Since the beginning of launching my business, I have always been hesitant to spend any money on business services for my business, as I’m always trying to learn and do every part of my business myself. But as someone who has never taken a financial course in their life, trying to teach myself how to manage my business finances in the most stress-free and cost-effective manner has been extremely challenging.
So when I heard the rad people at SOURCED. talking about Bench Co. and their free one month trial - I was excited to give it a try.
If there is one place to invest more money into my business, I decided that the finances, and specifically bookkeeping would be a great place to start.
What is Bench?
Bench Co. is online bookkeeping powered by real humans.
What they help with the most is tracking and categorizing your business income and expenses, and presenting these numbers via financial charts and reports that are easy for even a financial illiterate like myself to comprehend.
My favorite part of Bench though has been having a dedicated professional bookkeeper for my business, that I have used as a mentor to give me guidance on straightening out the basic set-up of all my finances.
Free one month trial! How does it work?
From the first step of the free trial, to the final sign-on, what I loved about Bench was their thoroughness and easy onboarding process. To get started, Bench sets up a phone call with you and a member of their team to walk step by step through the items they need you to submit to set-up your account. They’ll then review what you can expect from the platform and what resources are available to you as a Bench member.
By walking through the process step by step with a Bench representatives, the onboarding process took less than 30 minutes to complete.
As someone who still has a lot to learn about some general business finances, I appreciated having someone to ask questions to directly and to offer me professional guidance on everything from how I can better separate my accounts to what kind of expenses can be tax deductible.
Even outside of scheduled calls with the Bench team, your bench account includes a messaging platform to chat or ask random questions with anyone from the Bench team at any time! Their response time is within 1 day, and it’s a real person you are messaging - not a chat bot.
After setting up your Bench account, you’re given a dedicated bookkeeper who is not only a financial mentor for you at any time, but also through your account portal will:
1) Track all your business transactions & categorize them by business meals, merchant fees, software & web hosting expenses...etc.
2) Collect & store all your receipts, statements, payroll reports, and any other documents relating to your business activities
3) Send you monthly financial reports and easy to read graphs & balance sheets to evaluate your business income vs. expenses, spending habits and more
4) Create a year-end financial package to make it easy when it’s time to file your taxes
Ok...but what’s the price?
Bench’s affordable pricing is what makes it perfect for small businesses. For a starter package of less than $120 a month, having all of these services in one dedicated bookkeeping service, as well as the financial mentorship available at anytime, has been more than worth it.
In addition to getting my bookkeeping records in order, working with Bench these last couple months has been a huge eye opener for me to improve my general financial structure.
My biggest takeaway -
Separate your personal and business expenses! The easiest way is creating separate accounts, or a dedicated credit card for business related purchases only.
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Written by Nicole Prybula.
Nicole is a Corporate Event Producer that loves turning a standard business meeting into an impactful brand experience that attendees fall in love with. If Nicole isn't soaking up inspiration working with her co-workers at Sourced, it's because she's traveling and working from a cafe on the other side of the world. Find her online at www.cultivatedexperiences.com and follow her adventures on Instagram at @cultivatedexperiences