The Small Business Bookkeeping Checklist

The Checklist

1. Record and categorize every transaction. Every deposit, withdrawal, and charge needs to land in the right account. This is the foundation everything else is built on.
2. Reconcile every bank account. Match your accounting software against your actual bank statements to confirm nothing is missing or duplicated.
3. Reconcile every credit card account. Same process as bank accounts — credit cards are a common source of untracked business expenses.
4. Review accounts payable. Confirm which bills are outstanding, which are overdue, and that nothing was paid twice.
5. Review accounts receivable. Check which invoices are unpaid and how long they've been outstanding.
6. Categorize and file receipts. Attach supporting documentation to transactions, especially for anything over your accountant's or the IRS's documentation threshold.
7. Review payroll transactions, if applicable. Confirm wages, tax liabilities, and employer costs are recorded correctly.
8. Generate your profit & loss statement. This shows your revenue, expenses, and net income for the month.
9. Generate your balance sheet. This shows what your business owns, owes, and is worth at a point in time.
10. Compare actuals against your budget, if you have one. Flag anything meaningfully over or under expectations.
11. Check your cash position and near-term obligations. Are you set up to cover upcoming expenses?
12. Do a sanity check on the numbers. Does anything look off — a missing invoice, a duplicate charge, an account that doesn't reconcile? Investigate before it compounds.