One real file, published with the client's permission.
Plumbing subcontractor, Perth. A bookkeeper he had paid never connected to his Xero file, so he had been building it himself.
- A$5,050Back in his pocket from the first CFO note
- A$13,000The company owed him, and nobody had recorded it
- 22Hours from first access to a clean, reconciled file
- 97.7%Of his costs sitting in one account on arrival
The file. Not one transaction reconciled, A$7,600 showing as owed to suppliers he had already paid, and a van the company did not know it owned. Inside 22 hours the ledger was rebuilt around how a plumbing business spends, every receipt read, the bank reconciled.
The money he was owed. Matching every card on every receipt showed about A$13,000 of business costs he had paid personally, tools, the van deposit, loan and insurance. It is now on the books as owed back to him, tax free.
The thing a bookkeeper would not have seen. His GST registration started the day he was told to register, which was after he bought the van. A coding exercise leaves that alone. The first CFO note read the ABN record, saw the gap, and set out the one call to the ATO that backdates it: about A$5,050 back, nothing to pay in return. That note cost him nothing. At A$149 a month it would have paid for the next 34 months.
Every month since. Feeds reconciled, every receipt read, upcoming payments visible before they leave, and a note on the 5th that says what the numbers mean and what to do about them.