Running a company from home from scratch. How to start a private accounting practice and where to find clients: Review of freelance exchanges for accountants. What qualities do you need to have?

Greetings to my readers! I am with you again, Rimma Belyakina. We continue to find out what other professions can be painlessly transferred from a boring office to a cozy home environment. Next up is the profession of accountant.

Remember the words of the song of the once sensational group “Combination”: “Accountant, my dear accountant. That’s how it is – so simple.” The lyrics of the song are, of course, comic, but in every joke, as they say, there is some truth. How simple is the work of an accountant and is it easy to reconcile debits and credits while not in the office, but at home. Let's figure it out together.

Friends, if you have questions, additions or your own thoughts on this matter while reading the article, I will be glad to chat with you in the comments.

Who is an accountant and what does he do?

Well, who now doesn’t know what an accountant is? Whatever office, institution, enterprise or company you take, the above-mentioned specialist is everywhere. This is understandable, because any institution must keep records of its financial affairs and pay its employees. And there’s no way to do it without a specialist who knows how to work with numbers.

An accountant is an official of an organization responsible for financial accounting and reporting.

How this profession appeared

It always seemed strange to me why this profession received such a name. Knowledge of languages ​​gives me the opportunity to analyze and understand the essence. The word "accountant" comes from the German "buchhalter", where "buch" is a book and "halter" is a holder. Book holder? What do the numbers and the finances associated with them have to do with it? And despite the fact that previously all income/expenses were recorded in a book specially created for this, and the accountant was responsible for it.

It is also noteworthy that this profession is one of the most ancient. Ancient India was the leader in countries where bookkeepers were used to record the production of agricultural land. The first book, entitled “Treatise on Accounts and Records,” written by Italian mathematician Luca Pacioli, was published in the 14th century. This was the beginning of accounting. In Russia, accountants owe their existence to Peter I, who established this position at the beginning of the 18th century.

The profession of an accountant was, is and will always be in demand. Both large holding companies and small organizations of any kind need the services of a specialist who knows how to competently manage financial affairs.

Tasks and responsibilities of an accountant

What does an accountant do? The range of his tasks is large, as is his responsibility. After all, the entire activity of the enterprise depends on it. Judge for yourself. The “right hand of the head of the enterprise” is in charge of:

• processing of primary documentation,
• calculation of the organization's income/expenses,
• accounting of financial and material resources,
• preparation of tax reports,
• calculation (sometimes issuance) of salaries,
• carrying out inventory,
• execution of foreign exchange transactions (if any are carried out by the company),
• accounting for purchases and sales of products.

Do you want to know in more detail what an accountant’s job is, what he should know and be able to do? Check out the qualified job directory.

I always try, my dear readers, to collect the most interesting and useful information for you. And the text, so that it is not boring to read, should be diluted with an informative video supplemented with interesting facts. So this time I suggest you watch a short film - a description of the profession with educational statistics in addition to what has already been said.

Who needs which specialist? A small enterprise can easily get by with just one financial manager on staff. In a large corporation, an entire accounting department will be required under the leadership of a chief accountant. He is subordinate to several assistants, each of whom is responsible for a certain type of work of the entire accounting department.

Benefits of remote work for an accountant

"Everything flows, everything changes". Wooden abacus, once necessary for performing settlement transactions, is a thing of the past. They were replaced by electronic calculators, computers appeared and with them the possibility of transferring financial accounting from paper to automated computer programs.

And here it is, the moment of truth: for many organizations, especially for small individual entrepreneurs, it has become profitable to attract remote workers or freelancers to cooperate. Why, you ask? Because:

1. An entrepreneur can save on the salary of an online worker, unlike a hired one.
2. A remote employee does not need to pay sick leave.
3. There is no need to provide him with annual paid leave.
4. Set up a special workplace for him.
5. Provide necessary office supplies.
6. Pay income tax for him if no employment agreement has been concluded.

How can a digital scientist benefit from the ability to work remotely? Quite a few:

1. Free flexible schedule.
2. You can simultaneously cooperate with two or more employers and double or triple your income.
3. Your office at home/in a hotel, at least sit in cozy warm slippers with bunny ears.
4. No need to think about the dress code (saving on clothes).
5. There is more time left for home, family, children.
6. Working remotely is a good part-time job for mothers on maternity leave.
7. The “pleasures” of office work (stress, “sitting around”, “carpet”, etc.) bypass you.
8. There is an opportunity to realize a dream (travel at any time of the year, for example).

