Bookkeeper in El Paso, the CPA alternative.

A peso invoice and a dollar deposit are two events. Owners along the river already know the feeling. The invoice looks finished on Monday. The bank looks different on Thursday. Someone then has to say whether the month is one story or two. That someone is the work. We write the line that introduces the currencies, we date both events, and we leave the month open until the line explains the gap. The short payment, the bank fee, and the rate that actually cleared each get their own words on that line.

The books are the record of what happened. Payday is set up on a provider you already run, so the people who work with you are paid from a system that is not this practice. Statements and reconciliations are how we show that the record matches the bank. Filing starts only when both currency columns agree with their banks. An open month holds the return back until the columns agree. That order is the whole offer.

No sentence here locks a rate for your bank. Rates move. The useful thing is a month that can be explained in ordinary words. You should be able to point at a deposit and say which invoice it belongs to, which day it cleared, and what the bank kept. When you can do that, the close is real. When you cannot, we do not call the month finished to make a deadline feel better.

We can all read the combined rate of 8.25 percent on a city receipt, state 6.25, city 1, a county half, and a transit half. Drop either half and the return will not match the money collected.

Foreign Trade Zone 68 is where duty can wait and still be real. We still show the goods, the duty that has not been paid, and the day that duty becomes real.

We start with the bank, not with a hope. Every dollar account is matched to the statement for that month, and every peso account is matched to its own statement. Items that cleared are ticked. Items that did not clear stay on a list with a date and a reason. A deposit that arrived in dollars against an invoice priced in pesos gets a bridge line. The bridge names the rate that actually cleared and the fee that sat beside it. It does not invent a rate because a website published one.

Old items get a decision. A check that has been open for months is either still expected, voided, or asked about. A deposit that never got a name is either identified or left in a holding spot that the next month will see. We do not sweep leftovers into a miscellaneous pile and call that a close. A miscellaneous pile is how two currencies start to lie about each other.

When both columns agree with their banks, we lock the month. Locking means the next month starts clean, and a change to the locked month is a written correction, not a quiet edit. You get a short note that says what tied, what is still open, and what we need from you. That note is the close. A pretty report with an open bank is not.

Sales tax in this county is a stack, and the stack is easy to remember wrong. The state piece is 6.25 percent. The city piece is 1 percent. The county piece is half of one percent, and it is one of the county taxes in Texas that is dedicated to property tax relief. A transit piece is another half of one percent, and it applies inside the city. Together they reach 8.25 percent, which is the state maximum. Drop either half and the return will not match the money you collected.

Sales tax for a closed month goes to the state on the 20th. A monthly filer uses the 20th that follows the month just closed. A quarterly filer uses the 20th of the month after the quarter. The state clock is Central. El Paso is the major city in Texas that lives on Mountain Time, so the wall clock is an hour tighter than the rest of the state on the last day. We plan the filing for the morning, not for the last hour.

A Friday night sale is a good picture of the same problem in miniature. Tickets, food, and a deposit can fall on different dates. If the deposit lands after midnight at the end of the month, it is the next month's money even though the sale felt like this month. We date the bank, not the feeling. The night can be wonderful and still belong to the following close.

A range for the year is a guess until the last closed month is honest. We will not hand you a range off an open month, and we will not hand you one off a single currency when the file has two. October is the month when property bills arrive and there is still time to act. July is the month when estimates can still move. December is late for surprises. The device on this page is those months, in that spirit, with the work named in plain words.

What we need from you is ordinary. Access to the books, the last statement you trust, and the question that is actually bothering you. If the open months are many, the first job is to close them before a new month is added on top. A pile of open months that should not become a monthly engagement gets a no, said at the start. We would rather decline a file than build a return on a month that does not match a bank.

The relief people describe, when it comes, is specific. The deposit has a name. The fee has a line. The sales tax return matches what was collected. The property bill is on the calendar. Nobody is translating a peso invoice in their head on a Sunday night. That is the feeling we work toward. It is not a slogan. It is a month you can hand to someone else without a speech.

Foreign Trade Zone 68 can let duty wait while goods are stored, made, or assembled before they move on. Duty can wait and still be real. It has not vanished from the books. The books still have to show the goods, the duty that has not been paid, and the day that duty becomes real. If a good qualifies for a lighter treatment, that fact belongs on the record with the reason. If it does not qualify, we do not write it as if it did.

The same patience shows up in the year. A cost that is real but not yet due is still a cost. Owners get into trouble when the cash looks fine because a bill has not arrived. We would rather show the bill that is coming than congratulate a balance that is borrowing from next month. That is as true of duty as it is of a property bill that goes out in October and comes due at the end of January.

We work with owners in El Paso by video. The books are shared. A calendar link picks the time. The close lands on the same day of the month whether the river is outside your window or a long way from ours. You do not drive to a bridge for the numbers to be read. You open the books, we open the same books, and we talk about the line that does not tie.

That conversation begins on the form. Tell us the month you last trusted and the thing that has felt wrong since. We will answer as the practice, not as a room of callers. A file that belongs somewhere else gets that answer on the first call.