9 Best Outsourced Accounting Firms to Consider in 2024
Hiring internally as your business and client demands grow can be a slow and costly endeavor. As a result, many firms turn to outsourcing as a more flexible and cost-effective staffing alternative.
However, finding a reputable and affordable firm you can trust to deliver for your clients can be challenging.
Through extensive research, talking with dozens of profitable firm owners, and reviewing the crowdsourced recommendations from this post by Jetpack Workflow Found and CEO David Cristello, we discovered the top accounting outsourcing partners that thousands of US-based accounting firms work with successfully.
In this article, we share some of the most common services accounting firms outsource, reveal the best accounting firms for outsourcing, and provide some questions to help you find the right partner for your firm.
Typical Accounting Services That Can Be Outsourced
Here are some of the standard services CPA firms frequently outsource.
Bookkeeping
Since bookkeeping tasks are done continually, it often becomes repetitive and time-consuming for your team.
That’s why accounting outsourcing partners often offer bookkeeping as one of their primary services. Many even offer this as their only service. These services include tasks like balancing the ledger and expense tracking.
Skilled in-house professionals can let the outsourced team keep track of all data entry tasks and simply oversee the completed records to ensure they’re error-free.
Accounts Receivable (AR)/Accounts Payable (AP) Management
An outsourcing partner can help a firm manage accounts receivable and accounts payable for their clients, ensuring all payments are made and received promptly.
Some of the main tasks outsourced teams can handle on your behalf include:
- Invoice management
- Expense reporting
- Check processing
- Order management
- Collections management
Preparation of Financial Statements
Outsourced accounting firms can help you prepare financial statements for your clients. This is especially beneficial if they’re already handling the bookkeeping tasks and AR/AP management.
If this service is offered, the outsourced firm can provide you with accurate financial statements and custom reporting, which your clients can present to their internal team and external stakeholders.
However, while your outsourcing partner can prepare these statements to save you time and resources, you will likely review them for accuracy before passing them on to your clients.
Controller/CFO Services
Full-service outsourcing partners are also available that can offer more substantial accounting services. In addition to the services listed above, they typically include controller or CFO services, such as audit reporting, compliance management, cash flow analysis, KPI monitoring, and more.
While these services aren’t standard for accounting firms to outsource, they can be helpful if you act as a fractional controller/CFO for your clients. In turn, you can offer clients expert guidance to help them make informed business decisions and evaluate financial insights.
The 9 Best Outsourced Accounting Firms
1. TOA Global
TOA Global is a talent solutions provider in the accounting industry. Founded in December 2013, they provide dedicated outsourced accounting talent to international firms of any size.
Comprised of over 3,400 professionals in the Philippines, the TOA Global team serves more than 1,000 accounting and bookkeeping firms worldwide. Their talent can handle over 100 different roles for their clients, including accountants, CPAs, bookkeepers, administrators, and more.
All of their accountants and CPAs have bachelor’s or master’s degrees and receive regular training to expand their capabilities and offer quality service to their clients.
Pricing
TOA’s pricing is not made publicly available. Contact TOA Global to receive a custom quote tailored to your needs.
2. The Back Room
The Back Room is a skilled team of offshore accountants and business support specialists who make it easy to expand your capacity without going through the expensive recruiting, onboarding, and training process.
Its accounting staff specializes in routine tax and compliance work, giving firms more time to spend on high-value advisory services.
Rather than offering pre-set packages to choose from, The Back Room creates a custom engagement plan based on your unique needs and goals. The team recommends talent based on your requirements, giving you the final say over which outsourced talent to onboard.
Pricing
The Back Room has a one-time setup fee to get started, which covers recruitment, onboarding, and equipment costs. The ongoing monthly fee covers employee salaries, benefits, allowances, and their fee.
Contact The Back Room to get a custom quote tailored to your needs.
3. TeamUp
TeamUp gives you access to the top accounting talent in the Philippines through its DirectHire platform.
Firms might like the flexibility and control they get when hiring offshore talent with TeamUp. Instead of paying a monthly management fee to a business process outsourcing (BPO) service to oversee a team of outsourced accountants on your behalf, TeamUp makes it easier for you to find and directly hire qualified talent based in the Philippines.
TeamUp completes the job posting and initial screening process on your behalf, providing you with top-tier candidates that fit your culture and technical requirements.
Any candidates you hire get onboarded as contractors, allowing you to take your team with you. They’re not tied to TeamUp, meaning the staff you hire won’t be reassigned to other accounts, and you retain full control and oversight of your entire team — both on and offshore.
Pricing
TeamUp has a one-time fee of $4,000 per hire. Discounts are available for multiple hires.
4. Paro
Paro’s platform connects firms to expert accountants based on their unique accounting needs. Their goal is to help firms fill talent gaps and support growth without hiring full-time staff. Their robust online network of US-based professionals includes bookkeepers, tax experts, and qualified accountants.
Paro only accepts the top 2% of applicants with 15 years of experience on average to their platform. This means firms get top industry talent recommendations. These individuals can be hired on demand to fill temporary vacancies or partner with you long-term.
Paro begins the process with an introductory call to learn about the scope of work your firm needs. Then, they connect you with a professional from their network with the right expertise for the job.
