Accurately describing your bookkeeping skills

[lanelt]

It's very important to accurately describe your skill level when marketing yourself. (This holds true to whatever skills you're marketing!) In another thread I shared some good descriptions of the various Bookkeeping titles. By misrepresenting yourself it not only makes yourself look bad (and reflects in all areas of your business and can reflect on you personally) it can negatively affect the VA industry as a whole. I know that sounds a little harsh but, when you are claiming to be a VA and claim you can do something you can't then that really can affect the entire industry.

So, what does it mean to be a bookkeeper. I got these definitions from the AIPB website.

Assistant Bookkeeper
* Has up to one year's bookkeeping experience.
* Records basic transactions in the journals and subsidiary journals and posts entries to the ledger accounts with minimum supervision.
* Totals the subsidiary ledger accounts and, under supervision, reconciles with the control accounts.

Bookkeeper
* Has at least two years' bookkeeping experience in general bookkeeping, accounts receivable and payable and the bank reconciliation.
* Records transactions in the journals and subsidiary journals.
* Posts entries to the ledger accounts.
* May or may not do adjusting entries, file federal and state payroll returns and compute related deposits.

Full-charge Bookkeeper
* Maintains and handles all books through the adjusted trial balance.
* Records assets, leases and expenditures and performs the monthly bank reconciliation.
* Analyzes and corrects current-period errors in the general ledger.
* Does the payroll, files federal and state payroll tax returns and computes related deposits.

Freelance Bookkeeper
* Is responsible for setting up and maintaining books for small- to mid-size businesses.
* Maintains all journals and ledger accounts.
* Records assets, leases and expenditures, and does the monthly bank reconciliation.
* Maintains the journals, subsidiary journals and ledger accounts.
* May do the payroll, file the employment tax returns and compute related deposits.

Certified Bookkeeper
A Certified Bookkeeper (CB) is to bookkeepers what a CPA is to accountants: the cream of the profession.

A Certified Bookkeeper has passed a national examination at Sylvan-Prometric test centers and achieved a grade of at least 75% on each of five tests:
1. Adjusting entries
2. Error correction, including the bank reconciliation
3. Depreciation, book and tax, including passenger autos
4. Payroll
5. Inventory under the perpetual and periodic systems, including moving and weighted average, LIFO, FIFO and LCM costing.

A Certified Bookkeeper has at least 3,000 hours' (two years') experience, and signed a code of ethics.

A Certified Bookkeeper must earn an average 30 continuing professional education credits a year to maintain certification.

A Certified Bookkeeper has met the highest national standards for bookkeepers in accounting, tax and payroll.

[KiwiVA]

Wow, great thread with lots of info.

[vainparadise]

Very informative Lanel! Thank you for posting this.

[virtual writing]

Groan. Why didn't I study something useful, like bookkeeping? The skills required seem awesome to me - congratulations to all those who have them! And isn't it cool how the financial side of things can be clearly delineated like this ... I'll have to study into how a comparable list could be made for, say, writers.

[KiwiVA]

Writers are artists and don't need to adhere to any system.

[Diamond Virtual Services]

Thank you for this information. I had no idea one could get this type of certification and have downloaded the information packet. I hope to start studying for this immediately!

[Fox Valley Virtual Services]

Thanks for the information. Now I can accurately market myself by using the correct title for myself. I found this very informative and now I want to get certified. I am going to check into this and start working on it right away.