Lots of benefits and conveniences, isn't it? And for many asocial people, this format of cooperation is an opportunity to maintain business relations at the proper level, which is also important.

How to switch to work from the office to the Internet

There are more and more people who want to “set sail freely” and work “for themselves, not for their uncle.” And just like that, “from the street” knocking on some organization’s door and saying: “I want to work in your company as a remote accountant,” it’s unlikely to work. Let's take a closer look at where to start and how to move work from the office to the Internet.

You need to work in office accounting for at least three years, establish yourself as a competent, reliable specialist who you can completely rely on, and only then “throw a bait” at management about remote work.

Ideally, switch to an online workspace during maternity leave. Being at home all the time, what’s stopping you from spending a few hours reconciling debits and credits? Training, again, so as not to lose the skill. And money is never too much. And this only plays into the hands of the bosses: who wants to look for a replacement for a proven employee for a couple of years?

Many existing offline accountants with experience, at the beginning of their journey towards online work, take evening work and run one or two companies remotely in their free time from their main job. Having become proficient in the specifics of the profession, they completely switch to the Internet format.

I know this firsthand. My neighbor in the country, an accountant with 30 years of experience, started her remote work career and now, being already retired, she still works and only remotely.

All the pros and cons of a home office

Of the obvious benefits of working from home, the most convincing are:

• The opportunity to receive a larger fee than in the regular mode, where the salary is usually fixed. A freelancer can set prices for his services himself. And in freelancing you get paid upon completion of the work, you don’t have to wait for the end of the month, as in offline.
• A big plus, which we have already talked about, is a free flexible schedule. There is no need to get up early, shake in public transport, stand and be nervous in traffic jams. And most importantly, you can sleep as much as you want. A freelance accountant will not face any penalties for being late for work or absenteeism.
• Another significant advantage is the ability to combine business with pleasure. Who wouldn't want a “study” with windows overlooking the sea?

There are also a lot of disadvantages:

• Freelancing work, unless a contractual relationship has been concluded, is always a risk; you can “run into” unscrupulous customers.
• Building relationships with employers does not always go smoothly. Many, due to hazing, try to load them with overtime work, for which they usually do not pay.
• Big competition. There are more than enough vacancies for accountants at home. You will need to prove your qualifications and competitiveness.
• High responsibility, because miscalculations and mistakes are punishable by tax audits.
• Organization and self-discipline, which “free” workers so lack. The concept of “bosses, alarm clocks and Mondays” is absent in the understanding of a freelancer, and this is disorganizing. Many people procrastinate (to put it simply, they drive themselves crazy), which can lead to a decrease in earnings.

Features of the profession

The work of an accountant is strictly regulated by regulations of the current legislation. And in order to correctly maintain financial records, an accountant needs to know and study the laws and decrees of the Ministry of Finance and constantly improve.

Required professional knowledge

It is clear that a simple desire and ability to do mathematics is not enough to get an accountant position at an enterprise. Without graduating from a vocational college, or better yet, a financial and economic university, you can’t count on getting a prestigious position in a company.

An applicant for a high-paying position must understand the following issues:

• statistics,
• finance,
• accounting,
• lending,
• economics,
• planning,
• taxation.

Must have good knowledge and be able to use:

• 1C program (accounting),
• Excel program.

Knowledge of foreign languages ​​is required if you are aiming to cooperate with international companies.

What qualities do you need to have?

The accountant profession is in demand. Are you still thinking about acquiring this specialty? Then think about whether you have these character traits:

• responsibility,
• Analytical mind,
• competence,
• stress resistance,
• punctuality,
• attentiveness,
• perseverance,
• patience,
• logical thinking,
• decency.

All qualities are valuable and important. In my opinion, the absence of at least one does not give a complete picture of a professional.

What can he do other than accounting?

However, there are many types of profession. And, since mathematics was your favorite subject at school, and for some reason the position of chief accountant is not in the cards for you, with some effort you can prove yourself in one of them:

• Economist (for example, a credit department in a bank). It’s very profitable: less financial responsibility, more salary.
• Economist-analyst. Handles calculations, forecasts, and budgets.
• Financial Manager. Strategist who manages the company's financial flows.
• Auditor. This is, of course, aerobatics, since his job is to control the work of the accountant.

It is still difficult to say how likely it is to distance these professions, but we can try.

How much does an accountant earn remotely?

The salary level of a remote accountant depends on the company, position, assigned responsibilities, and region.

