What is financial reporting with CapEasy?
Bookkeeping records what happened. Reporting explains it. We prepare monthly, quarterly and year-end reporting packs to a consistent shape, so comparing one period against another actually tells you something.
A set of financial statements is not one document — it is a balance sheet, an income statement, a statement of cash flows, and the notes that make the first three readable, all tied to a general ledger that closes clean every month. For a US company, that pack does three jobs at once: it is what your CPA works from to prepare the 1120, 1120-S, or 1065 at year end, it is what a lender or investor asks for before they will talk numbers, and it is what tells you, mid-year, whether the business is actually making money or just moving cash around.
Most small and mid-sized US companies do not get monthly statements until something forces the issue — a bank covenant, a funding round, a board that starts asking questions. By then the books are usually a year behind and the first close takes weeks instead of days. We build the close as a monthly habit from the start: bank and credit-card feeds reconciled, accruals booked, intercompany and owner draws coded correctly, so the trial balance closes on a fixed date every month instead of whenever someone finds time.
The services inside financial reporting
4 services, each with its own page — scope, process and the licence line stated before you buy anything.
| Management accounts | A monthly P&L, balance sheet and cash view you can actually read. |
| Year-end preparation | The file your accountant needs, finished, so their work starts where it should. |
| Board and investor reporting | The pack, on the same shape every period, with the numbers tied to the ledger. |
| Budget vs actual reporting | Variance you can explain, not a spreadsheet nobody opens. |
Why it matters
| Without a system | With CapEasy |
|---|---|
| Performance problems surface a quarter late | A pack that lands on the same day each month |
| Board and investor reporting becomes a scramble before each meeting | Variance against budget, explained in a written note |
| Cash runway is an estimate rather than a number | Board-ready reporting produced from the close you were already doing |
What we need from you
From the close
- Reconciled general ledger
- Trial balance
- AR and AP aging
- Inventory reports if applicable
For comparison
- Budget and forecast data
- Prior period statements
- Segment or entity structure
How it runs, step by step
- Monthly
- Profit & loss
- Balance sheet
- Cash flow statement
- Quarterly
- Consolidated statements
- Quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year comparison
- Cash flow trend analysis
- Year-end
- Year-end statement preparation
- Supporting schedules
- Fixed asset reconciliation
- Management reporting
- Break-even analysis
- Profitability by product or service
- Working capital analysis
What lands with you, every cycle
- Monthly reporting pack
- Quarterly board pack
- Year-end statement package
- Supporting schedules
- A written summary of what moved and why
Who does what
We prepare the financial statements. We do not issue a compilation, review or audit report on them — under state accountancy law those are restricted to licensed CPA firms, and your CPA issues them from the books we prepare. Here is the licence line in the United States, stated before you buy anything — each of these is carried out by your CPA or enrolled agent:
- Issue compilation, review or audit reports — those are restricted to licensed CPA firms.
- Prepare or file federal or state tax returns.
- Represent you before the IRS, or respond to notices on your behalf.
- Determine sales-tax nexus, or worker classification.
- Advise on which entity to form, or draft formation documents — that is legal work.
Financial reporting in United States
The report is restricted, not the statements — UAA s.14(a)
The Uniform Accountancy Act s.14(a) restricts who may issue a compilation, review, or audit REPORT on financial statements to a licensed CPA firm. It does not say who may prepare the statements those reports are issued on. This is the distinction that gets blurred constantly: a bookkeeper or accountant can absolutely prepare accurate, GAAP-consistent financial statements; what they cannot do is attach a report that represents those statements as compiled, reviewed, or audited by a CPA. We prepare the statements. Your CPA reviews them, forms an opinion where one is needed, and issues the report in their own name.
Month-end close and what actually gets booked
A close under US GAAP means every bank and credit-card account reconciled to zero variance, every accrual booked (payroll accrued but not yet paid, revenue earned but not yet invoiced), AP and AR aged and matched to source documents, and a trial balance that ties before the period is called closed. This is preparation work, not attest work — no report is issued on a monthly close, so there is no s.14(a) question at this stage. The statements simply need to be right when the CPA picks them up at year end.
Delaware franchise tax and the two calculation methods
Delaware C-corps owe franchise tax annually, calculated by whichever of two methods produces a number the state will accept: the Authorized Shares Method (a flat schedule based on shares authorized, regardless of how many are issued) or the Assumed Par Value Capital Method (based on total gross assets and issued shares, usually the lower number for companies with a large authorized-share count and few actual shares outstanding). The state's own default calculation uses the Authorized Shares Method, which is often far higher than what's actually owed. Getting the lower number requires an accurate balance sheet — gross assets and issued shares both come straight from the statements we prepare.
A PTIN, not a bookkeeping credential, gates return preparation
Preparing a federal tax return for compensation requires a Preparer Tax Identification Number under IRC §6109. That requirement sits with whoever prepares and signs the 1120, 1120-S, or 1065 — your CPA or enrolled agent. It has no bearing on preparing the financial statements that return is built from; assembling a balance sheet and income statement is not "preparing a return." We stay on our side of that line and hand the finished statements to whoever holds the PTIN.
