Virtual Assistants for CPAs are an incredibly potent solution to the ever-present struggle of time management. CPAs simply have so many things on their plate that half the time, you’d be lucky to find their noses not buried in a ledger.
Much like the legal profession, the life of a CPA is unfortunately mired by reams of paperwork and sheaves of files. The saddest part is that all that time and money you spend getting certified feels like a waste when you’re stuck bookkeeping for half the day.
This is precisely where a virtual assistant can make a massive difference. As an entrepreneur, you should know how much of the accounting workload is mundane: sorting through receipts and generating invoices, recording transactions, and sifting through financial data. A lot of this work today can simply be automated. Thus, many firms have shifted to using automated solutions.
Furthermore, automation lacks human judgment and critical thinking, which are very important in the financial space. Anyone can jot down transactions, but not everybody can spot a bookkeeping mistake in a business’s ledgers.
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What is a Virtual Assistant (VA) for CPAs?
This is where virtual assistants, or VAs for CPAs come in. A virtual accounting assistant is like your personal secretary who works with you on the administrative side. Think of them as the CPA equivalent of a paralegal. Where a paralegal handles paperwork and research for lawyers, a VA handles such tasks for a CPA.
Let’s say you need financial statements generated for analysis, but your afternoon is clogged with meetings. Your VA can handle all the general administrative work while you’re handling the important stuff. Similarly, virtual assistants can take charge of your appointments and business calls, freeing you from distractions at work.
VAs bring a variety of benefits and quality-of-work improvements to CPAs. Let’s dive into some of them. (P.S. Wait till you hear how much better VAs make life for CPAs!)
4 Reasons Why Every CPA Needs a Virtual Accounting Assistant:
1. Managing the Grunt Work
Unfortunately, existing accounting procedures have left CPAs trapped under a veritable avalanche of formality. Even with digitization, there are simply too many responsibilities thrust on a single CPA to manage. This often forces them to prioritize mundane but necessary activities over innovating and actively contributing to financial strategy.
For any CPAs reading this, think about your average work day. Start noting down how much time you spend combing through data and making reports or reading through swathes of tax law to find the important bits. You will start to notice that the hours seem to fly by while you’re painstakingly making manual payments to suppliers or furiously combing through an Excel sheet trying to find an error.
The statistics concur with this assertion, with Accounting Insight News reporting that 56% of CPAs waste time on manual work. The survey leans towards using automation to solve the issue. Virtual assistants for CPAs are an alternative solution that we believe also deserves recognition here.
A VA is perfect to manage all of the mundanities of accounting. Generally, you would have a remote bookkeeper serve as your VA. They could handle bookkeeping and basic accounting tasks for all your clients. Leaving you to do the heavy lifting that you prepared your whole student life for.
Hiring anyone proficient in administration is also a good call regarding scheduling and other such administrative work. They may not be able to take up the mundane bookkeeping work, but they can manage your accounting business while you are working. You could put them in charge of managing your work phone calls. Give them the line to your business inquiry number, for example, and have them schedule client appointments and the like for you.
2. Boosting Productivity and Curbing Burnout
One of the major reasons why accounting professionals end up burnt out is because of task redundancy and lack of fulfillment and professional accomplishment. After spending years getting that pristine CPA certification, you would expect professional life to be more exciting and productive. Cut to the average accountant’s day. Half is spent laboring over the books of accounts and receipts, and the other half is spent trying to do some semblance of strategic work.
As a CPA, if you only do all the bookkeeping tasks, you leave a lot of value untapped.
This disbalance can lead to a negative relationship with your work. You may also feel like you are not contributing as much as possible, leading to doubts about your capabilities. Whatever the mental repercussions may be—and there are many—the bottom line is that they are not healthy. For many CPAs, being stuck doing bookkeeping may as well be an insult to all their hard work.
A virtual assistant in this case is just the shot in the arm a CPA needs to set them straight. Instead of being condemned to a life of boring, unfulfilling work, they can lean into their specialty. A VA frees up work time, which can be used to do more fulfilling work. For example, helping their clients plan for their financial future. They could be out there managing the finances of multiple projects, and taking care of all the complex regulatory duties. Meanwhile, their VA props them up by handling the boring but necessary tasks.
A VA is also an amazing resource for vacation time. Everyone needs a break, but taking a vacation in this hyper-competitive professional landscape could seriously hurt you. For example, missing work calls while you’re at a resort can sour client relations. This is where your VA can shine and lift the weight off your shoulders.
You can leave them to handle work-related things until you return, and they should be able to manage for the most part. If any emergencies do arise, your VA can redirect those to you. Otherwise, your business will still be running without you actively present.
When you return, you won’t find yourself down many clients because you did not answer the phone. You will have your business operating as normal. Your VA can catch you up on all the latest happenings. They can also schedule your commitments and plans and keep you on track when returning to the trenches.
All in all, a virtual assistant offers CPAs a second set of eyes and hands that can work independently and help them relieve some of their workload. It might not seem like much, but it can make all the difference for many overworked CPAs.
3. Affordability and Flexibility
VAs are not expensive, and affordability is the primary reason VAs for CPAs are a good solution. You need someone to do the work you do not want or do not have the time to do. You could automate that work, but it’s too expensive. A VA solves both of these problems.
Due to being remote, many VAs are from Asia or Europe and charge considerably less than an American equivalent. Despite the price drop, the quality remains unchanged, and you can personally test and vet them before hiring them. Our choice has always been virtual accounting assistants from Pakistan and Southeast Asia.
The perks don’t stop there, as a VA is affordable and incredibly flexible. They are not opposed to working unorthodox business hours. Your VA can do the bookkeeping while you are asleep, and you can wake up to have everything ready. They can also deal with clients in different time zones and give you more mobility to choose international clientele.
VAs are also the cream of the crop when leveraging the latest digital solutions. Whether it be AI communication software or the newest cloud accounting platform, they will know about it. VAs are also not permanent employees. You can hire them if you need extra help on a project and pay them for as long as needed. Or you could also just hire one VA permanently. It’s all a matter of preference.
The ability to have so many choices and options is where the beauty of having a VA for CPAs.
What Does a Virtual Assistant Bring to the Table for CPAs?
Let’s run down the list of the major responsibilities that a VA can take up for a CPA, shall we:
- Administrative Responsibilities
- Scheduling Meetings
- Contact Management
- Social Media Management
- Marketing and Client Outreach
- Virtual Assistant Bookkeeping
- Invoicing
- Online Research
- Data entry and management
Conclusion
These are just some of the many amazing things a virtual assistant can do for CPAs. The accounting business landscape is getting intensely competitive, so having a VA as a partner can make a difference. Simply having another human behind the scenes working with you is a game-changer. Accounting is a lonely job, but it does not need to be. Having someone support you as a VA and be the wind in your sails will get you far. You can go fast alone, but you go far together.
If you need assistance with administrative accounting tasks, it’s worthwhile to consider outsourcing firms. Outsourced bookkeeping services and accounting firms are great places to find good talent. These firms have internal controls in place to vet out the best VA candidates out there.
If you are a CPA who has worked with a virtual accounting assistant, how was your experience?
We would love to hear your thoughts on VAs, so feel free to continue the discussion in the comments below or send us an email if you’d like us to cover something else.
Till then, happy accounting to all the CPAs out there, and we wish you the best of luck in the search for the perfect VA for you.