April 5, 2018 Meeting, Letters of Engagement

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April 5th Meeting Notes Bulleted Letters of Engagement

April 5, 2018

President Kim Boaz opened the meeting with introductions and shout-outs.  There were new people joining us.  Most people had nice things to say about how others in the group had helped them with an issue during the month but also praising the FaceBook page.  Good to hear how technology is benefiting people

Kim shared that Leslie Gifford, CPA is currently experiencing a health-related issue.  Besides having to deal with the issue it occurred during tax season adding extra stress.  Steve Stegemen of Davis Graves CPA stepped up, is helping Leslie’s clients, at the previous agreed upon price and not taking any of the clients.  They will remain Leslie’s clients.  An example of how the group works to support and help one another.  In that spirit, it was agreed that a donation bowl (or object) will be available at every meeting, all donations will go to either giving flowers or something for a member when they go through a hard time.   Jeff Baker, ASAP Treasurer, will look into how donations maybe made on-line as many members stated they often do not carry cash.

Letters of Engagement workshop: Three participants shared their current Letters of Engagement.  Discussion followed regarding these and some members shared that they don’t use an agreement.  Some of the items that seemed to matter to most members are:

  • Spelling out when payment is expected. One member shared that her invoices go out the 1st of the month and she auto deducts from her client’s accounts on the 5th – the agreement letter states this.
  • Have a line in the agreement stating the rate can adjust or give a new agreement every year with updated rates.
  • Some have more of a Project based agreement which states what they will and won’t do for the client.

Discuss then turned to the approach people take before accepting a new client

  • Most offered an hour or more free consultation where they speak with the new client and review bank and financial statements
  • Some charge if they look at any of the data

Another good meeting with active, informative discussion

  • May 3rd meeting will be a presentation on QBA Management tools. Presented by Alicia Pollock  There will be time for questions.   Meeting will be at Meals on Wheels locationed at 7710 SW 1st, Portland, OR 97219.  11:30-1:00 pm and it is a bring your own lunch style meeting.

March 2nd Meeting Minutes, Chuck Palmer, Heartland

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Melissa Barton, our vice president, started the meeting.  She had those present introduce themselves.  Today’s guest speaker was Chuck Palmer with Heartland who discussed the timely topic of professional liability.  Chuck owned a business performing outsourced CFO services.  Chuck provided a real-life example from his personal experience of a roofing company that needed bookkeeping services.  The relationship with the roofing company was positive until a general manager was later hired.  As the relationship was ending, a final bill for $6,700 was submitted by Chuck’s company but the bill went unpaid.  The roofing company filed a lawsuit against Chuck’s company alleging 26 points in a letter.  Of the 26 points, 25 were incorrect and the one correct point was already addressed.  The case went to court.  In the end, the lawsuit was dropped and the bill was written off.  In many cases, litigation has more to do with emotions than facts. Two questions were raised.  First, how do we prevent litigation from occurring?  Secondly, how do we resolve litigation?  One critical step in preventing litigation is screening clients during the client acquisition phase.  Questions you may wish to ask a potential client include:

  1. Why are you looking for a new accountant?
  2. Ask for a copy of the QuickBooks file to review the file for problems.
  3. Use a professional services engagement letter and be as specific as possible
  4. Be clear that business management is not included
  5. Recommend an automated payment policy for payment of fees
  6. Have a solid insurance company. Understand what is covered and what is not.  Sit down with your agent to review your insurance coverage.

Communication and documentation are key.  Email your understanding to your client.  You may also wish to run a bank reference check before acquiring the client.  Document retention is very important.

Linda Lagraff asked how to deal with liability in an engagement letter for clients that provide bank account and credit card access to bookkeepers and accountants.  One suggestion was to recommend password security in an engagement letter.  Another comment recommended use of read only access for bank and payroll for bookkeepers and accountants.

We are looking for speakers for upcoming meetings.  Kim will be the speaker for April and the topic is “What is your Super Power/Niche?”  If you don’t know, we’ll help you discover it.