Paro takes pride in their proprietary AI software that makes talent matches significantly quicker than traditional recruiting methods.
Pricing
Paro’s pricing is not made publicly available. Contact Paro to receive a custom quote tailored to your needs.
5. Maxim Liberty
Since 2005, Maxim Liberty has offered flexible and affordable outsourced bookkeeping services for CPA firms in Canada and the United States. With plans starting at just $50 a month and the ability to cancel anytime, Maxim Liberty ranks highly in the industry for its high-value bookkeeping services.
Maxim Liberty’s services include payroll processing, financial reporting, bank reconciliations, billing management, and more. Their bookkeepers are trained in several accounting software programs and can update client books as frequently as you desire, whether daily, weekly, or monthly.
They have performed bookkeeping tasks for thousands of businesses throughout the year, both big and small. Though they have clients in many industries, such as manufacturing, engineering, and consulting, they share that 70% of their business is white label for accounting and CPA firms.
Pricing
Plans start at $50 per month with the Monthly Updates plan for 5 hours of support each month and range up to $200 per month with the Daily Updates plan, which includes 20 hours of support a month.
With any plan, additional support is available at $10 per hour.
6. Bench
Based in Canada, Bench only provides bookkeeping and tax preparation services for small businesses and firms in the United States.
In addition to tax preparation, they perform other duties like month-end financial reporting, tax advisory, and monthly bookkeeping services. They can either work directly for your clients on a referral basis or through a white-label accounting solution on the back end while you remain on the customer-facing side.
What makes Bench unique is how they expertly manage their bookkeeping tasks by utilizing their own proprietary software program. However, as a result, this means they won’t integrate into your existing accounting software and systems.
Pricing
Plans start at $249 per month (billed annually) for basic support from dedicated bookkeeping experts.
The higher-tier plan costs $399 per month with annual billing and includes additional support from licensed tax professionals.
7. inDinero
InDinero offers tax, accountant, and financial services for businesses of all sizes. Some of their solutions include CFO services, accounting and bookkeeping services, tax services, and financial reporting. They have a few hundred team members both on and offshore.
From small businesses to established enterprises, inDinero’s accounting services are handled by a team of fractional accountants, overseen by a controller, that completes all financial and recordkeeping tasks.
They also leverage advanced software to keep their work efficient, transparent, and easily accessible for the client. Plus, they have built-in support for accounting software like QuickBooks Online, Bill.com, NetSuite, Expensify, and others, so they can seamlessly integrate with your team.
Pricing
The Essential plan, starting at $750 per month, includes the native bookkeeping software and a dedicated controller and team to handle full-service outsourced bookkeeping tasks. The Growth plan, starting at $1,250 per month, integrates with QuickBooks Online or NetSuite.
The Executive plan is available with custom pricing for firms with more complex needs.
8. Cadencia
Cadencia is a Mexico-based company that gives firms access to a pool of outsourced accounting and finance professionals.
You are directly involved in candidate selection to ensure you select the outsourced staffer with the right talent, skills, and culture match for your needs. The professional you hire gets directly onboarded as part of your team, and you can start delegating tasks to them within 2 days of hire.
As a nearshore provider, accounting firms in the United States and Canada might like that the Cadencia team operates in the Central Time zone, making it easier to align schedules than offshore teams.
However, firms can still enjoy significant cost savings compared to hiring internally. Cadencia even states firms can benefit from cost savings of 70% compared to in-house recruiting.
Pricing
There is a one-time processing fee of $5,500 to get started. The ongoing monthly fee of $3,000 covers the salary, benefits, training, taxes, and paid time off for one outsourced employee.
9. Credfino
Credfino offers remote staffing and business consulting for accounting firms. Its staff can take on hybrid roles to deliver administrative, bookkeeping, accounting, tax, and fractional CFO functions according to your unique needs.
The provider aims to support firm growth through offshore staffing, generating cost savings that can be reinvested elsewhere in the business and making it easier to add profitable service verticals.
Credfino staff are well-trained in various accounting software applications like QuickBooks, Paychex, Xero, and others for seamless integration with your workflows.
One of Credfino’s unique differentiators is that its staff is trained in client engagement, enabling the end-to-end outsourcing of certain tasks. You can interview and select the staff that meets your requirements, ensuring you find the right talent to support client work.
Pricing
Contact Credfino for a custom quote tailored to your unique needs and desired level of engagement. Services start at $8 per hour.
How to Tell If an Outsourced Accounting Firm Is Good or Not
Finding the right partner is crucial if you decide to outsource some of your accounting services. You want to ensure your clients receive the same level of service and care you would personally offer while still taking advantage of the efficiency and cost savings that outsourcing provides.
When you’re evaluating potential outsourcing partners, here are some essential questions to consider so you find the best match for your needs:
- Do they have any success stories or case studies from firms similar to yours?
- Do they have good customer reviews and references?
- What types of qualifications or training does their team have?
- How do they stay compliant with relevant regulations and standards?
- How easily will they integrate with your internal team?
- Do they support the software programs you utilize?
- What data security measures do they employ to protect sensitive client data?
- How long will onboarding take?
- What kind of ongoing communication will you have with the firm?