According to statistics from the website trud.com for 2017, the average salary of a remote accountant is 30,000 rubles.

Where to look for work

How to find a job as an accountant from home?

Method 1. On job search sites, the most famous of which are:

• hh.ru
• superjob.ru
• avito.ru
• worka.ru

There are many work-at-home accountant vacancies. You can also place your advertisement for a job seeker there, having first compiled a competent resume.

Method 2. On accountant exchanges:

• pravoved.ru
• superbuh24.ru
• audit-it.ru
• kadrof.ru

Write a commercial proposal and send it to potential employers.

Method 3. Word of mouth is far from the last chance.

Method 4. You can make business cards and leave them in all sorts of places.

There are plenty of opportunities to find a job, you just need to want and be active. As you know, water does not flow under a lying stone.

Afterword

Every day we see how Internet technologies are being introduced into our lives at an accelerated pace. And we are increasingly moving away from real life, giving preference to virtual reality. This process can no longer be stopped. And all we have to do is learn to live in a new way and benefit from it.

For those who are seriously thinking about switching to freelancing, I advise you to read
.

You can find out more in our article by following the link.

Freelance accounting is playing an increasingly important role in modern business. This is especially true for small and medium-sized enterprises and entrepreneurs. Remote accountant is a promising profession for a good specialist. If 20-30 years ago most of the calculations had to be done on paper, now you have Excel, 1C and many other auxiliary programs. 5-10 years ago you had to go to the tax office with all your reports; now in many countries reports are submitted via the Internet.

The scope of accounting is very broad, both in itself and in relation to the transition to remote work. I cannot promise to cover absolutely all the information about working as an accountant at home, but I will try to cover this topic as much as possible.

Despite the fact that many modern companies are transferring many processes to outsourcing and remote work, the profession should be considered from all sides. Because enterprises, directors, and even old-school specialists themselves may not see the benefits of remote work.

Benefits for the specialist

• Opportunity to work in comfortable conditions
• Ability to work from anywhere
• Ability to work at any time
• Opportunity to work in several companies. For example, if you do accounting for a small company or private entrepreneurs
• Reducing travel time to work
• Reduce costs for lunch and travel

Disadvantages for a specialist

• Difficulties in communication. Actually a conditional disadvantage. With proper management of your time and affairs, any communications can be minimized
• Problems with the Internet. And this is a real problem if you have urgent work.
• Lack of live communication. There's nothing to explain here, but it's worth noting places like coworking centers, where you can rent a workspace and meet a lot of people. But today these are, for the most part, youth institutions.

Benefits for the employer

Cost reduction - one single and most important advantage for any company. There is no need to maintain an accounting department, an office for them and equipment. In addition to the printer, which is extremely important in accounting

Disadvantages for the employer

Difficulties in communication - t Same disadvantage as a specialist. If you need to quickly resolve the issue, then you still need to contact the employee, but for this you should determine in advance the work schedule and the time when he will always be available

IMPORTANT: Most problems in work arise due to problems in communications, this applies not only to accounting. Therefore, always agree on the period of time during which you will be in touch, and if you need to leave, always warn. This advice applies to both specialists and bosses.

The times when an accountant had to constantly be in a dusty office, surrounded by a pile of papers, have long since sunk into oblivion. The technological process has penetrated into the sphere of finance even more than into some areas of production. It is now possible to do accounting, generate and submit reports remotely, which means that a practicing accountant has an excellent opportunity to work without leaving home.

The demand for professional accounting services remains consistently high, and competent specialists are always in demand by employers. According to aggregated job search portals, accountant is one of the most popular vacancies. The number of offers for job seekers totals hundreds of thousands, including the possibility of remote work.

Who can become an accountant

It is worth mentioning right away that accounting services are not a type of income that is available to everyone, regardless of their level of education. Becoming an accountant will not happen overnight. An accountant primarily sells his professional knowledge and skills to the client. Therefore, it is important to have a specialized higher education or, at a minimum, complete accounting courses.

Often, courses take from 2-4 weeks to 2-4 months, depending on the class schedule and the amount of information. There is also the opportunity to learn the basics of accounting remotely through online courses. You can enroll in a correspondence or full-time department of a higher or secondary specialized educational institution, and in your free time from studying, work as an accountant at home. However, even the professional education received will not cancel the fact that an accountant must constantly modernize his knowledge and practice, monitor changes in legislation and innovations in accounting automation.

