Veterinary Bookkeeping
Veterinary bookkeeping is not general bookkeeping with animals in it. The practice management system is the primary record of income, the wholesalers issue high volumes of invoices and credit notes, stock moves through the business constantly, and a meaningful share of income arrives from insurers rather than clients.
We handle the whole cycle so your management accounts are built on records that actually reconcile.
What the Work Covers
- Takings reconciliation
- Daily takings from ezyVet, Provet Cloud, RoboVet, Merlin, RxWorks or VetIT reconciled to card acquirer settlements and bank receipts, so the gap between what the system says you earned and what reached the bank is found and explained.
- Wholesaler and supplier ledgers
- Purchase invoices and credit notes from veterinary wholesalers coded to the right category, with statements reconciled monthly. Credit notes for returns and short dated stock get chased rather than lost.
- Insurance and direct claim debtors
- Direct claims tracked as debtors with an ageing report, so you can see how much of your cash is sitting with insurers and how long it takes to arrive.
- Client deposits and account balances
- Deposits for planned procedures and client account balances kept off the profit and loss account until the work is done.
- Stock movements
- Purchases matched to the stock position so the gross margin line is real. Where the practice management system holds stock, we work to it. Where it does not, we agree a periodic count.
Cloud Set-up
We work in Xero or QuickBooks with Dext, Hubdoc or AutoEntry for document capture. Bank feeds and card settlement feeds run automatically, wholesaler invoices are captured on receipt, and the chart of accounts is the veterinary one, not the generic default that ships with the software.
If you already have a bookkeeper in the practice, we can supervise rather than replace. A good practice bookkeeper who knows the client base is worth keeping.
How the Work Runs
System review
We look at your practice management system, your accounting software and how money currently gets from one to the other.
Chart of accounts rebuilt
Income and cost categories set up so drug margin, laboratory costs and staffing show separately, including by branch where relevant.
Weekly or monthly cycle agreed
Most single site practices work monthly. Multi-site groups and busy hospitals usually need a weekly rhythm.
Reconciled records delivered
Bank, card, wholesaler and takings all agreed, ready for management accounts without a scramble.
What You Receive
- Reconciled bank, card acquirer and cash positions
- Purchase ledger with wholesaler statements agreed
- Aged debtor report including direct insurance claims
- Stock position carried into the management accounts
- VAT return prepared from clean records under Making Tax Digital
Common Mistakes
- Posting card receipts net of fees
- Merchant fees netted off the takings hide both the true income and the cost of card processing. On a busy practice that cost is a meaningful number worth reviewing annually.
- Never reconciling the practice management system to the bank
- If nobody checks, discrepancies from missed charges, refunds and till errors go unexamined. The reconciliation is the control.
- Coding everything from the wholesaler to one nominal
- Medicines, food, consumables and equipment bought from the same supplier are different things. Coding them together makes drug margin unusable.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you work with our existing practice management system?
Can you work alongside our practice manager?
How quickly can records be brought up to date?
Who owns the data if we leave?
How do you handle the wholesaler credit notes nobody chases?
Can you fix a year of records that were done badly?
Get Your Records Under Control
Tell us what your bookkeeping looks like now, including the awkward parts, and we will set out what a clean monthly cycle would involve.