Am I overpaying my accountant?

[hb2014]

I run two small business:

(1) An LLC with roughly $4 mln in annual revenue. We have about 375 items that get downloaded and categorized in quickbooks each month.

(2) A sole proprietorship with about $200k in revenue a year. We have about 15-20 quickbooks entires per month.

All of our quickbooks transactions are downloadable from 2 online financial accounts.

At year end my accountant prepares about 200 1099s for me and does my personal taxes and the taxes for the LLC. He handles all monthly quickbooks book-keeping as well.

I pay $1,400 a month and an additional $2,000 for the 1099 processing and distribution.
I like my accountant and plan to keep him for my year-end filings/advice but our monthly book-keeping is pretty basic and can be done by a conscientious employee in about 4 hours. As a result I am considering bringing the book-keeping and 1099 generation in house.


PLEASE ADVISE:

(1) I'd appreciate input regarding the rates that I'm paying now and whether bringing the monthly book-keeping in house is worth it in the experience of others.

(2) Also, if I do bring the book-keeping in house what should I expect to pay my accountant for preparing my federal and state returns?

(3) Lastly, for those who do in house book-keeping - what software do you recommend?

Thank you for your time.

 

[kirby]

If you have only 20 entries a month and believe that can be done in 4 hours a month then that is a tremendous hourly rate you are paying.

Depends on the rates where you live. Look at the websites for hiring temporary accountants to get a ballpark number

If quickbooks is working now why change?