If you’re tasked with running or looking after a business, you’ll need to keep track of the varying ways money moves through the organisation.
That means you need a great handle on your accounting reports, which will provide a detailed insight into how things are going.
These reports provide you with snapshots from different perspectives and help you find out exactly what’s going on at any point in time.
But what reports should you focus on? We’ve picked out seven of the most important, and we’ll also explain how these reports should be read and understood.
1. The profit and loss (P&L) statement
The P&L Statement gives you an overall picture of how your company has been performing financially.
It lets you see how revenue and expenses change from one period to another and is usually prepared monthly, quarterly, or yearly depending upon the requirement.
2. The balance sheet
The balance sheet gives you a picture of your company’s assets, liabilities, and equity at any given point in time.
It’s prepared monthly or yearly but the frequency depends upon your business size and other factors.
3. The cash flow statement
This report gives you information about how much cash (which may or may not be physical cash, depending on your operation) you have received through various sources, as well as how much cash you have spent during a particular period.
Cash flow statements provide information about what’s going on with the company’s liquidity at a given point in time and are vital for future planning.
4. Inventory
These reports can be prepared monthly or even weekly, depending upon your specific requirements and type of business.
An inventory report provides a picture of all physical products you have in stock and how much of each product has been consumed during a particular period. You can then use this report to physically check your stock for accuracy.
5. Payroll
The payroll report will provide a comprehensive picture of all employee financials along with their salary information and amount of holiday earned (or taken).
These reports usually include information from across the company and not just for a particular department.
6. Accounts payable
The accounts payable report will reveal how much money is still payable by you to your suppliers for any goods you’ve already received.
It will be helpful in maintaining an optimum cash balance by showing when you are likely to pay back each supplier and bring down your outstanding payments, should you become a regular fixture on their debtors list.
7. Accounts receivable
This report is designed to provide an insight into the financial health of your customers.
It reveals how much money is outstanding from invoices you’ve sent and for how long it has been outstanding.
It will help you make decisions related to cash flow and reveal which customers need more of a nudge to settle their outstanding debts.
Lifting a lid on your business
The reports mentioned above will help you make sense of your day-to-day financial performance as well as the state of your business. They’ll provide invaluable numerical data but also help you make better, more informed decisions about the future of the operation.
Some of these reports will seem complicated at first. But that’s where we can help. If you’ve got any questions about the accounting reports we’ve mentioned here, please get in touch with the friendly Trinity team.