Home topics finance tax-accounting-bookkeeping Accounting Expert Finance Accounting 5 Common accounting mistakes you should always avoid Guest Author January 25, 2016 Accounting mistakes can cause great damage to a small business, such as yours, and totter it to its foundation. Sadly, accounting errors and fails are rather common, particularly in newly founded companies. In this article, we have gathered 5 of the most common accounting mistakes characterising small businesses based on data given to us by some of the most famous and reliable accounting agencies, coupled with some hints on how to avoid them. Mistake number 1: not keeping track of the receivables What a thrill when getting paid, don’t you agree? Still, keeping track of the receivables isn’t always so exciting and often causes trouble to small business owners. Every time you make out an invoice, a receivable is recorded, i. e. a certain amount of money that must be paid by the customer. Every time you receive a payment from a customer, you should immediately register the corresponding invoice as “paid”. Unfortunately, many businessmen forget this simple process and, as a result, customer deposits are reconciled much later, usually behind the pretext of a constantly heavy schedule. Upon tax time you are engulfed by a pile of payments deposited in your revenue account and a corresponding receivables report that just doesn’t make sense. What’s the probable outcome? Days or at least hours spent in reviewing and registering receivables, overpaying on your taxes and multiple debts. So make it