What a cleanup costs

Every cleanup is quoted after a look at the bank statements, because the honest range is wide: a few months of a one-person business is a modest project, two years with payroll and three accounts is not. The structure is the same for both: a deposit up front, a monthly retainer while the work runs, then ordinary monthly bookkeeping from $250 once the books are current. Nothing is quoted sight unseen.

See the ranges and what moves the number.

See what yours would cost Call (888) 786-6502

Two kinds of behind

Catch-up is books that were never done. The business ran, the bank statements piled up, and nothing was recorded. The work is reconstruction: every transaction that cleared the bank is brought in and coded, receipts fill in what the bank cannot say, and the result is a set of books that did not exist before.

Cleanup is books that were done badly. There is a QuickBooks file, it has numbers in it, and the numbers are wrong: deposits booked as income, a thousand uncategorised transactions, a balance sheet that has not reconciled since the bank feed was connected twice. The work is repair: find what is wrong, fix the structure that let it happen, and recode the history so the reports can be trusted. Most backlogs are some of each, and both are quoted the same way.

Is this for your business?

• You have months or years of bank statements and no books, or books nobody trusts
• A tax preparer, lender or buyer has asked for financial statements you cannot produce
• Your QuickBooks file balances, but the profit it shows bears no relation to the bank
• You inherited a file from a previous bookkeeper and do not know what is in it
• You are an owner who did the books yourself until the business outgrew the evenings

Probably not yet: a brand-new business with a handful of transactions and no deadline. Set it up properly now and you will never need this page. The guides are free either way.

How it starts

You send a request or call. Within one business day a person replies and sets up a short conversation: what the business is, how many months are behind, what software if any, how many bank and card accounts, whether payroll was run, and whether there is a date. Then your bookkeeper asks for read access to the accounts and spends a short time measuring the problem.

From that comes a written quote for the project: the deposit, the monthly retainer, and an honest estimate of how long the catch-up takes. If there is a deadline, the quote says whether it is reachable and what the fallback is if not. Nothing is quoted before anyone has looked, because a number quoted that way is either padded for the worst case or wrong.

What a cleanup actually involves

Rebuilding from the bank

Every transaction that cleared is pulled in from bank and card statements and coded to the right account. Where a receipt is needed to say what something was, it is requested; where records are genuinely missing, the assumption is documented rather than invented.

Fixing the structure

A chart of accounts that fits the business, customer deposits and loans moved off the income and expense lines and onto the balance sheet, owner draws taken out of expenses, sales tax separated from sales.

Reconciling the balance sheet

Bank, card and loan balances tied to statements for every month. Undeposited funds cleared. Payroll liabilities matched to what was actually filed and paid. The balance sheet is where bad bookkeeping hides, and a cleanup that stops at the profit and loss is not finished.

The year-end package

Reconciled statements and the schedules your tax preparer needs, for every year the cleanup covers, so the return can be prepared from real numbers.

What you get when it is done

A set of books that reconciles to the bank for every month covered, a profit and loss and balance sheet you can hand to a preparer, a lender or a buyer without apologising, and a structure that stops the backlog from forming again. Then monthly bookkeeping takes over: accounts reconciled each month, transactions coded as they happen, and a year-end that is a formality rather than a project.

Working with your tax preparer

Keeping the books and filing the return are different disciplines, and the hand-off between them is where a late year goes wrong. Your bookkeeper closes each year of the cleanup with a package built for whoever prepares the return: reconciled statements, a fixed-asset list, loan balances, and 1099 data for anyone you paid. If you have unfiled years, the package is prepared year by year so the preparer can file them in order. If you do not have a preparer, say so; your bookkeeper will work alongside whoever you choose.

What your bookkeeper handles

• QuickBooks Cleanup Services
• Catch-Up Bookkeeping Services
• Bookkeeping Cleanup Services
• Behind on Bookkeeping Before a Tax Deadline
• Multiple Years of Bookkeeping, Rebuilt
• Monthly Bookkeeping After the Cleanup

Who this is written for

Being behind looks different in different businesses. A sole proprietor with one bank account doing two jobs is a different cleanup from an S corporation with a March deadline or a restaurant with three sales systems. Each page below is about one kind of business and what its books tend to need.

