It might be easy for you to be tempted to hire freelance accountants working online. After all, you don’t have to employ them on a full time basis. This means that you only have to pay them for the job that they have done. You also have to pay less since their rates are a lot lower than accounting firms. As tempting as it might sound, you have to think twice before you finally decide to hire them to do the job.
- They are total strangers. You have to understand that these freelance accountants online are strangers. You can only count on their words and nothing else. Some of them might just pretend to be accountants when in fact they are not. Some others might be using other people’s resumes to boost their chances of being hired. Considering how easy it is to hide your real identity online; this poses a major risk. As the old saying goes, never trust strangers.
- You can only deal with them online. The problem in dealing with them online is that they may not have a sense of accountability. Once you ask them to do the job and there are mistakes that they have to correct, they might not do it anymore. Since you can’t hold them to the task, you have no choice but to just let go. You have paid for a service that you didn’t really get in full. It is a total waste of resources for your business.
- You can’t pressure them to finish the task. The reason why you need accountants close to you is that you want to pressure them to finish the job on the deadline. Take note that you will be penalized if you have submitted the reports late. If the person working on your accounts is oceans away, you can never put any pressure to finish everything quickly.
- You are sharing sensitive financial information. When it comes to your financial information, you can’t just share it with anyone. This poses a big risk. This is true especially for someone whom you have never met in person. You might run the risk of having this information leaked.
In short, you have to avoid hiring those who are doing freelance jobs online. They might be cheap, but the results might not be what you wanted them to be. Accounting firms are better. Even if you have to work with them from a distance, you know that they are a registered business and you can easily contact them. If you live in London, there are a lot of offers; they are high quality accountants who will do the job right.