Toolbox | 02 Budgeting | 06 Accounting Tips & Tricks

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Accounting Tips & Tricks

Choose good accountant who can help you with organising
gallery accounts.

Keep all invoices safe (digitalised)

Sales in person:
Please collect client details: name, surname, email address,
and mobile number
+ details of the work – title, name of the artist and the
price.
+ all additional requests (framing, etc)

Payment options:Do a quick market research in your local area.
What are customers accustomed to pay with? Card? Cash? NFT?
Digital bank service arrangements? Remember that in many
markets it might be beneficial from a tax perspective for
companies to pay through an invoice. Decide what will work
best for your market while still keeping your own cost at a
rate you feel is realistic. Always register any sales and make
sure to give the client a receipt.

Invoicing

Keep your invoices securely stored online and update your
accountant according to the agreed contract and workflow.
Always send invoices for sold work, ensuring compliance with
legal guidelines. If uncertain, seek advice from a reputable
accountant. Artists may operate and sell works in various
ways, either as individual freelancers or as a company. Before
determining the selling price, verify whether they are VAT
payers.

Budgeting

Always start with making a monthly and yearly budget .

Create a sales register to keep track of your sales .

It can be as simple as an Excel sheet stating:

Date | Show | Artist | Titel | Price+ VAT | Commission

Every Friday use half an hour to go through the sales you did
during the last week and make sure to pay the artists as soon
as you have received payment from a client.

Find a good software tool that fits your need for invoicing
and bookkeeping. There are a lot of tools out there, make sure
to find one that is compatible with your country’s laws and
legislation.

It will cost around 30 – 50 £ per month, but it will save you
some money on expensive mistakes, errors and accountant fees.
Most of these tools will help you keep track of invoices,
expenses, and VAT and remind you when to do yearly reporting
and payments. In other words: Money well spent.

ALWAYS use your software tool to create and send invoices to
keep track of your income. It is a good idea to dedicate half
a day every month to register all paid invoices and your
expenses. For example last Friday of the month. This way you
keep on top of your finances and minimize the risk of any
unpleasant surprises.

Create automatic payments from your bank for all set expenses.
Examples: rent, internet, set salaries, electricity, heating,
water, website, hosting, listings, software tools…

This way you know that you do not have to take action every
month and risk missing a bill or a salary.

Lastly, block time in your calendar for admin days . For
example:

Every week: Friday morning 9-11

• Register sales and send invoices.
• Pay artists.

Every month: Friday 13-16

Register paid invoices and expenses.

• -Pay salaries to all freelancers.
• -Pay any additional bills that are not part of the automatic payment arrangement.

Every 6 months:

Go over your monthly and yearly budget and make sure you
are on track. Make adjustments, especially if you are
below the projected budget. Cut down on any unnecessary
costs, software, freelance staff, printed materials or
build-up costs.

Every Year:

• Make sure that all your expenses are paid
• That your artwork register is up to date. What have been
  sold? Are all artist been paid? What do you have in
  storage? Any thing that needs sending to a client or back
  to an artist?
• What show performed best? Which size of artwork?
  Sculptures or paintings? This will give you an indication
  of what you want to be focusing on for next year.
• Make a new budget for the year to come using the data
  from the current, perhaps you even want to have a look at
  the previous year to compare.
• Write down all “wins” and losses and make sure to share
  with your team.