Before starting work, an accounting specialist must know and be able to:

• Know the rules for preparing primary documents.
• Freely navigate the chart of accounts, understand the essence of business transactions, and correctly “post” transactions among accounts.
• Be able to prepare tax, statistical, financial, management reporting. Understand how report indicators are checked (compared) with each other.
• Know the basic provisions of tax, labor, and business law. Be able to analyze laws, find interrelated explanations, letters and by-laws.
• Be able to use accounting automation programs and make electronic payments through a remote banking system.

In addition to professional skills, the following personal qualities of an accountant are important: resistance to stress, ability to work overtime, attentiveness, scrupulousness, perseverance.

An accountant who wants to become a freelancer and work from home must be outgoing and able to communicate himself and his professional skills.

It’s rare that an employer will entrust its finances to a person without at least talking to him in an online conference. Therefore, it would not be amiss to mention that an accountant must have a presentable and neat appearance.

Who is suitable for working as a private accountant at home:

• Experienced specialists who have reached professional heights at their previous place of work and are thinking about changing employers, but do not see worthy alternatives.
• For specialists who want to exchange routine office work for income with a more flexible schedule.
• Young accountants who cannot find a suitable job due to lack of adequate experience.

Workplace equipment

Let’s say you have the above skills, knowledge and qualities, so you decided to go “freelance” and provide services at home. The first thing to take care of is the organization of the workplace. Unlike organizing production, providing accounting services does not require significant investments in equipment; however, to work from home, an accountant needs:

• Modern personal computer. Powerful enough to store large amounts of information and work with remote servers; quite reliable.
• Reliable internet connection. Remote work with servers on which accounting databases are located, as well as sending payments through online banking and providing electronic reports - all this requires good high-speed Internet.
• A printer, or better yet a multifunctional device (printer, scanner, copier). Automation of accounting does not deprive the accountant of the need to print primary documents, reports, summary statements and registers. Sometimes you may need to make copies of existing paper documents; for this, at least a scanner will be useful.
• Telephone (landline and mobile). Of course, nowadays it is difficult to find a person who does not have a mobile phone. However, calling banks or tax authorities very often has to be done the old fashioned way, using a landline phone. In order to minimize your expenses, it is better to get both a landline and a mobile phone.
• Comfortable table and chair. An accountant is a sedentary job, so it is important to take care of your comfort and health. An uncomfortable workplace can lead to problems with your back, legs, and neck in the future, so it’s better not to skimp on yourself.
• Filing Cabinets. As mentioned above, some accounting documents will still have to be stored in paper form. Therefore, it is better to determine a place for them in advance. However, the cabinet is not a priority purchase; it can be purchased when the volume of clients, and therefore documentation, increases.
• Calculator and stationery. It would seem that in the modern world of gadgets, when there is a calculator in every phone and computer, you can forget about a stationary adding machine. However, it is much more convenient to quickly add up the numbers on a calculator. Stationery will be needed for processing and storing documents.

You will also need a webcam and a headset to communicate with clients, but these can be purchased as the need arises.

Often, the work of an accountant does not involve frequent communication with visitors, especially if you immediately position yourself as a remote worker. However, it would not be a bad idea to provide a place in the house where, if necessary, you can communicate with your employer or counterparty.

Don’t rush to immediately invest large sums in organizing your workspace. To get started, all you need is a computer, phone and printer. Everything else can be purchased as the number of clients and volume of work grows.

Search for clients

The most difficult aspect of working as a private accountant is finding clients on whom your income directly depends. It is most convenient to go into private practice if you already have at least one employer who agrees not to keep an accountant in the office, but to collaborate remotely. If there is no such employer, you will have to look for one in one of the following ways:

• On regional ad sites. It is rare when it is possible to conduct accounting completely remotely, without meetings with the employer and visits to the office. Perhaps, by mutual agreement with the client, you will be able to do the bulk of the work at home, and visit the employer 1-2 times a week to sign the necessary documents, resolve financial issues, and make cash payments. Therefore, it is a priority to look for clients in the city or region of your residence in order to minimize the costs of transport and business trips, as well as ensure the efficiency of solving assigned problems.
• On national and international job search sites. The search principle is the same as on regional sites - look for an employer closer to you. All-Russian sites offer more vacancies, which means the possibility of higher earnings. To search on international sites, you need knowledge of foreign languages, most often English. But knowing a foreign language is an additional plus on your resume and an opportunity to get a higher-paying job.
• On freelance exchanges. A freelancer is a civilian specialist who provides his services via the Internet. At the initial stage, programmers, designers, photographers and copywriters were regulars on freelance exchanges. Now, on many large exchanges there are entire sections dedicated to the topic “Accounting/Finance/Consulting”, where an accountant can publish a resume and find his customer. Often, the scheme of work on exchanges is as follows: the customer places a task, the contractor responds if he is able to complete this task. Some exchanges act as guarantors of the fulfillment of obligations by the parties to the transaction, others only help the customer and the contractor find each other. Almost all exchanges have a rating system - the better the quality of the task, the higher the rating of the performer. Accordingly, performers with higher ratings earn more.

