Auto & performance shops
Your accountant has probably never seen a repair order.
Twelve years in the automotive industry before the CPA license, and still doing the books today for a working performance and dyno shop. The shop-floor part of the conversation does not need explaining.
Where shops lose money in the books
The things a generalist misses.
None of these are exotic. They are just specific, and if your bookkeeper has not seen them before, they tend to get handled the easy way rather than the right way.
Parts vs. labor sales tax
The two are not treated the same, and getting it wrong compounds quietly across every ticket until an auditor finds it.
Core charges and core inventory
Cores going out and credits coming back, tracked so they stop distorting your parts margin.
Flat-rate technician pay
Flat-rate hours against clock hours, and what your effective labor rate actually is once both are in view.
Work in progress on open ROs
Repair orders still open at month end are real value. Left out of the close, every month looks wrong.
Shop supplies and sublet
Shop-supply billing and sublet repairs recorded so they do not quietly eat the job's margin.
Parts vendor credits and rebates
Returns, credits, and rebate programs reconciled against what the supplier statement actually says.
Deposits on long-lead builds
Money taken up front for a build is a liability until the work is done. Treating it as revenue overstates a good month.
Departmental gross profit
Margin split by parts, labor, and sublet, so you can see which side of the business is carrying the other.
A real one
We do the books for a performance shop.
Southern Performance in Orlando builds and tunes late-model Mustangs, F-150s, and GM vehicles, with an in-house dyno. Custom tuning revenue, deposits on builds, customer-supplied parts, parts margin against a wall of vendor invoices. All of it runs through books we keep every month.
It is not a case study written after the fact. It is current work.
You should not have to explain what a core charge is to the person doing your books.
Talk to someone who already knows →FAQ
Shop owner questions.
Do you know shop management software?
Getting your shop system and your accounting to agree is most of the work. Which system you run is one of the first things we cover on the discovery call, and reconciling it into QuickBooks is standard.
We are a performance shop, not general repair. Does that change anything?
It changes the details, and they matter. Custom tuning, dyno time, long-lead builds, and customer-supplied parts all behave differently in the books than a straightforward repair ticket.
Our books are a mess. Where do we even start?
Cleanup is a normal starting point and it is not a judgment. We work out how far back to go, get things current, then set up a monthly rhythm so it stays that way.
Can you do the tax return too?
Yes. The books and the return are handled by the same CPA, so there is no handoff and no re-explaining how your shop works.
Let's talk about your shop.
A free call about how your shop runs, what your books look like now, and what would actually help.