their list can happen. List is always longer than time needed.     Is the Problem that the phone rings in the middle of something else and the Office Manager can only do two things at once but has ten things to be completed before going home. Ever heard of the old fashion phrase “Just Give It A Lick and A Promise” In other words a quick wipe verses a deep clean edge to edge. Solution for an Overworked Bookkeeper is that something slips. Usually it begins with something that not critical but then it is.    Usually the first to go is Job Costing.  After all the Job Costing is impacting a report that the owner never looks at.  Extra work for when the Office Manager is wearing the Bookkeeper hat.  Just get the transaction into QuickBooks and get the bill paid.  After all that’s what is important. Now is the slide into what I call the Office Manager | Bookkeeper is being...