Below we will look at the most popular exchanges where an accountant can find a client:

• https://www.weblancer.net/- more than 500 applicants who provide accounting services are registered on the exchange. The cost of accountants' services varies, some ask for their services $1-5 and others $10-30 per hour. Specialists receive the money they earn in their WebMoney wallet.
• https://www.fl.ru/- there are several hundred performers on the site providing accounting services. The cost of their work also varies, some “cost” 300-500 rubles per hour of consultation, others 5000 per month of work. To work more successfully on this exchange, you should purchase a PRO account.
• https://24freelance.net/- a relatively small exchange, with traffic of up to 10 thousand people per day. There are several dozen registered performers who provide accounting services. Some start from the hourly cost of work, asking 50-300 rubles per hour for services, others announce the cost for a month: 5-15 thousand.
• https://superbuh24.ru/- a young and small, specialized exchange for accountants. On it you can find both one-time tasks and remote, or permanent full-time work on staff. The cost of services is negotiated between the customer and the contractor.

Be prepared for the fact that in the early stages of establishing a private practice it will be difficult to find good clients. You may have to work a lot, but for little money. There is also a lot of information garbage on the Internet, when attractive offers of earnings hide network marketing, unnecessary customers, financial pyramids and fraud.

Consider each proposal carefully before you begin work. If possible, read customer reviews. This will save you from financial losses and wasted time.

To speed up the process of finding clients, it is better to use all of the above methods.

It is important to pay attention to your pages on social networks. Social networks can act as a means of promoting one’s name, in particular. For a remote worker, a page on a social network is a kind of “face”. Try to make your official pages more businesslike. Clear them of provocative, defamatory, ambiguous information, stupid jokes and pictures. According to statistics, most employers study the profile of a potential employee on social networks in order to confirm his competence. Subscribe to professional communities, you can repost news about changes in legislation or articles on professional topics. This will only “add weight” to your candidacy in the eyes of potential clients. By the way, social networks can also become a channel for finding customers, however, the risk of such transactions is very high, since there are practically no guarantees of payment.

In the future, to promote your name, you can create a business card website with a description of your professional experience, customer reviews, a detailed list and price of services provided. True, without investment in promotion, a site or group on social networks will occupy last positions in search engine results, so creating a site at the very beginning of the formation of a private practice is not worth it, since it will only entail additional costs without profit.

How much can you earn

The amount of earnings depends on several factors:

• Having professional experience;
• Estimated scope of operations and responsibilities;
• The region in which the company is located.

It is no secret that the salary of an accountant in Moscow and St. Petersburg is an order of magnitude higher than in other regions. In Moscow, you can find a part-time job as an accountant with the possibility of remote interaction with a salary of 15 to 45 thousand per month. In the regions, the minimum salary offer can be 5 thousand rubles for a part-time specialist. In general, if the time and volume of operations allow you to manage 2-3 clients at the same time, you can reach a good level of income with a flexible schedule.

The advantage of exchanges, compared to traditional work, is that you can find a well-paid project and in a short time earn an impressive one-time sum: 15-20 thousand rubles, or even more. But solid, highly paid projects for accountants on stock exchanges do not arise every day.

How to formalize a relationship

An important stage of remote work is formalizing the relationship with the client. An accountant is a person who is responsible for documenting transactions and displaying them in accounting records. Therefore, performing your work without documented obligations and guarantees is, first of all, unprofessional.

You can formalize a relationship with a private accountant using:

• Employment contract
• Civil contracts
• A business agreement, if the accountant is an individual entrepreneur or director of a company that provides accounting services.

It makes sense to draw up an employment contract if an accountant gets a permanent job, even part-time. The employment contract establishes a list of job responsibilities that are assigned to a private accountant. A GPC agreement is drawn up, as a rule, for one-time work with a specific result: restoring accounting records, entering documents into a database, submitting a report or conducting an inventory.

