Cleaning company bookkeeping: the six categories that cover almost everything

Cleaning companies have simple books if the categories are right from the start. These six cover nearly every line.

The six

1. Supplies: cleaners, cloths, bags, vacuum parts.
2. Vehicle: fuel, repairs, insurance, plus the mileage log between jobs.
3. Insurance and bonding.
4. Phone and software: the phone plan, scheduling or invoicing apps.
5. Helpers: anyone paid to clean who is not an employee, tracked by person for year-end forms.
6. Advertising: cards, magnets, signs, online listings.

Mileage between jobs

The drive from one client to the next is the record most cleaning companies lose. Log each job's miles the same day; monthly totals come from that, not from a guess in April.

Recurring invoices

Weekly and biweekly clients should be invoiced on a schedule and the payments matched to the invoice, so "who still owes me" is a one-line answer.

We keep a cleaning company's books ourselves, so this is the setup we start new cleaning clients with.