Internal Bookkeeper Transition

We've handled post close accounting for +80 business buyers, and this situation has come up a lot recently - searcher is a couple weeks out from close and wondering what to do with the internal “bookkeeper" on staff. This is pretty common in a $1-10M business where an admin who wears a lot of hats was also the “bookkeeper" and not a trained accountant. You don’t want to upset or scare the team, but you also know the seller didn’t have great accounting and finance functions. We’ll work alongisde them but here’s our lane vs theirs: Post close we will own: - Quickbooks set up and chart of accounts - Coding transactions and monthly reconciliation to produce financial statements - Anything tax related Tasks they likely do and you’ll need help with: - Ordering materials and scheduling jobs - Sending invoices and chasing down AR - Reviewing commissions or payroll - Paying bills +80% of these acquisitions are asset sales. So you’ll have a new EIN with new banks, new Quickbooks, new payroll set up, etc that is totally separate from the seller. Be careful not to DIY or have the internal admin handle set up - you’ll have a mess that’s more expensive to clean up. Make sure you have a modern accounting stack and an accounting firm that understands M&A to set things up proprely.