How founders should think about accounting

While any individual accounting calculation may be simple, accounting involves thousands of complex edge cases - a primary reason why it takes ~6 years and a series of tests to become a CPA. Though accounting services are expensive because the cost of mistakes is far higher—potentially leading to civil, criminal, and fiduciary liability. Like doctors and lawyers, accountants are professionals where expertise truly matters and consequences are significant.

We cringe when we see marketing to first-time entrepreneurs using eye-catching phrases like "you didn't start your company to do accounting" or "AI can do this for you" because they make you feel good in the short term, while causing the top reason companies don’t get funded, can’t sell or even worse, go bankrupt - their accounting is (non-existent or) a mess.

We work hard at Puzzle to give every entrepreneur, from the moment they incorporate, the ability to do accrual accounting in less time than it takes to do cash accounting in spreadsheets or in QuickBooks.

Why is accrual accounting important? It provides the most honest look at business health by including non-cash transactions that you expect will happen in the future. For example:

• Looking at your cash balance without outstanding bills is technically accurate, but ignores future obligations of your business.
• Looking at your cash balance without understanding unpaid invoices is technically accurate, but understates future cash receipts.
• Some businesses should expense assets right away to lower current tax burden, but if you expect higher profits tomorrow, you should consider depreciating them now.

There's no right or wrong answer, and we don't think you should have to choose. So we build the only solution that lets you have both, from day one forever.