What your CPA or enrolled agent receives from us
- A closed monthly trial balance, tied to zero variance across every bank and credit-card feed
- Balance sheet, income statement, and statement of cash flows for the period, formatted to US GAAP
- A reconciled AP aging and AR aging, matched to source invoices and bills
- Booked accrual entries for the period — payroll, unbilled revenue, unpaid expenses — with supporting schedules
- Fixed-asset roll-forward showing additions, disposals, and depreciation applied at the agreed capitalization threshold
- A year-end close package: full-year statements, closing trial balance, and a summary of any reclassifications made during the year
Questions worth asking before you start
Will you deal with the Internal Revenue Service on my behalf?
No. We are a consulting firm — licensed work runs through partner CPA firms. Anything that means dealing directly with IRS — filing, correspondence, representation — stays with your CPA or enrolled agent. What changes is how much work it is for them: they open a file that is already reconciled and coded, not one they have to rebuild first.
Exactly what lands with your CPA or enrolled agent at the end of a cycle?
Monthly reporting pack, Quarterly board pack, Year-end statement package, Supporting schedules, A written summary of what moved and why. All of it goes to your CPA or enrolled agent — or straight to you, if you are the one reviewing before it moves on.
Who actually does the work — a person or an AI tool?
A named person on our team owns your file and reviews everything that leaves it. Software does a real share of the grinding underneath it — coding, matching, flagging the obvious gaps — but nothing regulated happens without a person’s judgement, and nothing here is signed or filed by an algorithm.
Can you produce reports before our bookkeeping is clean?
Only from a closed set of books — reporting is only as good as the ledger underneath it. If bookkeeping is not already clean, we usually start there, or run both from month one.
Who signs off the numbers before they reach my board or investors?
You do, always. We prepare the pack and flag anything we think needs your attention before it goes out; the sign-off and the story you tell with it stay yours.
Can you match reporting to a template we already use?
Yes — send the last few packs you produced and we build to that shape rather than a generic one, so the switch is invisible to whoever reads it.
Can you issue an audited or reviewed financial statement for my bank or investor?
No. Under UAA s.14(a), compilation, review, and audit reports are restricted to licensed CPA firms. We prepare the underlying financial statements; your CPA issues whichever report your bank or investor requires.
If you're not a CPA firm, what exactly are you preparing?
The financial statements themselves — balance sheet, income statement, statement of cash flows, and supporting schedules — built from a reconciled general ledger to US GAAP. Preparing the statements and reporting on them are two different, separately regulated activities; we do the first.
Will you prepare my 1120, 1120-S, or 1065?
No. Preparing a federal return for compensation requires a PTIN under IRC §6109, which sits with your CPA or enrolled agent. What we deliver — closed, reconciled, GAAP-consistent statements — is what they build the return from.
How does this help with Delaware franchise tax?
Franchise tax can be calculated by either the Authorized Shares Method or the Assumed Par Value Capital Method, and the second usually produces a lower bill but needs an accurate gross-assets and issued-shares figure from the balance sheet. Our year-end close gives your filer both figures so the lower method can actually be used.
What is the difference between a monthly close and a year-end close?
A monthly close reconciles accounts and books accruals for that period so you have current numbers to run the business on. A year-end close does the same for the full fiscal year and produces the final package your CPA uses to prepare the tax return and, if needed, a report.
Do you use AI to prepare our statements?
AI does the repetitive matching — reconciling transactions against bank feeds, flagging coding exceptions, extracting data from invoices and receipts. Every entry that hits the ledger is reviewed by a named accountant who is accountable for the close; AI does not book an entry unsupervised or decide how something is classified.
Can you represent us if the IRS sends a notice?
No. IRS representation is governed by Circular 230 and reserved to a CPA, enrolled agent, or attorney. We keep the financial statements and supporting schedules organized so whoever represents you isn't reconstructing the year from scratch.
What accounting basis do you use — cash or accrual?
Accrual, applied consistently, unless your CPA has a specific reason to run cash-basis statements for a particular filing. Accrual is what US GAAP and most lenders and investors expect, and it is the basis that keeps revenue and expense in the period they actually happened.
Will my CPA be able to use your statements directly, or will they need to redo the work?
The general ledger export is formatted for direct import into standard CPA workflow software, and the close package includes the reconciliations and supporting schedules a CPA needs to move straight to return preparation rather than rebuilding the year first.
We're pre-revenue. Do we still need monthly statements?
If you're Delaware-incorporated, franchise tax is owed regardless of revenue, and getting the lower calculation method still depends on an accurate balance sheet. Most pre-revenue companies also get asked for statements the first time they raise, and building the habit before that conversation is cheaper than reconstructing a year of history under deadline.
What happens if you find an error in a prior period during a close?
We flag it in the variance note for that month, document the correction, and discuss the reclassification with you and your CPA before it's booked, so nothing moves silently between periods.
Do you determine our sales tax nexus as part of preparing statements?
No. Sales tax nexus is a legal and factual determination outside what we do. The determination is made by your CPA or a nexus specialist — we'll flag when multi-state activity shows up in the transaction data so you can raise it with them.
