Best Accounting Software for Multiple Businesses

You just have to learn the dos and don’ts of managing multiple businesses from the same account if your accounting software provides this option. But, as some of the following cases will show, you don’t have to panic if you are obliged to use multiple accounts, since these clever programs can still connect your businesses via their integrations.

Managing multiple companies

Having multiple businesses under the same account is anything but impossible thanks to cloud-based accounting solutions. In fact, if you are engaging in similar business activities but have the same clientele and vendors, the accounting software allows you to share the so-called master files. Aside from the shared data, one of the biggest advantages of having your businesses under the same account is the almost seamless interoperability. This means that you can perform actions which have effects on your other businesses, but the software still prepares individual business reports for each company to avoid any confusion, like accidentally entering an expense in a different currency. Another important aspect is that it is only you, the account manager, who will have access to all businesses, thus preventing others from accidentally or deliberately tampering with the data of your other companies.

However, keep in mind that almost all accounting companies treat your businesses separately: in other words, regardless of the same account, if you have multiple companies, you have to multiply the subscription fee with the number of entities.

Things to look for

Like we said before, it is not impossible to manage multiple businesses through the same account. However, there are certain things you have to pay attention to, otherwise you might end up creating a mess.

Multiple currencies

Support for multiple currencies is crucial, especially if you run businesses in different countries. Simply entering an invoice amount in the wrong currency already impacts the books of your different businesses. Therefore it’s important you pick a solution that makes it easy to enter and manage different currencies.

Separate reports

Thankfully the accounting software knows that it deals with different companies under the same account, therefore it keeps business reports separate from each other. However, it is best to ask the help of an accountant to go through your books, in order to spot deviations and to comply with the different regulations of the countries and states you conduct business in.

Banking

This is a real catch 22: keeping different bank accounts for each of your businesses is logical, but maintaining them costs a lot. However, if you have one bank account you might end up mixing them up, because you will not be able to differentiate between bank transactions. Some accounting software will let you tag bank transactions or group them, so that you can create an overview of the transactions related to one business entity or branch specifically.

Taxing

Each state and each country applies their own tax rates – and you have to keep them separated from each other. Applying the wrong tax rate once can result in faulty tax reports, which is one of the riskiest parts of managing multiple entities through the same bookkeeping account.

Recommended online accounting software

Although finding an online accounting solution with the option of multi-business accounting is not easy, it is not impossible – and we have three examples worthy of your consideration.