How to Evaluate Your Options for Nonprofit Accounting
The Jitasa Advantage
The Jitasa Advantage
Finding the right professional partner to meet your nonprofit’s accounting needs can feel overwhelming. Fortunately, if you’re in this position, you’ve come to the right place! Our experienced team at Jitasa has broken down your options and key differentiators to consider as you bring on a financial professional or firm, so you can make an informed decision.
At a high level, you have three options for bringing on a nonprofit accountant to join your team. Let’s break down each approach in more detail.
Very large nonprofits with extensive, complex accounting needs
Small, brand-new organizations that are just setting up their accounting systems
Nonprofits that fall anywhere in between the very largest and the very smallest
If you decide to outsource your nonprofit’s accounting needs, you’ll need to find a firm that can address your unique situation and help you achieve your financial goals. Let’s look at a few essential criteria to help you start comparing accounting providers.
Nonprofit accounting differs from its for-profit counterpart because nonprofits’ primary accounting goal is accountability rather than profitability, and they have to follow unique rules and regulations to maintain their tax-exempt status. Your outsourced accountant should, at a minimum, have experience working with nonprofits so they’ll understand the nuances of your organization’s situation. However, it’s even better if they work exclusively with exempt organizations.
If your accounting firm assigns a team of professionals to work with your nonprofit, there will always be someone available to answer questions and solve problems for you during business hours. Plus, you’ll benefit from multiple external perspectives on your organization’s financial situation and tap into different individuals’ expertise to get a holistic view of your needs and next steps.
Your financial situation will evolve along with your organization, and your accounting firm should be prepared to provide the support you need when you need it. Even if you only want help with tax filing right now, for example, that doesn’t mean you won’t find yourself looking for grant management or audit preparation assistance down the line. Make sure your firm offers a wide range of services so you can scale up over time.
The best accounting firm pricing models require your nonprofit to pay a flat monthly fee that corresponds directly to the services you receive. Ensure there are no hidden costs or startup fees, and when you add a new service to your plan or remove something from it, your accounting team should let you know upfront exactly how that change will affect your payments going forward.
Jitasa is the largest national provider of outsourced nonprofit financial services, having served more than 2,000 organizations since our founding in 2008. Although Jitasa works with exempt organizations of all sizes and missions, we only serve nonprofits.
Every Jitasa client has three to five team members assigned to their engagement for maximum availability and flexibility. We offer bookkeeping, accounting, tax filing, fractional CFO, and controller services, each with multiple core services and add-on options. Depending on your nonprofit’s size and needs, we’ll provide a custom quote for a flat monthly fee for your chosen services with no hidden costs.
Jitasa even goes above and beyond by using our experience to design tailored solutions for every client. This way, we can function as an extension of your organization and ensure you have the time and resources you need to further your mission. Check out our case studies to see how we’ve achieved this balance for real nonprofits like yours!
Nonprofits need accountants to ensure compliance with relevant regulations, transparency with supporters, and efficient, mission-focused resource use. No matter how you recruit your accountant (hiring, outsourcing, or soliciting an in-kind donation of services), they’ll help you organize your records, create reports, file tax forms, and improve your approach to financial management based on your unique needs and goals.
Although Jitasa works exclusively with nonprofits, we serve tax-exempt organizations of all kinds—traditional charities, associations, clubs, churches and other religious organizations, educational institutions, scout councils, and many others. Jitasa also accepts nonprofit clients of any size, from one-person startups to multi-chapter enterprises and everything in between.
The Jitasa team has put together a comprehensive guide on this very topic that you can check out! A few of the questions covered in it include:
While this guide is tailored to outsourcing, you can adapt some of the questions for hiring or vetting skilled volunteers, and you may add or omit others depending on how your conversations with potential accountants go.
Our core accounting services include:
We also offer a range of add-on services, from grant management to payroll coordination. Bookkeeping, controller, CFO, and tax filing services are also available as add-ons to our core accounting packages.