Bookkeeping services for churches

“We’ve got the church bookkeeping blues!”

Many churches benefit from the work of faithful volunteers in various aspects of their ministry, including bookkeeping. For some churches this works well, for example if there are volunteers who already have good knowledge and experience in this area, as well as the time and resources to maintain the workload.

For other churches, however, bookkeeping can be a real strain. There are a number of reasons why this may be the case:

• the principles and rules for bookkeeping, GST and payroll that apply to your church may not be well understood by those who are processing the bookkeeping transactions
• the person who has been processing the church accounts becomes unable to do so, and this leaves a gap with no one suitable to fill it
• there may be a change of officeholders within your church and the new officeholder may not have the expertise to manage part of or all the bookkeeping requirements
• the people who are helping with the bookkeeping may have significant time pressures and responsibilities that make it difficult to do the books in a consistent and timely way
• helpers may not have a good enough understanding of financial reports to quickly see if funds are being allocated and provisioned correctly each month
• ATO compliance may be unfamiliar to helpers, and important compliance areas like PAYG, BAS, STP and superannuation, may be confusing and overwhelming
• there may be a disconnect of communication between the bookkeeping function and other operational areas, meaning ministry decisions can be made more difficult by lack of up-to-date financial information
• some of the specific peculiarities of church bookkeeping (like Minister’s Expense Accounts [MEA, MDBA] or complex GST situations), may be too much for helpers to understand and apply in the time they have available
• your church may be using systems and processes that are not taking advantage of modern accounting software features and options

Imagine the benefits up up-to-date church accounts

Your ministry staff and volunteers have so much to do – consider how much good church bookkeeping can assist them:

• time and headspace are freed up for your team to do what they do best
• your staff understand their remuneration structure and have all the documentation they need
• your staff are paid with consistency and their MEA and expense reimbursements are checked and processed
• your church has a clear picture of how income and expenses are tracking
• you can see how your overall accounts are performing against budget
• you have reliable information to communicate to your congregation, encouraging understanding, confidence and generosity
• your church officeholders are able to make informed financial decisions
• you can see clearly the balance of funds that you have set aside for specific projects and purposes
• you can relax knowing that your compliance obligations with GST/BAS, PAYG, STP and superannuation are being monitored and actioned
• you have easy, accessible reporting for your monthly church accounts, as well as annual head-office reporting obligations
• you have good data and information to help plan for your church’s financial future

How to get help with your church bookkeeping

Exdia Bookkeeping Services offers a full range of options to get your church bookkeeping up to date and operating efficiently. Every church is different, and our bookkeeping, payroll and BAS services are customised to your exact situation.

You may be ready to get set up with modern accounting software – we can manage this whole process for you and get your system set up and fully configured. You may even want to change from one software to another – we can also manage this for you.

You may want to free up your team by having your whole bookkeeping function taken care of – we can take this load off your mind with our easy, cost-effective professional services.

Or you may just need a hand with some of the more complex aspects of your church accounts like reconciliations, payroll and BAS – we can take care of these for you while your team manages other aspects of your church bookkeeping like payables and receivables.

The place to start is with a chat. Get in touch with us and we will explore with you options that are tailored to your church. We’ll set this all out for you in writing, with clear pricing so you can make and considered and informed decision.

Looking for our church finance website? Click here

Feel free to check out our business bookkeeping services as well!