If you plan to register an individual entrepreneur or open an LLC to provide accounting services, include the amount of tax costs in the cost of your services.

Additional ways to earn money

The main activity of a private accountant is the provision of accounting services (accounting, financial, management). However, finding clients for ongoing service is a lengthy process. While this process is happening, the accountant can earn extra money as follows:

• Write coursework, diploma, and test papers in the discipline “accounting” and related economic disciplines;
• Write articles on accounting, economic, financial topics. In the future, you can even write a book on current accounting issues;
• Provide consultations on a paid basis, answer accounting questions from Internet users;
• Sell ​​accounting software products, including through the Internet and placing affiliate links;
• Become a teacher of accounting courses: conduct seminars or even webinars for accountants.

Development prospects

Long hard work to achieve your goal does not pass without a trace. Over time, as the number of clients increases and the volume of work increases, it may be necessary to attract additional employees. This way, you will not only provide yourself with work from home, but also provide it to other people. In the future, you can start your own firm providing accounting services or become an auditor. After all, even the founders of such well-known international auditing firms as Ernst&Young and KPMG began by going into private accounting practice.

You will learn where to start providing accounting services at home, where to find clients for remote work, and how to become a successful accountant working outside the office.

Every year, the phenomenon of remote work is gaining popularity. It is also called the fashionable word “freelancing”.

The concept itself reveals the essence of cooperation: the employer and the employee (customer and contractor) are at a distance from each other. That is, remote work is professional employment outside the office using Internet technologies.

Remote work as an accountant - when you don’t have to go to the office every day

This method of employment is interesting to many. It is especially popular among those who are tired of working “for someone else” but are unable to open their own business. There are many remote workers who are pensioners, women on maternity leave, and students.

This type of income can be considered both as a main and as a part-time job. Working from home remotely saves you time and money!

Once you start working from home, you will no longer have to waste time traveling from home to the office, stand in traffic jams, or adhere to the dress code adopted by the company. You can save on transportation costs and lunches in cafes.

More and more programmers, designers, marketers, and accountants are becoming members of the remote workers community.

I am a professional accountant with more than 10 years of experience in freelancing, so I will talk specifically about how to work as an accountant remotely.

How to get started - step-by-step instructions

You can get the desired result in any business only by conducting high-quality preliminary preparation.

You don't know how to organize work remotely? How to start working as an accountant from home? Then my step-by-step instructions will come in handy!

Step 1. Organize your workspace

I recommend that anyone who wants to provide accounting services remotely first set up their own mini-office at home. Yes, yes, only this way and no other way!

If you don't do this, you can end up in a very unpleasant situation.

Example from life

My friend Olga, who worked for many years as a chief accountant at a large plant, decided to leave for free work. No sooner said than done!

Old connections helped her find her first clients: she once taught accounting courses for aspiring entrepreneurs at the city employment fund. Some of them became her customers.

“Clients are the most important thing, everything else is secondary,” the aspiring freelancer was sure. She believed that she had a table, a chair and a computer, which meant that she was ready to work as an accountant remotely.

The first working day in a new capacity has arrived. Olga enjoyed the silence, leisurely going about her business. Suddenly the unimaginable began: one client asks to urgently pay for materials, another asks to receive goods into the warehouse, a third asks to arrange a vacation.

And here’s the problem: the computer freezes, the table is far from the outlet, and the extension cord, as luck would have it, is unknown where, the cartridge in the printer is slightly “alive”, in the accounting program of one of the companies the former accountant did not enter invoices for almost ten days.

Late in the evening, Olga, almost exhausted, telling me about her misadventures of that day, no longer doubted that a properly organized workspace is important!

For an accountant's home office, I recommend purchasing the following items:

1. Reliable computer. It is better to consult with computer specialists. Perhaps the one you use to communicate on social networks is suitable for your needs. Or maybe your “old man” will not run all the necessary programs, and you will have to either upgrade it or buy a new one.
2. MFP (printer+copier+scanner). A must-have item, even if you mostly deal with electronic documentation. Firstly, it is often necessary to send a scan of a document with signatures and seals, which means that it must, first of all, be printed, formatted properly, scanned and only then sent. Secondly, the paper archive of the “primary” has not been canceled. Thirdly, your employees may probably need a copy of their work record (for example, to obtain a bank loan). And here you can’t do without a photocopier. Believe me, there will be many such cases, every day.
3. Calculator. Calculating on a phone or an online calculator is inconvenient, but it has been tested in practice.
4. Table+chair. Of course, the table and chair can be anything, but we want to conduct business, not as we have to, but with comfort. Remember how your back and neck hurt when you have to sit all day at an uncomfortable desk. After just a couple of hours you don’t want to think about anything. You dream of finishing everything quickly and warming up.
5. Stationery. In this category I included not only pens, pencils and erasers, but also a stapler and hole punch. All these are little things that you can’t do without!