Our group will continue to meet at the Meals on Wheels site until we have space on the eastside of Portland for 25 to 30 people.

Bullet Points:

  • Melissa Barton, our vice president, started the meeting. She had those present introduce themselves.
  • Today’s guest speaker was Chuck Palmer with Heartland who discussed the timely topic of professional liability. Chuck owned a business performing outsourced CFO services.  Chuck provided a real-life example from his personal experience of a roofing company that needed bookkeeping services.
  • The roofing company filed a lawsuit against Chuck’s company alleging 26 points in a letter. The case went to court.  In the end, the lawsuit was dropped and the bill was written off.  In many cases, litigation has more to do with emotions than facts.
  • Two questions were raised. First, how do we prevent litigation from occurring?  Secondly, how do we resolve litigation?
  • One critical step in preventing litigation is screening clients during the client acquisition phase.  Questions you may wish to ask a potential client include:
  1. Why are you looking for a new accountant?
  2. Ask for a copy of the QuickBooks file to review the file for problems.
  3. Use a professional services engagement letter and be as specific as possible
  4. Be clear that business management is not included
  5. Recommend an automated payment policy for payment of fees
  6. Have a solid insurance company. Understand what is covered and what is not.  Sit down with your agent to review your insurance coverage.
  • Communication and documentation are key.
  • Linda Lagraff asked how to deal with liability in an engagement letter for clients that provide bank account and credit card access to bookkeepers and accountants. Suggestions included recommending password security in an engagement letter and use of read only access for bank and payroll.
  • We are looking for speakers for upcoming meetings. Kim will be the speaker for April and the topic is “What is your Super Power/Niche?”
  • Our group will continue to meet at the Meals on Wheels site until we have space on the eastside of Portland for 25 to 30 people.

 

 

 

February 2nd 2017 Meeting Minutes -Bullet Points

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ALL STAR ACCOUNTING PROFESSIONALS, INC. Meeting Minutes- Bullet Points

February 2, 2017

  • Kim Boaz opened the February meeting asking each attendee to introduce themselves, provide shout outs to other members and allowing each member to state a goal they have for 2017.
  • Alicia Katz Pollock was today’s presenter and provided a slide presentation on QuickBooks Online. Alicia is a QuickBooks trainer with Royalwise and offers QuickBooks training and classes.    She specializes in QuickBooks accounting setup and questions.
  • Alicia mentioned that QuickBooks Online (QBO) does many of the same functions as the desktop but in different places. She discussed the QuickBooks Labs option and the Audit Trail.
  • The cost per month for QBO is $40 for the Plus version, $30 for Essentials and $15 for Simple Start. Wholesale pricing for clients is available to bookkeepers and accountants, where the client pays you instead of Intuit.  Alicia provided a helpful tool for cleaning up errors in billable expenses  and discussed management of rules to classify transactions for Bank Feeds.
  • QuickBooks Online be backed up but you must use Internet Explorer. Select the “gear” icon, then export data.
  • It is also possible to convert QuickBooks Enterprise to QuickBooks Pro or Premier if none of the Enterprise features were used previously.   Use //royalwise.com/?p=9793 to help convert your file.
  • Alicia next explained several keyboard shortcuts including “Ctrl-Alt-?” for a shortcut list.
  • You can have the software be used as a calculator by doing a calculation in an amount field.
  • When working between different areas of QuickBooks, you can open multiple tabs by right clicking on the tab and duplicating a tab. You may need to hit the refresh button if you make changes and want to see the results.
  • To see two different files, you would open two separate files, each one in a different browser, such as Chrome and Firefox. Using Chrome incognito allows for a cleaner experience.
  • You can use your browser’s search function (Ctrl-F) to search within QBO as well.
  • Alicia’s contact information is as follows: Alicia@royalwise.com; info@royalwise.com; 503-406-6550.  You may also sign up for their newsletter on the Royalwise website.  Thank you, Alicia, for a great presentation!