Bookkeeping in Provestor
When managing a company it’s important to ensure all transactions on its bank statements are recorded. This is called bookkeeping.
Bookkeeping is the most important part of your company’s records - it's at the heart of your financial records and used in many ways including for your LiveCash, profits and tax calculations, and your year end accounts. You’ll need to update your bookkeeping frequently, we recommend at least once a month, or before using any information displayed in Provestor to make a decision or process a dividend.
This guide explains how to accurately record and match your transactions in Provestor with your business bank statements.
Without accurate and up to date bookkeeping records, your LiveCash, profits, taxes and company accounts won’t be accurate. This may lead to overspending or incorrect tax payments.
Bookkeeping in Provestor
We’ve designed Provestor to make bookkeeping as easy as possible. You’ll find many of your transactions are shown as ‘pending payment’ in the bookkeeping area – all you need to do is match them as they appear on your bank statement.
You’ll need to repeat this process for all the accounts your company has – for example current, savings and credit card accounts. Each of your accounts needs a separate account in the bookkeeping – if you need one adding, for example a credit card, let you account manager know.
Our team has decades of experience helping clients with their bookkeeping. Here are some of the top tips from them:
- Don't withdraw cash from your business bank account. It can lead to surprise tax bills.
- Avoid taking cash for rent. Instead, ask your tenant to pay it into your bank account. If you must accept cash, pay it in full into your bank yourself.
- Don’t pay yourself without a payslip or a dividend payment. It would likely result in higher tax bills later on.
- Keep your bookkeeping balance matched exactly to your bank statement. Any difference will affect livecash and profit calculations.
- Don't be afraid to ask for help. If you’re having difficulties, get in contact with your account manager - they are experts!
The process to complete your bookkeeping is:
Step 1: gather your bank statements
You’ll need a copy of your bank statement for each of your accounts. If you use online banking you might find it useful to print off a copy of your statement.
Step 2: check the starting balance
The starting / opening balance on your bank statement should match the balance of the last transaction you’ve recorded in Provestor. If it doesn’t, you may have missed a transaction or two from a previous bank statement. It’s important to go back and balance your account before continuing.
Step 3: enter the transactions
You now need to work through your bank statement, from the oldest to the most recent transaction. You need to ensure that each transaction is captured in Provestor.
Whilst working through each transaction on your bank statement, you’ll need to :
- Check if it's already there – If it’s already recorded in your bookkeeping records, check the date, amount and it is included in your overall balance. Edit it if needed.
- Match pending payments – If it’s in the list of pending payments you’ll need to match it, and record the date and amount
- Enter new transactions – If it’s not shown in the bookkeeping area or in the pending payments you’ll need to enter a new transaction
Read on for more information on how to complete these steps.
How to match pending payments
Pending payments are automatically created by Provestor for certain upcoming payments. They include payments you’re expecting to receive for invoices you’ve created, salary and dividend payments you need to make, tax payments due, and any recurring payments you’ve created in Regular payments & savings.
If the transaction is shown at the bottom of the page in the pending payments section, you’ll need to match it. Simply click the icon on the transaction and you’ll be asked to check and match the transaction details. Once this is done, press tick the matches statement checkbox and press save.
How to enter new transactions
If you have additional transactions that aren’t in the pending payments area simply press “enter new transaction” to create a new transaction.
You’ll then need to select one of the six options:
- Other outgoings – use this to record outgoings taken directly from your business bank accounts, for example bank charges, bills and other purchases.
- Other income – use this to record income where you haven’t created an invoice, for example income from tenants, interest on savings, etc.
- Refund of expense – use this to record when you receive a refund of an expenses, for example if you make a purchase and categorise it as a travel expense, you would record the refund and again select the category travel expense.
- Transfer to another account– this allows you to transfer money to another business bank account. If you are using a company credit card or savings account you should use this feature to transfer payment between accounts.
- Asset purchase – use this when purchasing an asset (not a property). The asset will be entered into your company’s asset register, as used during corporation tax calculations.
- Asset sale – use this when selling an asset (not a property). The asset will be removed from your company’s asset register.
You can then record the details of your transaction.
Step 4: check the closing balance
Finally, you’ll need to check the closing balance to ensure you’ve entered everything accurately. Simply look at the closing balance on your bank statement and ensure it exactly matches the balance shown against the last transaction in the bookkeeping area. If there’s a discrepancy, check your bank statement against the transactions shown in Provestor to find the incorrect / missing transactions.
Related Articles
Introduction to Provestor online
Welcome to this short introduction to help you get started with Provestor. We'll take you through the key features of the software and signpost you in the right direction. Find answers fast, 24/7 Try the search box above to see how easy it is to find ...Adding or removing a property
If you buy or sell a property within your limited company, we'll need some information from you. This will enable our accountants to set-up the property purchase or sale in Provestor allowing you to continue to maintain your records. Buying a ...Creating invoices for rent and other income
Getting paid is high on the priority list of any business and for landlords it is no different. Our advice is be consistent and make it easy for your tenants to pay. By providing clear rent invoices, details of how to pay and keeping track of ...Getting started whilst changing accountants
The Provestor accounting software has many features that allow you to run your company and see your finances in real-time. To get you started we need to collate and input some information about your company and your accounts. Once we have contact ...Recording agent rental statements
Sometimes it's convenient to use a letting agent particularly for dealing with rent collection and maintenance. A good agent will send you rental statements with details of rent collected minus any costs. The temptation is to put the statements to ...