• Sole Proprietors & Single-Member LLCsone bank account doing two jobs, and a Schedule C due with everything else
• S Corporationsa March 15 deadline, a balance sheet the return actually needs, and owner pay that must be on payroll
• Contractors & Tradesdeposits booked as income, materials in overhead, and a year that looked better than it was
• E-commerce Sellerspayouts that are not sales, fees that are not expenses yet, and inventory nobody counted
• Restaurants & Food Businessesdaily sales from three systems, tips, and a payroll that outruns the deposits
• Real Estate Agents & Brokerscommissions net of splits, a year of mileage, and an S-corp question nobody answered
• Medical & Dental Practicesinsurance remittances that never match the deposit, and a payroll with six pay types
• Switching From Another Bookkeepera file you no longer trust, a handover nobody wants to do, and a clean line to draw

Guides

• What a QuickBooks Cleanup Costs (2026)
• How Far Behind Is Too Far? What a Catch-Up Can Recover
• Catch-Up vs. Cleanup: Which One You Need
• What Your Tax Preparer Needs From Your Books, and By When
• The Seven Mistakes Behind Most QuickBooks Cleanups
• The QuickBooks Cleanup Checklist
• Filing an Extension With Real Numbers Behind It
• Bookkeeping for Unfiled Years: Rebuilding From the Bank

Common questions

What does it cost to use this site?

Nothing. There is no charge for the introduction and no obligation after the first conversation. You pay the bookkeeping firm directly, at whatever you agree with them, and we take no share of it.

How is a cleanup priced?

As a project with three parts: a deposit up front, a monthly retainer while the catch-up runs, and then ordinary monthly bookkeeping from $250 once the books are current. The project price depends on how many months, how many accounts and how many transactions, which is why it is quoted after a look rather than from a table. The cost guide gives ranges.

How far behind is too far?

There is no too far. Multi-year rebuilds from bank statements are routine. What makes a cleanup slower is missing records, and even those can usually be recovered: banks keep statements for years, card processors keep payout reports, and the IRS can provide income transcripts for unfiled years.

Can it be done before my tax deadline?

Sometimes, and your bookkeeper will say plainly which after seeing the bank statements. If the date is not reachable, the fallback is a defensible set of interim numbers so an extension is filed with something real behind it, and the cleanup finishes against the extended date.

Do I need QuickBooks?

No. Many cleanups start from nothing but bank statements, and some start from a spreadsheet or an old desktop file. If you are already in QuickBooks, Online or Desktop, your bookkeeper works in it. If you are not, they will say what makes sense for the size of the business rather than sell you software.

What happens to my old bookkeeper’s file?

It gets reviewed, not thrown out. Often the structure is salvageable and the history is recoded in place. Where a file is beyond repair, your bookkeeper says so and quotes a rebuild from the bank instead. You do not need your previous bookkeeper’s cooperation for either.

What about my tax return?

Your bookkeeper prepares a year-end package for whichever tax preparer you use: reconciled statements, a fixed-asset list, loan balances and 1099 data. If you do not have a preparer, say so in the request; the package is the same either way.

What happens after the cleanup?

The point of a cleanup is never to need another one. Once the books are current they roll into monthly bookkeeping at the ordinary fee, with the structure fixed so the problems that caused the backlog do not come back.

Are you the bookkeeping firm?

No, and it matters that you know that up front. This site is an advertising and referral service. When you call or send a request we put you in touch with an independent bookkeeping firm that does catch-up and cleanup work every week. We do not keep the books, we are not accountants, and we take no cut of what you pay.

Request a quote for your cleanup

Tell us how far behind the books are and whether there is a date. Your bookkeeper replies within one business day with a plain answer: what it would take, whether the date is reachable, and what the deposit would be. Requests answered within one business day · Calls Mon–Fri, 9am–5pm Eastern Or call (888) 786-6502 if you would rather talk it through first.

Name Phone Email optional Business name optional What do you need help with? Choose one… QuickBooks cleanupCatch-up: the books were never doneBehind before a tax deadlineMultiple years to rebuildSwitching from another bookkeeperNot sure — need advice Anything we should know? optional

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