This is the most necessary thing. Decide on the rest as you go.

Check the quality of communication and Internet. Decide in advance on the services in which you will have to keep accounting records. Even if you are familiar with their functionality, don’t be lazy to test it again. This way you will save your strength and nerves when the turnover hits you.

Step 2: Write a resume

I’m sure no one will argue about the importance of the ability to present oneself. After all, future employer-customers must somehow find out about your basic skills, education, practical experience, strengths and weaknesses, professional achievements, etc.

This is how a resume will become a presentation for a remote accountant.

A resume is a document containing reliable information about education, practical experience, professional skills and other information necessary for consideration of a candidacy for employment.

Now there are special companies that, for a fee, offer to package your information in a beautiful package and create a resume that will present you to potential employers in the right, advantageous perspective. If you don't want to bother, then this is your option!

You can create a completely effective resume yourself. The network can help you! There is no need to retell all the advice from numerous sources on this matter. You can find and read them yourself.

I want to draw attention to just a few particularly important nuances of this process:

• Always provide only reliable facts. Remember - all important information can be easily verified;
• structure the information. I recommend using resume templates. For example, on the website hh.ru, by registering as a job seeker for free, you can easily create a good resume;
• Pay attention to the style of presentation of information. A resume is an official document, your business card. Creativity in drawing up this document is acceptable if you are a candidate for an animator, show host, etc. When applying for a job at a bank, a large company's liberties can play a cruel joke on you;
• Don’t imagine yourself as L. Tolstoy, don’t write your resume in several volumes. 1-2 standard sheets are enough;
• and, no matter how trivial it may be, write correctly. Errors in a resume are unacceptable.

Step 3. Find a customer

Workspace and resume sorted out! All that’s left to do is find a customer.

And here almost all means are good:

1. Don’t hesitate to contact your friends, tell them that from now on you are a freelance accountant.
2. Make inexpensive, high-quality business cards; you may need them at any time (for example, when you are waiting in line at the tax office, know: the people next to you are your potential clients. Communicate, talk about your services, leave business cards).
3. Subscribe to groups on social networks that post similar vacancies - they are not difficult to find.
4. Place advertisements in newspapers that publish vacancies.

If you weren’t able to find a job using “guerrilla” methods, turn to professionals—specialized resources. Read about them in detail below.

When setting out on a search, weigh your strengths. Clearly determine how much work you are willing to take on. Identify your priority taxation systems, that is, those with which you are ready to work first. Find a company that uses such systems and begin your first steps in freelance accounting.

Even if you are a super professional, do not recruit many clients at once. Remote work is not like working in an office; it has its own rules that you will still have to get used to.

Where to find remote work as an accountant

So, let’s determine the places where employers are found - customers who are ready to cooperate with remote accountants.

There are many such places: freelance exchanges, specialized job search services, message boards on the Internet, recruitment agencies, etc.

Let's get acquainted with the most popular:

1) FL.ru is a place where performers and customers from all over Russia and the CIS countries meet. The service began its work in 2005. Over the years, the number of registered users has reached more than 1.5 million people. Programmers and designers, accountants and copywriters, consultants and tutors can find work via the Internet at home, secure decent income.

Exchange Features:

2) Weblancer is another Freelance Exchange where accountants can find a remote customer for their services. The service was created in the early 2000s, but still occupies a leading position.

Advantages of Weblancer Exchange:

• ease of access to the resource;
• quality assurance;
• the benefit of the customer and the contractor is guaranteed by internal arbitration;
• availability of the “safe transaction” service.

By registering, you can not only place your ad, but also respond to customer offers. However, this is only available on paid plans. You can only view vacancies for free.

It’s nice that you can find both permanent and project work here. The choice is yours!

3) Avito is one of the most famous online free message boards in the Russian Federation. As of June 2017, more than 35 million different advertisements were posted on the site.

A variety of advertisements are posted here: about the purchase and sale of things, equipment, real estate, vacancies, offers of services. We are interested in the “Services” section. Of course, the service has a special “Work” section, but the proposals of accountants are printed here. To gain access, you must complete a simple free registration.

