School of Bookkeeping team.
Growing a business

School of Bookkeeping prepares accountants and bookkeepers to deliver enhanced client services

Many accounting and bookkeeping professionals turn to their peers to enhance their practices and learn something new. That’s definitely the case with the School of Bookkeeping, run by Carrie Kahn, Angela Greenspan, and Dan DeLong. While you may know these three through their participation at Intuit® conferences, as authors for Firm of the Future, or as QuickBooks ProAdvisors® in various campaigns, here’s a bit more about how they are preparing today’s professionals for future challenges.

Scott Cytron: What is the schoolofbookkeeping.com, and why did you create it separate and apart from the Complete Business Group?

Carrie Kahn: schoolofbookkeeping.com is a video learning center that allows students to learn at their own pace. The videos are short and easy to consume, typically less than three minutes each. There are different membership levels that include QuickAnswers, so that you can get a reliable answer and get back to work.

When I acquired schoolofbookkeeping.com, I knew I couldn’t do it alone. I have two business partners—Angela and Dan—to assist in creating content and developing the online business model. I am the sole owner of Complete Business Group (CBG), which is focused on providing the best experience in purchasing/selecting QuickBooks® products and our recommended third-party add-on products. schoolofbookkeeping.com is focused on the support side for all-things QuickBooks. The two businesses complement each other. However, they are very different, so I wanted to keep them separate.

I saw the vision to offer training to more people by leveraging schoolofbookkeeping.com, including CBG clients and partners. This platform allows me to share my knowledge with many accounting professionals and business owners who need additional support rather than individual support calls. My goal was to help more people and there is only so much time in the day. I want to support the most people with our resources; acquiring schoolofbookkeeping.com to carry out my mission for training and support was a perfect complement for CBG clients, partners, and beyond.

Scott: The three of you have worked well together for a while. How does the partnership work?

Carrie: Angela and I have worked together for seven years developing the CBG partner program. We met Dan in 2018. Dan worked for Intuit for more than 18 years, and had a wealth of knowledge and experience, so he was a great complement for support at CBG. I have been a power user of QuickBooks for 30+ years. We are the yin/yang of QuickBooks education. Angela brings us all together with her organizational skills, marketing background, and her credential as an attorney. She provides education around business formation and things to take into consideration in business law.

Scott: Tell me about Workshop Wednesdays; why is the webinar format effective, and what kind of audience do you get?

Carrie: We use Workshop Wednesdays in several ways. First is a discussion of any current news that we feel needs clarification. Often, there is a confusing email or announcement that needs to be addressed. Second, as we see common issues arise that we feel would benefit our community, we leverage this platform to demonstrate how to work through the process. It’s very lighthearted, discussion -based, and a great place to share helpful resources.

Scott: What is the #1 topic the audience wants to know about, and why?

Carrie: Anything that will save people time and eliminate work is a top request, such as setting up common business workflows that will handle the bookkeeping properly with minimal effort. Handling customer deposits, credits and refunds, NSF checks, or consignment of inventory are popular topics we address in the workshops. Certain QuickBooks workflows are best handled in a certain way and set up is critical to getting it right. Our goal is to enable small business owners to set it up so the bookkeeping is handled “by accident.”

Scott: There’s an ongoing campaign to migrate customers from QuickBooks Desktop to QuickBooks Online. What are some of the benefits you think QuickBooks Online has over Desktop.

Carrie: There are five benefits that immediately come to mind:

  1. Bank Feeds are far superior in QuickBooks Online than in QuickBooks Desktop.
  2. You can work remotely, from anywhere, from a mobile app or web browser, and data is instantly synchronized.
  3. There is nothing to download, install, backup, save, or restore. SaaS-based software can be accessed from anywhere with a URL, and you can use a MAC or a PC. Your IT department is not required to allow for permissions, file folder access, and network and internet security issues.
  4. Data file damage is greatly minimized. The redundant backups of QuickBooks Online make desktop data damage virtually a thing of the past.
  5. Updates are automatically applied; there is not a manual process to update your software as there is with desktop.

Please note, that we still hesitate to move all customers over that require certain features not yet available in QuickBooks Online, but for those customers who can benefit, we are here to help. We have provided courses to migrate and we are available to hire if you do not want to do it yourself.

Scott: I know you are specialists in payroll; what are the primary questions you get from customers about payroll and how do you help them solve their issues?

Carrie: Typically we get customers ready to switch products, but haven’t thought about the consequences of making the change. We recommend hiring an expert to work with them to make sure the switch is successful, as well as signing up for Elite QuickBooks Online Payroll, so that Intuit is involved as well. We also offer hourly support through CBG.

Scott: How do you go about recommending apps to your customers?

Carrie: We do not recommend anything we do not use ourselves. Once it is proven, then we make sure they are connected with our vendor’s onboarding team for a smooth process.

Scott: Anything else you want to tell me?

Carrie: We want schoolofbookeeping.com to be a QuickBooks companion: a supplement for small business owners and accounting professionals to not only get the most out of the software, but to provide an introduction to apps and industry professionals who specialize in creating unique workflows when QuickBooks needs a boost.

As we enter into the second half of 2022, we are combining QuickBooks with our learning platform to provide a great value of service as a “one stop shop” of curated content and articles so that you can find the answer yourself or have the personal touch to assist you in your time of need. As your business needs grow, we will grow with you. If we can’t handle it, we can confidently use our nationwide network to refer the job to an expert in that niche.


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