Monthly bookkeeping for owner-run businesses in Montréal
More than one address, one set of books
Montréal is one city made of many boroughs, and a business that grows here can grow into a second address well before it becomes a second company. A shop and a workshop. Two storefronts in different neighbourhoods. An office and a warehouse. It is still one business, with one set of books.
What goes missing is the ability to read each address separately. Rent, wages, utilities and sales for both locations land in the same accounts, and the month produces one profit figure for the whole business. That figure is true, and it cannot tell you whether the second location is paying for itself.
Each location read on its own
The answer is set up at the start rather than reconstructed later. Each location becomes a class in the books, and every transaction is recorded against the location it belongs to as it is entered. Once that is in place, a month can be read three ways: the business as a whole, each location on its own, and the two side by side.
Costs that belong to both, such as the owner's time, insurance, the accounting itself, are split by a rule you choose once and that stays the same every month. A rule that changes from month to month makes the comparison meaningless, so it is written down and applied as written. When it needs to change, it changes from a stated date forward, and the earlier months keep the rule they were recorded under.
What is kept, each month
- Every transaction recorded against the location it belongs to.
- Shared costs allocated by the written rule, the same way each month.
- Every bank and card account reconciled to its statement, whichever location uses it.
- Payroll recorded per location where staff work at one address, and split by the rule where they work at both.
- A quarterly package for your accountant that shows the business whole, with the location detail behind it.
Québec terms
The books are kept on Québec terms. The sales tax your business collects and pays is recorded on every transaction, payroll is entered as your provider processes each run with the CNESST figures alongside, and your accountant files from the package we prepare.
Who is doing this
One operator, with over 20 years of experience in bookkeeping, accounting and financial analysis, for-profit and non-profit, across a wide range of sectors, in English and in French.
Questions Montréal business owners ask
We already have two locations in one set of books. Can they be separated now?
From the start date forward, yes. Separating the past depends on whether the old transactions say which location they belonged to, and the read-only look answers that before anything is promised.
What if staff work at both addresses?
Their wages are split by the same written rule as other shared costs, so the split is consistent and can be explained to your accountant in one sentence.
Do we need two separate sets of books?
One business keeps one file in QuickBooks Online, with each location as a class inside it. Whether the locations ought to be separate companies is a question for your accountant, and the books follow whatever that answer is.
One next step
A fifteen-minute call about your month, at no cost. Ask for a call.