Your church has decided to bring in a bookkeeper, and now someone has to sit across the table from two or three candidates and tell them apart. These fifteen questions are written for a pastor, treasurer or finance committee member who is not an accountant. Each one comes with the reason it matters and what a good answer sounds like. Ask every candidate the same questions and write the answers down.
Church experience
- How much of your work is with churches or other nonprofits? Church books differ from business books: gifts carry purposes and nobody is measuring profit. A good answer is specific about the kind and size of churches served, and honest if the answer is "a few".
- Who would actually do our work? You are trusting a person, not a logo. A good answer names the person, says who reviews their work, and says who covers when they are away.
Fund accounting and giving records
- How would you track our restricted and designated funds? Listen for a method: each gift coded to its fund on deposit, spending coded to the fund it came from, and balances carried forward every month. If the terms are new to you, read restricted, designated and general funds first.
- How do giving records get tied to the bank and the books? A good answer describes reconciling the giving system to deposits during the year, not in January, so year-end contribution statements match what was received.
- Who will see individual giving, and how is it kept confidential? Expect a short, definite list of people and a clear statement that giving detail does not appear in board reports.
Payroll and clergy pay
- Have you run payroll that includes a minister? IRS Publication 517 explains that ministers are treated differently from most employees for Social Security and Medicare and for income tax withholding. A good answer shows familiarity with setting payroll up to match what the church and its tax adviser have decided, and does not offer to make those decisions.
- Exactly which payroll tasks and filings are yours, and which are ours or the payroll provider's? Vague answers here produce missed filings. A good answer is a list, and an offer to put it in writing.
Access and security
- What access do you need, and will you have your own login? Look for named user accounts rather than shared passwords, and view-only access wherever it is enough. A bookkeeper rarely needs the ability to move money.
- How do we send you statements and payroll documents, and what happens to access if we part ways? A good answer avoids ordinary email for sensitive documents where it can, and commits to handing back and removing access at the end. Be wary of anyone who promises that nothing can ever go wrong.
Reporting
- What reports will leadership receive, and when? Expect a named set (activity against budget, a balance sheet, fund balances) and an agreed date each month. Compare the answer with what a leadership report should include.
- Will you walk the treasurer or finance committee through the reports? Reports nobody understands do not improve oversight. A good answer includes plain-language explanation and a way to ask questions between meetings.
Scope and fees
- What is included, and will we get it in writing before work starts? The answer should be yes, with a document listing services, exclusions, schedule and fee. See what a scope of work should spell out.
- How is the fee set, and what would change it? A good answer explains what drives the fee, such as transaction volume, the number of accounts and funds, payroll, and how current the books are, and says how cleanup work or added services are priced before they are done.
What they don't do
- What credentials do you hold, and what do you not do? A bookkeeper who is not a CPA cannot perform an audit or review, and should say so plainly. A candidate who lists their limits without being pushed is usually the safer choice.
- Will you work with our CPA, tax adviser or attorney? Questions about clergy tax status, housing allowance amounts and worker classification belong with those professionals. A good answer is willingness to coordinate and to keep records organized for them, not a ready opinion.
How Carey Danielson would answer the scope and credential questions
So you can hold this firm to the same list, here are the plain facts. Carey Danielson holds an MBA and is a QuickBooks Online Advanced ProAdvisor, with 20+ years of bookkeeping and financial management, much of it with churches. Carey is a bookkeeper, not a CPA, an enrolled agent or an attorney. Danielson Bookkeeping & Consulting does not provide tax preparation or tax planning, audits or reviews, legal advice, or investment advice, and coordinates with the professionals a church chooses for those.
On scope: what is included, what is not, the schedule and the fee are agreed in writing before work starts, and exactly which payroll filings are included is confirmed in writing before any payroll work begins. The full sequence, along with how access and documents are handled, is on how we work.
Once you have a short list, the next step is a first conversation. See what to gather before a consultation, or request one with Carey.