And then everything is simple! Place a catchy advertisement offering accounting services remotely, attach your certificates and diplomas related to accounting (if any) and wait for your first clients. You will learn that your proposal has received a response from a message sent to the email address you provided during registration.

Want to speed up the process? Order paid promotion of your services.

What it takes to become a successful work-at-home accountant

To become a successful remote accountant, you need to have some key qualities. Don't confuse them with professional competencies. Their presence is not discussed!

This is about:

• communication skills. It is very important to be able to communicate with people and win them over. Communicative specialists find customers faster and conclude more profitable contracts;
• self-organization. When people go freelance, they relax. They stop planning and correctly distributing time between work and rest. It seems to them that they didn’t have time today, they will do it tomorrow. This is how the days pass. And now, on top of one task, ten more were layered. All of them require urgent solutions;
• self-control. There are no bosses over you anymore, no one controls your affairs. How your career will turn out now depends only on you;
• desire to self-develop. Accounting and tax accounting is perhaps one of those areas that is constantly changing. Nobody writes instructions and regulations for remote workers, monitors legislation updates, or cares about improving their professionalism. Only a personal desire to develop yourself will allow you to withstand competition and become successful.

Working from home as an accountant is becoming a popular remote position. Every day more and more offline workers are switching to remote positions, and employers are hiring more and more remote accountants. Both sides have their benefits.

Required knowledge and skills

Like any offline work, remote work from home as an accountant requires special knowledge and skills.

Knowledge of accounting is required, preferably above the basic level. They can be obtained through specialized online courses. It’s great if accounting is a profession for which you studied at an educational institution, and you have a diploma about it.

In addition to the standard requirement, you must be able to:

1) manage your time correctly. This is an important rule for any remote work. The more time you work, and not just sit at the computer, the more money you get. Don’t hope for mountains of gold if you spend no more than half an hour a day on freelancing.

Household duties should not be completed during working hours!

2) work. Native walls make you relax. You need to not allow your body to lose its working spirit;

3) communicate with clients. Working as a chief accountant from home does not involve communicating with clients, but it is possible. Be prepared to submit your report orally, without hesitation and respond adequately to criticism.

4) develop. An accountant must know all existing legislation, monitor their updates daily, and keep abreast of the latest news in his business.

5) be creative. Although this profession is difficult to associate with originality, it is still appropriate. A non-standard but rational approach to business is always rewarded.

To be creative, it is enough to do your work with pleasure.

Where to begin

You have all the required knowledge. You're ready to get started. Then let's start in order.

Tell your friends that you are going to work as an accountant from home. Create a resume that you will send to large companies or private entrepreneurs.

Create groups on social networks. Sell ​​your services as a remote accountant. Make business cards and leave them in reputable boutiques, tax offices and other places where an entrepreneur may be. You can advertise in newspapers or place them on employment sites.

If you set a goal, your first clients will appear quickly. As soon as you start working as a chief accountant from home, follow a few important rules:

1. Be punctual. Submit reports on time. It's better to do it sooner rather than later.
2. Remember that the boss is always right. Although the good thing about remote work is that if the above statement is fundamentally wrong, you can always change your workplace without remorse and layoffs.
3. Be polite, try to understand the essence of the work. The better you understand your superiors, the more trust you will receive, and, accordingly, the higher your fees.
4. Prove your professional level. Work done at a high level will always bring high income. Even if they pay you little for it. But they will definitely recommend you to someone. And clients are never superfluous.

Where to find a job

There are several options where you can find work as an accountant from home.

Websites with advertisements. Just enter any phrase in the search bar. For example, “accountant required to work from home.” And choose among various advertisements the one that will bring you a stable income.

Exchange accountants. I recommend the following exchanges: Pravoved.ru, HRtime.ru, birca.ua, exchange-raboty.rf. They are convenient because they are thematic and literally give you the opportunity to start working right away, you just need to fill out your profile.

Newspapers. Take regular paper newspapers and call advertisements that require an accountant. If a company needs an offline worker, try to explain how you can be useful online. Tell us about your advantages. You can convince an employer if you correctly emphasize your strengths.

Finally

Pay for a home-based accountant is not particularly different from that of an offline worker. It’s worth counting the travel and lunches that your offline salary goes on to understand that you’re not losing anything.

On average, you can consistently earn from 25,000 rubles per month.

Go for it! I wish you success!